Book review: Ravinder Kaur and Rajni Palriwala,Marrying in South Asia: Shifting Concepts,Changing Practices in a Globalising World

Marrying in South Asia is one of the most exhaustive and comprehensive books in recent times on the study of marriage. Editors Ravinder Kaur and Rajni Palriwala, have provided a rich and extensive variety of changes and continuities in practices of marriage in South Asia. The aim of the book, as they explain, is to examine the ‘complexities of changes and continuities in marriage in South Asia’. This poses a definite challenge for it is tricky to be able to speak of South Asia as a whole—a concern also outlined by the editors at the outset. Yet, a reading of the 18 chapters shows that Ravinder Kaur and Rajni Palriwala have indeed been able to ‘sensibly speak of marriage across the breadth of South Asia’ (p. 6), highlighting continuities whilst not compromising on the rich heterogeneity of cultures. They have examined key practices and strategies of match-making, including consanguineous marriages and impact of women’s education and employment on choices of spouse, and have also addressed cultural-specific practices and anxieties related to marriage as that of same-sex partnerships, Islamic contract of marriage (nikahnama), and family courts in India.

The editors specify that a key concern of the book was to not anchor the book around upper caste or elite perspectives on marriage practices and customs but ‘focus on practices and the multiple, disparate, and incoherent ideologies of family and marriage that influence individual and group choices’(p. 6). The contributions surely fulfil this aim as, for example, Janaki Abraham’s ‘“Why Did You Send Me Like This?” Marriage, Matriliny and the “Providing Husband” in North Kerala, India’ that draws attention to the Thiyyas of Kerala, and not the Nairs, to explain changes in matrilineal societies. Whilst focusing on changes to the practice of virilocality, Abraham also notes adoption of certain customs which North Indian in origin and more popular in patrilineal societies such as Thiyya women dropping their tharawad name (matrilineal name) to take their husband’s family name and increasingly wearing sindhur (vermilion in the parting of one’s hair). Similarly, in ‘“Puraani aur Nai Shaadi”: Separation, Divorce and Remarriage in the Lives of the Urban Poor in New Delhi’, Shalini Grover draws attention to the urban poor, and not the more widely written about middle class when she explains that the boundaries between primary and secondary marriages are flexible amongst this segment of the urban population.

Often works on shifts in marriage practices adopt a unidirectional perspective to explain changes by establishing easy and direct causalities, for example between employment and self-assertion in marriages. Ravinder Kaur and Rajni Palriwala have refreshingly not followed this simplistic framework and their book provides a more nuanced perspective highlighting the challenges and contestations to changes and continuities. For example, some chapters such as Johanna Lessinger’s ‘“Love” in the Shadow of Sewing Machine: A Study of Marriage in the Garment Industry of Chennai, South India’ highlight the importance of employment for women’s modern self-fashioning, and ability and opportunity to assert and espouse choice in love and marriage. At the same time, Amali Philips in ‘Marriage, Women, and Work: The Estate Tamils in Sri Lanka’s Tea Plantations’ and Anwar Shaheen’s ‘Marriage, Women’s Economic Participation and Patterns of Support in Urban Karachi’ argue that work opportunities and economic independence do not necessarily translate into gender equality and desired freedom. Another set of chapters look at the convoluted links between technology, modernity, and certain rules of marriage as inter-caste and preferential marriages, questioning the easy claim that modern technology has definitely altered these traditions. For example, Ravinder Kaur and Priti Dhanda’s ‘Surfing for Spouses: Marriage Websites and the “New” Indian Marriage?’ draws attention to the role of the internet in match-making and acknowledges that it allows for greater individual choice—though with appropriate parental guidance. Priti Ramamurthy (‘Marriage, Labour Circulation and Smallholder Capitalism in Andhra Pradesh’) provides an insightful analysis of the dynamic relationship between ‘new capitalism’ (technologies of agriculture) and marriage practices. She argues that ‘preferential marriage practices are being subtly transformed and in the process, they sometimes enable labour circulation in the service of capital, and at others, frustrate it’ (p. 177). Lester Andrist et al. (‘Negotiating Marriage: Examining the Gap Between Marriage and Cohabitation in India’) explain the use of ‘traditional scripts’ such as early marriage but delayed cohabitation especially by families of brides so that allows there is time to educate their daughters during the interim. These chapters therefore, explain the complicated ways in which kinship, customs, and ideals of modernity interact with each other.

The editors tell us that an important consideration of this volume was to ensure that women’s voice, gender, and contours of intimacy are well-documented (p. 6). Whilst all chapters cover these aspects, some contributions stand out. Johanna Lessinger (‘“Love” in the Shadow of Sewing Machine: A Study of Marriage in the Garment Industry of Chennai, South India’) comprehensively explains the meaning of love and marriage to women working in garment factory in Chennai, Makiko Habazaki (‘Widowhood, Socio-Cultural Practices and Collective Action: A Study of Survival Strategies of Single Women in Nepal’) presents the resistances and realities of single and widowed women, and Ashley Tellis (‘Multiple Ironies: Notes on Same-Sex Marriage for South Asians at Home and Abroad’) writes of LGBT communities’ desires and ideas of family and marriage.

Whilst the book has several note-worthy features, I found two aspects particularly interesting. The first is the book’s focus on consanguineous marriages and practices of dowry, which otherwise are often hastily explained away as being in decline. Chapters in this book, however, present a more balanced perspective. In her longitudinal and ethnographic study of a Sunni Muslim family of the Nawwayat Quam, Sylvia Vatuk (‘Change and Continuity in Marital Alliance Patterns: Muslims in South Indian, 1800–2012’) notes a definite shift towards fewer cross-cousin marriages. However, she explains that close kin marriages are still preferred primarily by the bride’s family. Similarly, Shareen Joshi et al. (‘Why Marry a Cousin? Insights from Bangladesh’), argue that where ‘marriage payments such as dowry are customary, consanguinity may be chosen when a family can neither afford a dowry nor credibly commit to paying a dowry in the future’(p 209). Sajeda Amin and Maitreyi Das (‘Marriage, Continuity and Change in Bangladesh’) trace a shift from bride wealth to dowry practices, as does Pushpesh Kumar in ‘Transgressions, Accommodation and Change: Configuring Gender and Sexuality within Marriage practices of the Kolams’.

The second important focus of this book is on the non-state and non-family actors that validate and legitimise weddings and assist in settlements of marital discords. An outstanding contribution here is by Sidharthan Maunaguru (‘Transnational Marriages: Documents, Wedding Albums, Photographers and Jaffna Tamil Marriages’), who brings much needed attention to the role of photographs and the photographer in being and ‘witnesses’ for a marriage that in turn determines a spousal visa status of Jaffna Tamils seeking visas for Sri Lanka. Katherine Lemons, in ‘When Marriage Breaks Down How Do Contracts Matter? Marriage Contracts and Divorce in Contemporary North India’, discusses the importance of nikahnama for local level adjudication, and Srimati Basu’s ‘Dreaming a Better Court for Women: Adjudication and Subjectivity in the Family Courts of Kolkata, India’ is an ethnographic study of family courts and their ways of addressing marital grievances. Basu explains that family courts bring a certain ‘newness’ in the method of marital settlements, however the ‘newness’ itself is embedded in existing institutional and ideological structures (p. 366) such that the ‘process and result’ of these courts is gendered (p. 367).

Marrying in South Asia: Shifting Concepts, Changing Practices in a Globalising World, is a welcome contribution on understanding South Asian realities on marriage practices. At the same time, the book would have been further enriched by pushing an explanation of ‘newness’—mode, imaginings, desires, and realities—of match-making, desire, and conjugality. In that regard, a chapter or two on the role of media—cinema, mobile technology, dating applications, would have been helpful (Dwyer, 2000; Hirsch & Wardlaw, 2006). Furthermore, a greater emphasis diverse forms of romantic experiences such as live-in relationships, would have certainly aided the editors interest in understanding ‘contours of intimacy’ (p. 6; see Agrawal, 2012; Titzmann, 2017). An inclusion of such themes would have ensured a more holistic insight into understanding shifts and continuities of marriage practices and, imaginings and realities of love and romance.