Looking For Love In An Equal The

Looking For Love In An Equal: The Truth About Peer Marriages Essay, Research Paper

Danielle L. Woods

February 12, 2000

Sociology 352

Book Review

Looking for Love in an Equal: A Review of Love between Equals; The Truth About Peer Marriages

For Centuries in our society marriage between man and woman has been a practiced cultural right and custom. Over 90% of Americans will marry in their lifetime and roughly 50% of those marriages will result in Divorce. Many Sociological factors contribute to the high divorce rate expressed in our culture. Reasons that contribute to the divorce rate are longer life expectancy, women in the work force, birth control, social acceptance of cohabitation, single parenting and welfare reform. It is also now socially acceptable and legal to get a divorce due to dissatisfaction and unhappiness. This social acceptance of divorce implies that today there is a changing criteria when entering marriage. Couples today now insist on the element of personal fulfillment and happiness for entering wedlock, where as, in times past this was not one of the main considerations for man and woman to get married.

Historically with in marriage man and women have adopted gender roles. These gender roles that are predicated by society are traditionally seen as the man in the provider/ authoritarian role and the woman is seen as the caretaker of the home and children or in the nurturer role. These gender roles exist in our society today, even though our society now considers man and woman equal and gives each sex equal rights. Consequently, many couples still adopt traditional roles while in other marriages couples opt for non-traditional roles and treat each other as equals these are called egalitarian relationships and are far less frequent in our society. By examining these egalitarian couples that do not operate with in the traditional limits of gender and comparing them to traditional relationships, we, as a society can learn how the elements of traditional gender roles in marriage have provided a disservice to man and woman and how the less common egalitarian marriage may better suit individuals in the pursuit of a fulfilling and lasting marriage. Pepper Shwartz, Ph.D, a professor at the University of Washington and author of the book, Love Between Equals: How Peer Marriage Really Works, explores the aspects of traditional and egalitarian or peer marriage. She examines how gender roles interfere with partner equality, deep friendship and fulfillment. She also argues that we should eliminate the provider and nurturer role when pursuing a peer marriage because these traditional roles interfere with man and woman’s chance to overcome the social and biological differences that separate them and ultimately interfere with the pursuit of fulfillment and happiness of the marriage.

In her book, Schwartz identifies five types of marital failures that come from traditional gender guidelines and undermine marital intimacy. Schwartz also identifies four principles adopted by peer couples that, in turn, promote intimacy. Throughout Schwartz’s history of research she has found the failure of empathy among traditional couple’s leads to isolation, feeling alone and not understood. She demonstrates that this failure comes from traditional couples not sharing common perceptions which gives them separate experiences instead of a shared world. This initiates a feeling of being unknown and affects communication while tearing away at intimacy. Schwartz also recognizes the failure of interest in traditional marriages that occurs when partners become too separate in their daily lives. When the man is involved at work and the woman is involved at home with the children they end up with lack of conversation. They begin to ask ritually how each other’s day was with out genuine interest and more out of obligation. Or the couples stop sharing altogether about day to day experiences because they do not want to burden the other partner and lastly the husband may use his wife as a ‘sounding board’ and talk at her leaving no room for her in the conversation. Again this results in the failure of shared worlds, which results in the couple having little emotional exchange and having to get it from friends and family.

Another failure in traditional marriages that Schwartz points out is the lack of mutual respect. Due to gender roles the relationship between man and wife in traditional marriage is a senior and junior partnership based on hierarchy. The husband has ultimate power to make decisions because he makes the money. Schwartz notes that power is typically the right of the breadwinner and with it breeds superiority. Traditional wives feel patronized and this failure of respect brings resentment. In conjunction, Schwartz has observed traditional couples having a failure of realism. By this, Schwartz means that the husband and wife idealize one another usually as the husband being all knowing and the wife being a saint. This idealizing or lack of realism interferes with partner’s ability to give and receive support and understanding. Finally, the traditional marriage dehumanizes women. Traditional wives are encouraged to invest themselves in their husband’s interests and to even read books on how to please a man. After time, usually after the kids have left the house, wives report feeling like they do not know who they are, they e