Saturday, June 5, 2010
Department Seminar
The Department of Sociology organized one day Seminar on 5 June 2010. It was exclusively meant for the Students.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Lecturers of Sociology
Saturday, May 29, 2010
2008-2009 II B.A Sociologists
Department Magazine's committee along with the Lecturers incharge
Marriage Transaction: Dowry and Bride Price
Unit- VI
Marriage in most cases involves material as well as non-material transaction between the bride giver and bride taker. It involves with a few exception, the transfer of the wife to the husband’s family.
Two major types of transfer of material wealth accompanying marriage. In one, wealth travels in the opposite direction of the bride and in another it travels along with the bride in the same direction. The former is identified as bride price whiles the latter as dowry.
Bride price
The tradition of bride price is found among certain Patrilineal tribes and some castes in the middle and lower rank. The form and amount of bride price vary from region to region, from tribe to tribe and within the tribe from time to time, some pay only cash, some other only in kind, while some others pay both in cash and kind. Payment in kind include a wide variety of things likes clothes, ornaments, tools and implements , liquor, grain, cattle, goats and other forms of livestock. For instances, among the Uroan tribe of Chhottanagpur a man takes a set of clothes for the bride’s relatives. Bhunias of Orissa give cash, five or six saris and three goats as bride price.
Bargaining bride price is also common. In some tribes the groom offers his services to the bride’s father as a form of bride price. (Our own tribe……)
Bride price or the payment in cash or in kind to the bride’s father by the groom’s father reflects the transfer of authority over the bride from her father to the groom and his family. The idea of compensation for the loss of a productive worker is also implicit in it. The bride’s family loss a productive worker when the girl married and leaves her parental home. So the bride’s family is paid a compensation for this loss. The girl is a source of wealth and prestige to her natal family i.e., the family in which she is born. In this sense the transaction implies the transfer of all that the girl stands for. Thus bride price is a form of transaction wealth and prestige that accompany marriage.
Under the local influence of higher castes values and practices some group have given up their customs of bride price and have adopted the custom of dowry.
Dowry:
Broadly speaking, dowry refers to a specific category of gifts given by the bride’s side to the groom’s side. This set of gifts symbolizes the transfer of wealth from the bride side to the groom’s side. This act confers prestige and honour to both the sides. The bride giver gains prestige within his community by giving dowry while the bride taker receives both wealth and prestige in his own and other communities. Thus in ordinary sense dowry refers to money, gifts, goods etc, that the wife brings to her husband in marriage.
Today in legal terms dowry constitute what is given to the son-in- law or to his parents on demand either in cash or in kind by the bride’s side. There are regional variations in the practice and people’s understanding of the term dowry. Some view it mainly as “groom – price” and often the price paid to the groom depends on the groom’s qualification, job, and social status regardless of the bride’s parents’ ability to pay the price demanded by the groom’s side.
Unit- VI
Marriage in most cases involves material as well as non-material transaction between the bride giver and bride taker. It involves with a few exception, the transfer of the wife to the husband’s family.
Two major types of transfer of material wealth accompanying marriage. In one, wealth travels in the opposite direction of the bride and in another it travels along with the bride in the same direction. The former is identified as bride price whiles the latter as dowry.
Bride price
The tradition of bride price is found among certain Patrilineal tribes and some castes in the middle and lower rank. The form and amount of bride price vary from region to region, from tribe to tribe and within the tribe from time to time, some pay only cash, some other only in kind, while some others pay both in cash and kind. Payment in kind include a wide variety of things likes clothes, ornaments, tools and implements , liquor, grain, cattle, goats and other forms of livestock. For instances, among the Uroan tribe of Chhottanagpur a man takes a set of clothes for the bride’s relatives. Bhunias of Orissa give cash, five or six saris and three goats as bride price.
Bargaining bride price is also common. In some tribes the groom offers his services to the bride’s father as a form of bride price. (Our own tribe……)
Bride price or the payment in cash or in kind to the bride’s father by the groom’s father reflects the transfer of authority over the bride from her father to the groom and his family. The idea of compensation for the loss of a productive worker is also implicit in it. The bride’s family loss a productive worker when the girl married and leaves her parental home. So the bride’s family is paid a compensation for this loss. The girl is a source of wealth and prestige to her natal family i.e., the family in which she is born. In this sense the transaction implies the transfer of all that the girl stands for. Thus bride price is a form of transaction wealth and prestige that accompany marriage.
Under the local influence of higher castes values and practices some group have given up their customs of bride price and have adopted the custom of dowry.
Dowry:
Broadly speaking, dowry refers to a specific category of gifts given by the bride’s side to the groom’s side. This set of gifts symbolizes the transfer of wealth from the bride side to the groom’s side. This act confers prestige and honour to both the sides. The bride giver gains prestige within his community by giving dowry while the bride taker receives both wealth and prestige in his own and other communities. Thus in ordinary sense dowry refers to money, gifts, goods etc, that the wife brings to her husband in marriage.
Today in legal terms dowry constitute what is given to the son-in- law or to his parents on demand either in cash or in kind by the bride’s side. There are regional variations in the practice and people’s understanding of the term dowry. Some view it mainly as “groom – price” and often the price paid to the groom depends on the groom’s qualification, job, and social status regardless of the bride’s parents’ ability to pay the price demanded by the groom’s side.
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