浅析中美婚姻观念之差异 An analysis of the Differences of Sino-US Marriage Concepts

论文总字数：27660字

摘 要

奔篇论文简述了中西方婚姻观的差异。通过从中西方的婚姻观念和特点，总体上分析两者的不同。之后再从具体的方面分析，例如婚姻目的，准则和夫妻间在婚姻中的关系等。婚姻在世界文化中起着非常重要的作用, 不同的国家有自己不同的婚姻观念和特点.。通过对中西方婚姻观念差异的分析，我们可以了解婚姻文化对社会发展带来的影响，促进中西方的交流。

关键词：婚姻观念；跨文化；中美；差异

Contents

1. Introduction 1

2. Literature Review 1

3. Different purposes in The Two Different Marriage Cultures 2

3.1 Purposes in chinese marriage culture 3

3.2 Purposes in western marriage culture 3

3.3 Reasons of these existing differences 4

4. Different Criteria in Mate Selection 5

4.1 Chinese criteria in mate selection 5

4.2 Western criteria in mate selection 6

4.3 Causes of the differences 6

5. Relationship between Husband and Wife in Marriage 7

5.1 Relationship in chinese marriage culture 7

5.2 Relationship in western marriage culture 8

6. Conclusion .........10

Works Cited 11

1. Introduction

Family is the basic constitution of society while the couple is the most important factor of the family. The marriage relationship is one of the most closely and long-lasting relationships in the interpersonal relationship. Chinese and western marriage concepts have a huge difference due to the central concept of philosophy. The Americans focus more on individualism while the Chinese are more focused on the mutual dependence between person and person. The American’s like ‘discovery’, ‘novel’, ‘extremity’ while the Chinese people claims the golden mean. Marriage is a permanent topic that all human beings must have to face when they reach legal age. Marriage may be seemed as one of the most important things in human’s life. Marriage is the process by which two people fall in love and want to make their relationship open, authoritative, and eternal. It included phenomenal love, happiness, and self-fulfillment. Everyone around the world views it as a most important time for his or her whole life. When the two fell in love, they seem everything pleasant and lovely.

A Chinese encyclopedia describes the marriage relationship of the couple relationship is the most closely, long-lasting and earnest relationship in the interpersonal relationship. The couple should understand and trust each other. Meanwhile care, love, consideration, respect are the central points of Chinese marriage.

We can see that the scholars have done lots of studies of marriage. Through the comparison of the marriage concepts of between Chinese and Western, they have used their own methods to research the potential culture reasons. However there are lots of factors in the marriage, so the more comparisons are needed. Furthermore, what the researchers had done before was relatively limited in the discrepancy of marriage customs and beliefs, so we need to do more to penetrate into the cultural field.

2. Literature Review

Before making comparison between Chinese and Western marriage concept, it is necessary for us to confine the current research to certain aspects to avoid confusion. In this chapter, some notions and terms related to the research will be discussed. In addition, some relevant researches done by both foreign and Chinese scholars will be reviewed.

The western scholars mentioned that there are two opposite theories for human marriage. First was proposed by Morgan and Engels, while the second theory was proposed by Edward Westermarck. Morgan and Engels thought that there were different kinds of marriages in human history but finally those marriages have developed into a perfect monogamy. However, Westermarck did not agree with the viewpoint mentioned above. He thinks that the monogamy is the only marriage style.

Sun Jianjun indicated there are clear discrepancies in the Chinese and western marriages. First, is the discrepancy of marriage purposes. Second, is the differences of the relationship between husband and wife in marriage, and the last one is the discrepancy of mate selection. Gong Lixia indicated that there are similarities in the Chinese and western marriage. She concluded the recent general marriage trends of the two cultural. First, is the delay of marriageable age. Second, is the customs are more simplified than before, Third, is that hold wedding is usually a kind of luxury, Fourth, is the shaping of new marriage customs and the last one is the appearance of naked marriage. Zhang Li proposed that the Confucian culture is the core of Chinese civilization and formed the marriage concept should focused on the groups while the core of Western civilization is the freedom which has formed the marriage concept should focused on individual.

From the above-mentioned, we can see that lots of books have been written and researches have been done on cross-cultural marriage concepts; however, the researches about the marriage concepts are comparatively very few. Even if some research have been done. They are scattered somewhere and haven"t formed an own system, not to mention the equivalent researches on marriage cultures between countries. Therefore, the research that has being done, to a certain extent, tries to add further researches in the development of cross-cultural communication, and to different marriage cultures in particular.

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3. Different purposes in The Two Different Marriage Cultures

3.1 Purposes in Chinese Marriage Culture

Chinese traditional marriage is based on family rather than love. It means that: the two families could become larger and larger due to the marriage, and enlarge the scale of relatives. In order to breed, expand the family, maintain and improve the family’s reputation and status ‘Book of Rites’ with justice says: Adult ceremony was begun with crown etiquette and basis on marriage. In China, to get marry means to marry into another family, in order not to hurt the family’s reputation, the man will choose the marriage very carefully. Therefore, marry a good wife are good for setting the needs of the family above their own interests. In order to benefit your family, the man could get married with a totally stranger.

In terms of role fulfillment, males will take the responsibilities of earning a living and keep the financial secure, while the women’s job are housework, foster the children, etc. While males sometimes look for employment, most females acted as housewives and didn’t involve in any vocations (“Men outside, Women inside”, indicates this distinction of functional roles) (Bao 58).

But, the traditional marriages’ purposes acknowledge the heavy impact. The younger generation usually pays attention to the marriage that true love comes first. But it is not an easy thing to turn love into the main purpose in the highly traditional country. With the development of modern society and ideology, there is a great change in the marriage concept of Chinese people. Husband and wife’s relationship are becoming more equal; they respect each other and bear the living stress together. Also, in the social environment and marriage setting, females have gained higher social status. They have received better education and had employment choices than before. In China, especially in Feudal Society, once there was a fierce quarrel between man’s mother and wife, the husband would choose to support his mother, even worse, the husband may choose to divorce with his wife. But now it is totally different, the social view towards marriage is persistently changing with the development of economic, political and transformation undergoes.

3.2 Purposes in Western Marriage Culture

Compare to Chinese conservative view of marriage, Western traditional view of marriage is more open, freer, and more romantic. For westerners, the perfect ending of a love is marriage but not the grave of love. The ground of western marriage is love and sexes. The people who fall in love with each other expect to gain a full result. So they will choose to get married. They are searching for an opposite sex partner due to the desire to meet the long demand of physiology and psychology. They think that the marriage without love is immoral and low-quality.

The United States is a young country but the purpose of marriage is pure. There are two main purposes of their marriage, first, is that the two young people hope their love could have a perfect ending; second, is that hope to have a long-lasting sex partner. While America is country which pursuing personality independence, and from the prospects of American love is the highest level of pursuing happiness which they believe the personal happiness is beyond everything. These kind of irrational concepts have made them put the love in a position over everything. So, we can tell from that the most important purpose of most of American is the love.

So, we can say that the purpose of Chinese marriage is the on the base of taking responsibilities of family while the purpose of American is to pursue personal rights.

3.3 Reasons of These Existing Differences

The differences between Chinese and Western marriage concepts are due to the different aims of marriage. The supposed purpose of marriage is that the man and woman want to reach an expected result by setting a marriage relationship. As an old saying goes: ‘When a man has grown up, he will get married with his wife. And when a girl is old enough, she will go to her husband. And that is right and proper.’ (Wu 15). To have a son to inherit his family name is the main purposes of Chinese marriage; to bring up one"s children and so can continue the family line; continue the ancestral line.

Qian Zhongshu indicated in his famous work “Fortress Besieged” that marriage is like bird cage in golden which the bird outside wants to live in while the bird inside wants to get out; so, the divorce due to get marry; get marry due to divorce. And also indicated that marriage is a fortress besieged which the people outside want to get in while the people inside want to get out. A sample survey from Tianjin Woman’s Federation indicated that 81.7% couples thought the children is the main factor of sustaining a marriage. Most people have confused the emotion after get married is equal to family affection. But the American hold a different opinion, they think love is the only guarantee of sustaining a marriage.

So, the differences of marriage purposes between Sino-us only can demonstrate the differences of two cultures. We can not say which is better and which is not good, because everyone has his/her own lifestyle. With the development of globalization, the contacts between China and America are more and more closely, so, of course, in the present Chinese society, these traditional purposes have been greatly impacted.

4. Different Criteria in Mate Selection

4.1 Chinese Criteria in Mate Selection

The China’s feudal society has lasted for 3000 years. The thought of feudal were highly focused on blood ties, interpersonal relationships, help each other. The children were depended on their parents before he or she established a family while the parents will depend on their children when they get old. The ‘dictates of parents and words of matchmakers’ have lasted thousands of years which are the oldest Chinese mate selection style. This ancient mate selection style also represents the consciousness of our Chinese’s support each other and interdependent.

Since the Reforming and Opening, with the development of economic and the deep communication of Chinese and Western cultural, the young generation in China are no longer tied by the traditional thoughts, they own the opportunities of selecting mate freely (Yun 65). They think the free love is also an important part of realizing self-value. Young people’s loves were usually introduced by others, once they contact gradually, what they focused on is that if their hobbies and personalities are similar (Copeland 15). But due to the impact of traditional culture and moral, children were still ruled by parents with a rod of iron. Parents want their child on a road which designed by themselves. But if children were growing under the wings of parents, they have no enough capabilities of being independent while it’s the prerequisite of fall in love freely. So, they still need their parents to make the final decision when they are mature enough to get married. In some ways, it indicates that the parents still have the power to make the decision on the issues of child’s mate selection.

4.2 Western Criteria in Mate Selection

Choosing mate freely dominated in the American marriage concept. What the American are focused on are the cultivation of personal independence, child could have more freedom and equalities. They can discuss or debate with their parents; they can choose the college and work freely; they usually leave their parents when they are 18 years old, work or as a part-time student. If they still live with their parents when they are 18 years old, they would be looked down by others. Due to the education of cultivate independence, American students can have an independent opinion on society, political, economic and international situation (Pan 8). For love and mate selection, they definitely have their own norm and criteria. They don’t need to introduce girlfriends or boyfriends by others, especially in the high school and college; they can hang out with a mate easily in the student’s center. If the college students want to know a girl, they can call them directly and make a self-introduction. In America, what they care about are the compatibility of personality and sex but not care about the family context, educational status and religious belief (Barack and Michelle 33). What they admire is the romantic love. Parents would not interfere with their child’s love but give blessings. Once in news said that a foreign teacher from United States gets married with a gatekeeper of her school, this is unacceptable in Chinese marriage concept; but due to the personality of American, they can step into the wedding if they love each other. This foreign teacher’s mother is a professor of Stamford University who expressed blessing happily from the other side of the ocean.

4.3 Causes of the Differences

Due to the two totally different cultures, the differences were greatly, the feudalism thoughts force the mate selection more clan but not individual socialization and rites, while capitalism make the marriage more rational, freedom and widespread. This is the cross point of Chinese and Western marriage mate selection when the history and modern thinking was crossed. 40 years ago, China’s famous historian Hou Wailu has indicated that the disintegrating of Chinese society and the entering of modernization are different from Western countries that the Western are more focus on private but not country while the Chinese are more focus on country instead of private. This indicates two characteristics, one is the Western society was based on individualism; another is that the fact of our country has been constrained by the patriarchal clan system. This is not only the most incisive assertion but also can analyze the Chinese and Western mate selection consciousness.

5. Relationship between Husband and Wife in Marriage

5.1 Relationship in Chinese Marriage Culture

Chinese style marital relationship between husband and wife. In the traditional Chinese marriage, the husband is often holds a dominant position in marriage while his wife is in a support status. The structuring of this kind of marriage is due to the traditional cultural division, namely ‘men outside and women outside’. In the family, the husband is the head and the pillar, burdens the main economic responsibility of the family; And his wife’s job is to take the management of the house working, serve in-laws.

After the Reform and Opening-up, economic conditions of the people have greatly increased than ever, many women come back home and to be full-time wives is completely supported by their husbands. For these full-time wives, people always show a contemptuous eye. But nowadays, things have changed, that individual full-time husbands appeared, people always have a contemptuous stare, and think those men have no backbones. Women walk out of the family circle, join in social work, keep economic independence, so the women’s status both in society and family is equal to man’s place and make themselves free from tradition, ideas and values, achieve true equality with them.

5.1.1 Equality of the Sexes

At the beginning of the establishment of P.R.C, the equality of the sexes was stipulated by the law, the constitution pinpointed that the women of PRC enjoys the same rights in the aspects of political, cultural, society and living and so on. Chairman Mao said that women hold up half the sky and time has changed, man and woman are the same, women can do what man can do (Zhang 4).Especially due to the development of ‘Reforming and Opening’ and the keep growth of China’s economy as well as the all-round social progress have guaranteed the equal rights and opportunities of women. Meanwhile the woman’s progress has met an unprecedented opportunity. As a result, the equality of the sexes is not only benefit of economy growth but also benefit of promoting the fair and equal of society.

With the development of economy, more and more people have found their own status in the society and have a career. But due to the pressure of social competition, the communications between husbands and wives are becoming less and less which has made their feelings weaken, furthermore, with the impacts of Western cultural have led the China’s divorce rate keep growing(Hofstede 7). But generally most of the Chinese people would choose single-mindedness once they get married. As we all know, the Chinese mental attitude is the so-called concern type which are depend on each other and perpetual. Chinese society is a society of gratitude, and where there is gratitude, there is warm. We can have a happy and sentiments talk with few friends in a cafe shop or tea house after working. And we can share our happiness, caring and sadness, which is a relationship of connection. But due to the communication in Chinese society is quite unobstructed, so once the husband and wife have a quarrel, the wife would choose to go back her mother’s home or pour out with her intimate friends while the husband could have a chat with his friends in the tea house and go home after a while. Finally the couple can be on good terms as before, but under the heavy pressure of social and family, usually they will not choose to divorce. This also represents the equality of sexes.

Above all, insist on the equality of the sexes is the necessity of creating a harmony society, also can promote woman’s development.

5.2 Relationship in Western Marriage Culture

5.2.1 Equality of the Sexes

Western people think that the relationship between man and woman in the marriage should be equal. As their saying: ‘Husband and wife should be equal partners’ (Xu 43). Since the Western Industrial Revolution, the need of labors forced women devoted into labor market. Women devoted themselves into more and more fields to participate in work and communication, due to retake the opportunity of creating economy for family, women wanted to promote their status in the society. Thus the sensational Woman’s liberation has spread in the Western society. These Woman’s Rights activities roused raised the outline ‘equality between men and women and women liberation’ and requested for equal place with men in the society and family which has freed women from traditional customs, concepts and values.

It is known that, America is a high divorce rate country. We often can hear the news of a American celebrity that get married the second time or the third time. So why does the American divorce so casually? Why does the American could have this phenomenon? Because the mental attitude of American is the so-called wonder type which are discovery, advocate innovation and enterprise. And America is a pluralistic society which advocates people to admire personal freedom, interdependence and to solve the problems not rely on the assistant of relatives and friends but rely on administration directly (Li 11). Due to the social system make the people’s mutual dependence minimized; do you have time to talk with a friend? Your friends may think you bothered them; do you have something very happy to tell your friends? They may don’t care about that. The phenomenon of indifferent can reflect the only relationship of advantages and disadvantages as well as the businesslike relationship from the aspect of lateral. Although the marriage life is a sentiment life and it’s inevitable to have quarrels and argues during the daily life. In America, due to the sentiment communication is limited so that the conflicts between husbands and wives were not easy to cope with. It is easy to create traumas and cracks in sentiment because of the cumulative conflicts. Of course, due to the social customs, couples will not get the opportunities of vents easily, so the traumas and cracks of sentiments would not heal but lead to a collapse, finally the divorce is inevitably. According to the survey, the divorce rate all over the world has grew fiercely, in China, the rate has reached about 40% while in America is about 50% (Jia 13). We can tell from the statics that the divorce rate of the China is lower than the America; there are many aspects of the differences. First is that the Chinese and Western holds different marriage purposes. The traditional purpose of marriage in China is to produce offspring to inherit the bloodline. While the most of Western marriages are aim to sublimation his or she loves so that they can get satisfied with their mind and mental. So 90% American believe that only love can sustain a marriage. But in China only 25% couples get married were due to love. So when the Westerners feel there’s no more love in the marriage, they would choose to divorce, while the Chinese people who don’t think the love is the main sustain of marriage would choose to bear all of these but not to divorce.

So how did this equal-relationship reflect in the marriage? In Western, both wives and husbands can work outside and burden the economy responsibility together. Everything of the family could be negotiated and burdened by husbands and wives. If you visit the home of a Western friend, you can find that it’s common for a man to do cooking. And the responsibility of taking care of the baby should also be burdened by the husbands and wives. Wives did not need to give up her career role because of the new-born baby while the husbands need to take the responsibility of breeding and educating of their baby and there’s no more burden and isolated role in the baby caring.

6. Conclusion

Due to the differences of history, economy and culture, China and western countries have bred completely different marriage concepts. Especially due to the impact of western cultural, the Chinese marriage concept is not completely passive anymore and has more concern of woman’s rights and more respect of human rights. While after the ultra-individualism in western world, there are more humanistic cares. In this world, no one could defeat the temptation of corporeal and vanity, but love can desalination them. A normal development of society needs healthy love and marriage with peace.

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