Marriage Choices and Class Boundaries
Social Endogamy in History

Considers endogamy, the custom forbidding marriage outside one's social class, which is central to social history.

Marco H. D. van Leeuwen (Edited by)

9780521685467, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 9 March 2006

302 pages, 10 b/w illus.
22.9 x 15.1 x 1.5 cm, 0.488 kg

Marriage choice plays a crucial role in the formation and decay of social classes. Endogamy, the custom forbidding marriage outside one's social class, is thus central to social history. The study considers the factors determining who married whom, whether partner selection has changed over time and regional differences between Europe and South America. The volume also questions to what extent these factors have changed over the past three hundred years. The case studies presented are preceded by a state-of-the-art theoretical introduction on the determinants influencing trends in social endogamy. Each contributor has employed the same social-class scheme and thus the volume is the first comparative study of social endogamy in an historical context.

1. Endogamy and social class in history: an overview Marco H. D. van Leeuwen and Ineke Maas
2. Marriage choices in a plantation society: Bahia, Brazil Katherine Holt
3. Deciding whom to marry in a rural two-class society: social homogamy and constraints in the marriage market in Rendalen, Norway, 1750–1900 Hans Henrik Bull
4. 'We have no proletariat': social stratification and occupational homogamy in industrial Switzerland, Winterthur 1909/10–28 Reto Schumacher and Luigi Lorenzetti
5. Pyrenean marriage strategies in the nineteenth century: the French Basque case Marie-Pierre Arrizabalaga
6. Homogamy in a society orientated towards stability: a micro-study of a South Tyrolean market town, 1700–1900 Margareth Lanzinger
7. Finding the right partner: rural homogamy in nineteenth-century Sweden Martin Dribe and Christer Lundh
8. Migration, occupational identity, and societal openness in nineteenth-century Belgium Bart Van de Putte, Michel Oris, Muriel Neven and Koen Matthijs
9. Migration and endogamy according to social class: France, 1803–1986 Jean-Pierre Pélissier, Danielè Rébaudo, Marco H. D. van Leeuwen and Ineke Maas
10. 'They live in indifference together': marriage mobility in Zeeland, The Netherlands, 1796–1922 Hilde Bras and Jan Kok
11. Total and relative endogamy by social origin: a first international comparison of changes in marriage choices during the nineteenth century Ineke Maas and Marco H. D. van Leeuwen.

Subject Areas: Information technology industries [KNTX], Economic history [KCZ], Sociology & anthropology [JH], 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000 [HBLW], Modern history to 20th century: c 1700 to c 1900 [HBLL], General & world history [HBG]