Advantages and Disadvantages of Marriage in the Context of the 21st Century

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1. What in your opinion are the advantages and disadvantages of marriage in the context of the 21st Century? Discuss in your particular cultural context. Discuss marriage as an economic transaction with specific reference to India/your cultural context. Ans- Just as family is a basic fundamental social system that is universal, marriage is a fundamental relationship to be found in almost all societies. In fact, it is so universal and fundamental of all social institutions that hardly ever is its necessity debated. Though Pluto decried marriage as “natural enemy of the commonwealth, aiming for its own higher unity”, till the beginning of the 20th century the voices against marriage were few and faint. In response to the increasingly louder getting voices against marriage, marriage as a necessity has begun to be debated and even redefined. In urban India, love marriages are taking place more than ever before and thereby some of the older dynamics in a marital relationship that made marriage advantageous or disadvantageous are also changing. The sentiments of the urban, educated Indian youth of the 21st century are echoed in the bestselling book ‘Open Marriage’ in which authors George and Neina Oneill (1972) write “the meaning in marriage today must be independently forged by a man and a woman who have the freedom to find their own reasons for being and being together. Only by writing their own open contract can couples achieve the flexibility the need to grow.” Yet this is far from being realised on a practical basis in our country due to the stronghold of culture and collectivism and the fact that marriage is functional for the society. Thus due to a clash between traditional blueprints of living and loving, prescribed by marriage as it is in India, and the new ways of thinking brought about by emphasis on individualism and growing emancipation of women, marriage

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