Arranged Marriage
Uploaded by luatagal on Apr 17, 2013
Arranged Marriage
Kelly Luá Franklin
AP Literature, Period 1
Talking about arranged marriage in India is as common as talking about travel plans over coffee in the United States. Marriages that aren’t arranged are seldom in the country. In fact, when these do occur they are called “love matches”. Although there are many benefits to an arranged marriage, love matches may be more beneficial.
Families in India consist of parents, unmarried daughters, sons and daughters in law living in the same house. During the process of arranging a marriage, the prospective wife is sent to live with the prospective groom’s family in a sort of evaluation. This evaluation puts tremendous pressure on the prospect to exhibit all the qualities the ideal wife should have. I don’t believe that this type of stress is beneficial to any relationship because it causes emotional ties to be obligatory instead of voluntary. The marriage may work out in the end or it may have an unhappy existence due to its rocky beginnings. In a love match, marriages have a better chance of working out do to mutual expressions and pacing.
Although providing or asking for a dowry is illegal in the country, it is still widely required as an unspoken social standard. I view this as a bribe for the young man’s family to go into an arranged marriage with a young woman. There are reports that some prospective wives have been pressured into asking their families for more gifts in place of a dowry. I find this “twisting of the arm” to contrast greatly with the way that two families bond in love matches. In the later gifts may be desired, but definitely not required like the way that they are in arranged marriages.
It is widely known that love matches in the United States have a high percentage of divorces. Despite this, I believe that love matches are still better than arranged marriages. With arranged marriages, a person never really knows what they’re getting into and once they get in it’s a social disgrace to try to get out. In a love match, a person should know exactly what they’re getting into so if the marriage ends badly then it’s the person’s fault for making a bad decision and they can get out of it by means of divorce. I’m a strong believer in the notion that it is better to have loved and lost than to...