Please visit the new home of Majikthise at bigthink.com/blogs/focal-point.

« Leiter goes upriver | Main | Notes on Sense and Sensibilia »

October 02, 2004

Monogamy

Fellow philo-blogger Siris writes:

One of the things that annoys me is the application of marriage-related terms to dating. The most common culprit is the word 'monogamy'. If two people are dating, and they are exclusive, they are not monogamous unless they are also married to each other and only to each other.

Siris believes that legal marriage is a necessary condition of monogamy. He seems to be arguing that a relationship isn't monogamous unless the parties involved have promised to be faithful to each other forever. Maybe that's why he thinks that people who date exclusively don't deserve to be called "monogamous." After all, if you're dating, you haven't promised to be monogamous forever. If you had, you'd no longer be dating, you'd be engaged, or common-law married, or betrothed, or whatever. (Read Siris' post to see his argument in full.)

Siris thinks that broader applications of "monogamy" are incorrect or misleading, and that we should return to the correct literal meaning of the term. I disagree. Siris is actually proposing a radical redefinition of the term "monogamy." The term already used in biology, medicine, and ordinary language to describe a variety of sexually exclusive relationships. When your doctor asks whether you are in a monogamous relationship, she isn't interested in the legal details, she just wants to know whether you or your partner are having sex with other people.

I don't see any compelling reason to change our current usage or to be annoyed by it. The fact is that marriage is only of many types of monogamous relationships. Our usage reflects that.

TrackBack

TrackBack URL for this entry:
https://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d8341c61e653ef00d8346cfdcb69e2

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Monogamy:

Comments

Oh, I liked what he was saying. Because it pointed out that marriage and sexual fidelity aren't the same thing. You can have one without the other; the way we use "monogamy" for both confuses the issue.

Tell me about it bitchphd. I found out for certain that my wife of 10 years was having an affair on Xmas fucking morning. Always did hate that holiday. (Incidentally/Consequently, I've been flying a Jolly Roger since early Spring, for my morale). Oh, she's got a phd too. heh.

Siris is wrong. When you're dating and have an exclusive commitment to one another that is what is called monogamy. Whereas when you are married, that is what we call monotony. ;-)

[I'm not bitter. Actually, it's truly the best thing that's ever happened to me. Then this year has been very strange, a series of coincidentia oppositora.

You're pretty clearly correct on this one. Another obious problem with Siris's arguments is that under most contemporary legal regimes marriage doesn't represent a lifetime commitment; it can be dissolved quite easily (like a mutual commitment to exclusivity made in a non-marriage relationship.) It's difficult to use marrigae to defend the argument that monogomy *requires* a permanent commitment.

OK, fine. We'll stick with the current usage.

Can we bring back Aristocratic-Republicanism, as the form of government where there are elections?

Neo-Con Classicist, and all-around guttersnipe, Victor David Hanson and I would be thrilled.

I'm not sure who else wants it, but I think I feel a pulse. (hmm, perhaps that's _my_ blood).

Dr. B's comment makes me wonder if I misinterpreted Siris. I still don't think we should change our usage, though. Initially, I thought Siris was making an argument about lifelong or committed monogamy vs. temporary or fortuitous monogamy.

Now, I think Siris is arguing that we restrict the term "monogamy" to its anthropological sense. In that context, "monogamy" and "polygamy" explicitly describe marriage customs. As Dr. B. points out, a person could have one spouse and many sexual partners. Such a person would be monogamous in the anthropological sense, but not in the ordinary sense of term.

To most people "monogamy" now means something like "sexual exclusivity" or "bilateral sexual exclusivity." Biologists and epidemiologists already use "monogamous" in the wide sense, as do ordinary people. It is too bad that there's some ambiguity between the anthropological sense and the wide sense of the word. The anthropological sense has no greater claim to truth or correctness than the contemporary application. Besides, it's too late to put this particular linguistic genie back in the bottle.

As a biologist, I use the word "monogamy" in a technical way. I have to ALWAYS use it within a phrase "sexual monogamy" or "social monogamy", the former denoting two indiviuals mating (exclusively), the latter denoting two individuals living together and raising a family (exclusively).

It is also almost required to specify the duration of monogamy, e.g., daily (don't laugh, think insects), seasonal, till-death-of-partner, serial, lifelong, etc.
Homo sapiens is designated a sexually polygamous (as are most other mammals) and socially serially monogamous animal.

I have a couple of posts on my blog with my own taxonomy of marriage. Since I wrote them, I have read Lakoff's article on marriage, as well as E.J.Graff's "What is marriage for?", and Roughgarden's "Evolution's Rainbow" and have changed my mind - I now want to use the word "marriage" to describe gay marriage and other forms of marriages.

Here are the links:

Definition, Semantics and Future of Marriage
http://sciencepolitics.blogspot.com/2004/08/definition-semantics-and-future-of.html

Gay Marriage and "Marriage Tax"
http://sciencepolitics.blogspot.com/2004/08/gay-marriage-and-marriage-tax.html

As a biologist, I use the word "monogamy" in a technical way. I have to ALWAYS use it within a phrase "sexual monogamy" or "social monogamy", the former denoting two individuals mating (exclusively), the latter denoting two individuals living together and raising a family (exclusively).

It is also almost required to specify the duration of monogamy, e.g., daily (don't laugh, think insects), seasonal, till-death-of-partner, serial, lifelong, etc.
Homo sapiens is designated a sexually polygamous (as are most other mammals) and socially serially monogamous animal.

I have a couple of posts on my blog with my own taxonomy of marriage. Since I wrote them, I have read Lakoff's article on marriage on the Rockridge Institute website, as well as E.J.Graff's "What is marriage for?", and Roughgarden's "Evolution's Rainbow" and have changed my mind - I now want to use the word "marriage" to describe gay marriage and other forms of marriages.

Here are the links:

Definition, Semantics and Future of Marriage
http://sciencepolitics.blogspot.com/2004/08/definition-semantics-and-future-of.html

Gay Marriage and "Marriage Tax"
http://sciencepolitics.blogspot.com/2004/08/gay-marriage-and-marriage-tax.html

I have a question about sexual exclusivity. What is the role of sexual exclusivity in mariage and family? Do you think experiments with "open families", where sexual activity is unrestricted , could work? How? Can you give an ethical argument for sexual exclusivity?

Hi
I,m Masud 42 years
teacher
live in capital iran

The comments to this entry are closed.