Relationship status? It's complicated
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Date
2014-03
Authors
Brook, Heather Jane
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
University of Sydney, School of Economics
Rights
Copyright (2014) ARPA, University of Sydney - School of Economics.
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ARPA, University of Sydney - School of Economics.
Abstract
Not since the radical reforms to divorce enacted in the heady 1970s has there been so much huffing and puffing
and anxiety about the whole institution of marriage being blown down. At the centre of this anxiety is the
relationship of marriage and sexuality: is marriage (always, necessarily, naturally) heterosexual? Should it be?
These questions are being debated not just in Australia, but in many places around the world; including, of
course, in the United States, where the Clinton administration’s Defence of Marriage Act of 1996 established
similar ends to the Howard Government’s Marriage Act amendments of 2004: namely, to limit marriage to
man/woman pairings (King 2007). Marriage has, for the most part, served heterosexuality (and its gendered
foundations) in ways that normalise and endorse heterosexuality as ‘natural’. At times marriage has carried
heavily gendered weight, and arguably still does. (Does ‘wife’ mean the same thing as ‘husband’, and are both
these terms interchangeable with ‘spouse’, or do they all have different connotations?) The issue for many is
whether marriage should remain exclusively heterosexual, or whether marriage can and should be expanded to
include same-sex as well as different-sex relationships. As a social institution, marriage is entangled in sex,
religion and politics, and as such can inspire heated controversy. The three books reviewed here address various
questions about marriage, relationships and politics.
Description
Copyright (2014) ARPA, University of Sydney - School of Economics. Published version of the paper reproduced here with permission from the publisher.
Keywords
Citation
Brook, H. (2014). Relationship status? It's complicated. Australian Review of Public Affairs, March 2014 pp. 1.