Conjugal Love from a Sociological Perspective: Theorizing from Observed Practices.

Abstract

This paper presents a sociological reflection on contemporary conjugal love, both from an empirical and a theoretical point of view. Drawing on analyses of data regarding financial arrangements between partners forming a couple, as well as on the sociological literature concerning love relationships, we present a theorization of contemporary conjugal semantics. We define these semantics as consisting of eight “meaning rules” through which social actors respond to the challenges of intimate relationships. Our analysis shows us the gaps and the tensions between different logics of love, on the one hand, and logics of love and social realities, on the other. However, partners’ utterances feature an integration of elements stemming from opposed semantic frameworks; meaning rules fostering mythical idealisation are combined with rules regarding relationship work, therapeutic communication, and the entrepreneurial management of the relationship. This empirical analysis also allows us to tackle a double confusion in the contemporary sociological literature on love and couples.

Interethnic Matrimonial Unions and Intercommunity Relation Within a “Migrants” Community

“…Through this cultural integration, the immigrant hopes to achieve or enable his descendants to achieve structural integration, which is participation in collective life and above all the invention of rules in the community that adopted him Schnapper [16]. However, even if for the spouses interviewed, their union is the pure and simple result of their love, it should however be noted that for the social actors, it is an investment from which each expects to derive a profit, either material [17] or symbolic [18].…”

“…To this end, Dozon [17], in a socio-economic analysis in Côte d'Ivoire, affirms that the natives, to differentiate themselves from other ethnic groups, rely on the identity differentiation between them and non-natives. For him, economic reasons are the basis of this distinction.…”

Studying Individuals in Same-Sex Couples using Longitudinal Administrative Data from Canadian Tax Records: Opportunities and Challenges

“…As recent studies have shown, individuals' sexual identity is not fixed, and may not always align with one's partnership status or their sexual behavior (Hu & Denier, 2023;Mittleman, 2023;Silva, 2019;Silva & Fetner, 2022). While it is suboptimal that the LAD does not offer a direct measure of sexual identity, it allows us to consider individuals' partnership practices, assuming co-residential partnership indicates, on balance, a certain degree of financial, social and emotional interdependence in a joint household (Belleau et al, 2020). 8…”

Mine, yours, ours, or no one's? Homeownership arrangements among cohabiting and married couples

“…In contrast to transaction cost theories, institutional approaches to conjugal economies posit that not just practical concerns and relationship trust, but also norms of conjugal behavior guide couples in their resource organization (Belleau et al., 2020; Stocks et al., 2007; Yodanis & Lauer, 2007). Although those norms were once relatively homogenous under the male breadwinner model, inviting men to financially provide for their caretaking wives, multiple ideals have come to coexist (Belleau et al., 2020; Cherlin, 2004; Evertsson & Nyman, 2014). One of them calls for independence in romantic relationships (Beck & Beck‐Gernsheim, 1995; Giddens, 1992).…”