Rural Groom Family’s Marriage Payment

Taking H town in north Henan province as the place of field work, thepaper studies the groom family’s marriage payment in the rural marriagemarket. On the basis of investigation, the paper mainly presents the highgroom family’s marriage payment and uneven distribution in differenthierarchies in current marriage market. From the perspective of PierreBourdieu’s marriage strategy theory, the paper mainly provides atheoretical interpretation to the phenomenon’s logic behind.Groom family’s marriage payment in this paper refers to all economicexpenditure of the rural groom’s family from mate choice to marriage,including bride-price, new house, automobile, electrical appliancesprovided by the groom’s family and so on in marriage and uxoilocalmarriage. The paper mainly uses qualitative research method to study thetopic. The field work is conducted in five villages in H town. On theconcrete method, the study combined with various research methods,including interview, observation, documentary research method.The first chapter mainly introduces the cause of the study, brieflyreviews relevant research results of the topic in and outside china andanalysis the shortages and problems to be solved.The second chapter mainly introduced H town, including thegeographical environment of H town, the traffic condition of H town, the economic development of H town, peasants’ economic income level, thegap between rich and poor, social customs and the evolution of the socialatmosphere.The third chapter describes the marriage market of H town. Thechapter mainly describes the characteristics of the marriage market of Htown from the angle of marriage autonomy, marriage circle, the sex ratioof marriage aged population and the stratification of marriage market.The conclusion is: The peasants’ marriage autonomy have been greatlyenhanced, but parents’ views still have great influence and the concept ofmarriage is becoming increasingly rational; The marriage circle of mostyoung people still remained very narrow, expanded marriage circle andconventional marriage circle coexist; The sex ratio of marriage agedpopulation is seriously unbalanced; The marriage market is stratified bymale’s material family life conditions.The fourth chapter introduces the groom family’s marriage payment inH town marriage market and analysises it.The chapter first describes thecurrent situation and characteristics of H town’s groom family’s marriagepayment and points out that it is not proper to explain the payment fromthe perspective of “power” and interprets it from the point of view ofPierre Bourdieu’s marriage strategy theory. The paper points out that thegroom family’s marriage payment in H town marriage market is not a result of power but a result of strategy. From the point of PierreBourdieu’s marriage strategy, the paper points out that the high groomfamily’s marriage payment in H town marriage market is actually theresult of marriage strategies of both sides. It is a result of the use ofcomplex strategies on the basis of sense of the game. In the marriagemarket of serious sex ratio imbalance, the supply-demand relations ofmore males than females decides the position of “the requested person” ofthe female’s family in the marriage negotiation. The position gives thefemale’s family quotation advantage which makes the female’s familyacquire relatively strong ability of asking for a high price rather thanpower. The ability is even stronger when faced with lower hierarchymale’s family. The ability of asking for price is the basis of asking formarriage payment. Therefore, the quotation advantage is the preconditionof the groom family’s marriage payment as a marriage strategy. Thegroom family’s marriage payment is the strategic results of female’sfamily’s applying of ability of asking for price gained by the quotationadvantage in marriage market in order to realize the family’s socialreproduction and increase, maintain family’s economic capital andsymbolic capital. It is also the result of male’s family’s strategy to realizefamily reproduction and maintain family’s symbolic capital.This quotation advantage also makes female’s families in current rural uxorilocal marriage acquire higher ability of asking for price. Thefemale’s family’s behavior of asking for high marriage payment in Htown uxorilocal marriages is virtually a rational strategy that the female’sfamily use the ability of asking for price gained by quotation advantage tomaintain and increase its symbolic capital and shift its marriage paymentto male’s family to maintain family’s economic capital. For the samereason, the groom family’s marriage payment is also the male’s family’ssocial reproduction strategy to increase its symbolic capital.Compared with Pierre Bourdieu’s marriage strategy theory, H townmale’s family’s economic capital consideration is in a very minor positionin the marriage strategy. It is not a strategic choice as Pierre Bourdieusaid to ensure the family property integrity but a family reproduction andsymbolic capital maintenance strategy. The study can be seen as theapplication and further development of Pierre Bourdieu’s marriagestrategy theory in current sex ratio unbalanced rural china marriagemarket. Its theoretical significance lies in trying to develop a newinterpretative framework that can be used in china rural society andspecific sex ratio unbalanced marriage market.The paper applies Pierre Bourdieu’s marriage strategy theory to thestudy of H town’s groom family’s marriage payment, trying to revisesome view points on high rural groom family’s marriage payment in relevant researches. For example, the paper points out that it is not properto use social exchange theory as a theory tool to explain high rural groomfamily’s marriage payment.According to the needs of the study, the paper puts forward thestandards and the condition of marriage market stratification. Thephenomenon of rural male families buying houses in the county town forthe sake of marriage is also included in the research field of vision and isseen as one part of the rural groom family’s marriage payment. The paperfirst pays attention to the rural groom family’s marriage payment incurrent growing uxorilocal marriage and carried out theoretical analysis.