Marriage is a socially recognized union that establishes relationships and obligations between spouses and often between their wider families. Its forms and meanings vary across societies: recognition may depend on law, customary practice, religion, or a combination of these. Marriage can organize partnership, child-rearing, economic cooperation, and alliances between families, but having children is not a necessary feature of every marriage. Anthropological definitions therefore encompass a wider range of arrangements than any single jurisdiction’s legal definition. (openstax.org)
Marriage, family, and household
Marriage is closely connected with kinship, but it is not synonymous with either family or household. Families may include relationships established through descent, adoption, marriage, or other enduring social ties. A household concerns living arrangements and economic cooperation; its members need not all be relatives. These distinctions allow researchers to examine marital status separately from residence and family membership. (openstax.org)
In anthropology, marriage is examined comparatively, including rules about eligible partners, relationships between families, and residence after marriage. Sociology studies its relationship with family organization and wider social institutions. Neither approach assumes that one culturally specific marriage model describes every society. (openstax.org)
Forms and partner selection
Monogamy is marriage involving two spouses. Polygamy involves multiple spouses and includes polygyny, in which a man has more than one wife, and polyandry, in which a woman has more than one husband. These terms describe marital arrangements rather than necessarily describing sexual exclusivity. Same-sex marriage concerns the spouses’ sex rather than the number of spouses and can therefore be monogamous. (openstax.org)
Marriage rules may encourage partners to come from within a specified social group, known as endogamy, or require them to come from outside it, known as exogamy. The relevant boundaries can involve kinship, religious affiliation, or other social categories, and differ between communities. (openstax.org)
Arranged marriage and forced marriage are distinct concepts. In an arranged marriage between adults, relatives or intermediaries may help select a partner, while the prospective spouses retain the decision whether to marry. Forced marriage lacks the full and free consent of one or both parties; pressure or coercion may be physical, emotional, or financial. An arranged marriage can become forced if genuine choice is removed. (gov.uk)
Legal recognition and obligations
Legal marriage changes the parties’ status and establishes rights and duties. Requirements commonly address capacity to marry, mutual consent, age, prohibited close relationships, and compliance with prescribed formalities. The particular requirements, and the authority responsible for applying them, depend on the jurisdiction. In the United States, marriage is principally regulated by state law, subject to constitutional constraints. (law.cornell.edu)
Civil and religious recognition need not coincide. A religious ceremony may establish a legally recognized marriage in one country but require separate civil procedures in another. Common-law marriage, where recognized, can arise without the usual ceremony or licensing formalities, but merely living together does not automatically establish it. Cohabitation and registered partnerships should consequently not be treated as interchangeable with marriage. (oecd.org)
Marriage law may govern financial support, property arrangements, and the consequences of dissolution. Rules concerning property rights distinguish, in some jurisdictions, assets acquired during marriage from separately owned assets. In divorce proceedings, courts may also address spousal support, child support, and custody; these are separate questions rather than a single consequence of marital status. (law.cornell.edu)
Consent and human rights
Marriage is addressed in international human rights instruments. Article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted in 1948, recognizes the right of adults to marry and found a family, requires full and free consent, and states that spouses are entitled to equal rights at marriage, during marriage, and at its dissolution. (un.org)
The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women further addresses equality in choosing a spouse, parental responsibilities, and ownership and administration of property. These international standards must be distinguished from domestic legal provisions, which are not uniform across countries. (docstore.ohchr.org)
UNICEF defines child marriage as a formal marriage or informal union involving someone younger than 18. This statistical and programmatic definition is distinct from any particular country’s statutory marriage age. Ending child, early, and forced marriage is included in the Sustainable Development Goals under the target for eliminating harmful practices by 2030. (unicef.org)
Dissolution and demographic measurement
Divorce legally dissolves a marriage. Annulment instead addresses invalidity arising from conditions present when the marriage was formed. Separation may leave the marriage legally intact. The grounds, procedures, and financial consequences differ among jurisdictions. (law.cornell.edu)
Demography measures marriage through indicators such as marriage rates, divorce rates, age at marriage, and population distributions by marital status. OECD comparisons document declining marriage rates and later marriage in many member countries, alongside varied patterns of cohabitation. These are regional trends, not a uniform global sequence. Comparisons also require attention to whether statistics include religious marriages, civil unions, or other partnerships, and to differences in registration and divorce procedures. (oecd.org)