Weddings, Women, and Tradition
What do our wedding traditions say about our perspectives on gender roles? I recently read an article (here) that outlined the ways in which modern feminists are breaking with wedding traditions. For some there were obvious choices – like not being given away by one’s father as if you were a piece of property- while others simply wanted to avoid consumeristic messages that tell women we are good only if we spend a lot of money making ourselves pretty. For these women, it’s not about tradition its about avoiding supporting messages they don’t agree with.
In some ways I get where they are coming from. Nearly ten years ago, I had the traditional wedding. Granted we cut the “obey” line out of the vows and both sets of parents gave us both away, but all the trappings were there. White dress complete with the butt bow, attendants, flowers, bad hair-do, unity candle, guest book – I had it all. I took my husbands name, stuck with all the traditions, and really didn’t think twice about what it all meant. But I kinda wish I had. My wedding wasn’t “me” – even back then. I had all that cheezy crap (oh looking floating candles as centerpieces) because I thought it was what was expected. I didn’t think about what I was supporting or what messages about women I was affirming. Now, I like the idea of weddings (and strongly support marriage), but I wish I had been comfortable enough with myself to just have the sort of celebration that affirmed who I was. The traditions and trappings matter far less to me than the purpose of commemorating the joining of two lives.
What about you all? Did issues of gender roles, tradition, and unspoken messages affect your weddings (or future wedding)? Do you wish they had? Are you glad they didn’t? Please share your thoughts.
June 17th, 2009 at 6:42 am
I’m not married, but my future wedding will MOST DEFINITELY be affected by my feminist commitments. One thing I’m wrestling with at the moment is the whole white dress thing – one one hand, it could look really cute and make your wedding photos stand out, on the other hand it’s totally sexist (ie. if premarital virginity matters – which I think it does – it should matter for men too and not just women)…
I really like the website ‘Offbeat Bride’ – http://offbeatbride.com/
June 17th, 2009 at 8:15 am
I’m so glad you brought this up! My wedding is 10 days away and I think about this all the time. My fiance and I are inter-racial, so that plays a part, too. We’re both egalitarian in a hierarchical church environment. We are staunchly convicted it was God who brought us together and even set our wedding date. (You can read about us here: http://www.mywedding.com/promisedflower)
So, my personal changes to my wedding:
1. Dress — it’s a champagne/ivory color and not pearl white. Not b/c I’m not a virgin since I still am, but b/c it was the dress I was comfortable in, and since I hate dresses in the first place having grown up in a legalistic church where women only wore dresses and skirts, I’d say finding a dress I’m comfortable in is pretty hard to come by. All my friends will attest to this. I actually wanted to wear jeans underneath. =P
2. Veil — no veil, b/c I believe it’s a misinterpretation of 1 Cor 11 and symbolizes wifely submission
3. Chinese traditions — my fiance is Chinese and they have this thing where the man brings a pig to the woman’s home that must be intact to show she’s still a virgin. I dont think he knew that when he proposed it to me. He was just thinking of all the other Chinese weddings he’s seen, but once I found out the significance I was insulted. I made sure it was ok with his parents tho. Otherwise, I may have had to do it. >_<
4. Vows — we’re allowing our officiant to come up with something but we must approve it. (Still waiting on him to send it to us.) And certainly there will be nothing in there about submission and obedience.
5. Surname — I wrestled with this a LOT at first. And some of my musings were misunderstood by my fiance, so we had to keep re-hashing it. In the end, I am keeping my name. I am Puerto-Rican, he is Chinese. But more than that, my name is part of my identity, and I dont think it’s an easy thing for me to give up. Plus, why should I? Nothing in Scripture says I have to. But, I keep getting asked that question – “What will your name be once you’re married?” and it annoys me every time, b/c my fiance will never be asked that question since he’s the man. Grr….
6. Church — not actually wedding-related, but we’re not changing churches once we’re married. I know this has shocked many ppl. I’m a lay-pastor in my new church. I’ve been there less than 2 yrs, and he’s recently ordained in his new church of 1 yr. We both know God’s called us to these places and there’s no reason to move til He says so. The end.
Other than those aspects, we have a pretty formal event. But it’s our style with most of our touches. (If we really had the freedom to it our own way, we may have dressed in character – he as Homer Simpson and me as a Harry Potter character! =P) But, we do have to cave to some pressures b/c it’s a family event more than just an “us” event.
June 17th, 2009 at 8:19 am
PS– My father passed away 18 months ago, so my brother is “walking me down the aisle.” I made it clear to him and everyone else that he’s not “giving me away” as if he owns me. (Which he doesnt anyway, b/c I’m the older and I will smack him silly if he had any kind of idiotic notion like that.) He grinned when I told him. My brother loves the feminist in me. Lol!
June 17th, 2009 at 9:07 am
Jasmine, I really enjoyed looking at your wedding website!
When I got married, we used the exact same vows as each other. No different vows for me because I am a woman. Both my parents walked by down the aisle to show their support of my marriage, not to give me away. I did change my name because I wanted to symbolize that we were a new family and I wanted all of us (including our future children) to share the same surname. My sister and b-i-l chose a new last name for their new family, and my b-i-l had a hell of a time doing his legal name change. My sister? Not a whisper of question. Although I wore the traditional white, my sister also wore a blue dress for her wedding. Which I thought was great!
June 17th, 2009 at 9:31 am
Thanks Robyn! =D I love that your sister wore a blue dress! I will be wearing one, too! But that’s b/c Chinese weddings have several dress changes, so I have a traditional red one and a 2 nd one which is blue to reflect our ceremony colors. =D
I did propose to my fiance that we take on each other’s names and hyphenate as long as we BOTH did it and not just me. Or that we choose a new name altogether – which is actually my favorite option. But, since he’s not ready to change his name, I figured I’ll wait. I know he’d get a lot of flack for it – particularly b/c he’s an only child (and thereby the only son) in a very traditional hierarchical Chinese culture. His family might be insulted if he changed his name completely. =T
June 17th, 2009 at 10:32 am
I got married 22 years ago. I was the first woman on my mother’s side of the family to have a church wedding in three generations. This was funny b/c my mom is agnostic.
I wore a white dress, but I wasn’t a virgin since my (then) fiancee now husband and I were living together and had been for a year. [shrug] All of my peers wore white and we thought it was quaint.
I kept my maiden name for a year after the wedding because I couldn’t make up my mind about it. But honestly, it was very difficult and it was uncomfortable for family. So I kept all of my names (middle, maiden, etc.) and tacked my husband’s last name onto the end. One day in the middle of that year I did suggest that we both take a name that was completely different and he was horrified by the idea. But you have to know that he’s a geneologist and that would be like breaking the chain of evidence or something. So I have all my names and that’s enough.
Both my parents “gave” me away and I remember at the rehearsal the three of us laughed and laughed over that idea. They thought it was a hoot and so did I … I remember looking at them during the ceremony and we grinned at each other. We knew they could no more “give” me away than they could fly to the moon. So, I suspect, did most people who attended our wedding
It was part of the traditional ceremony and whatever … I guess I never thought too much about it. Certainly it never occurred to me to balk at it and now I have that fun memory with my parents from it.
I guess like everything we each have to find our own way through those waters.
June 17th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
I have no current plans to get married, but I have some definite ideas about it. I prefer not to label myself as a feminist, but I suppose some of the values I have about marriage could be construed as feminist.
First, I plan on having no veil, mostly because I hate lace.
Second, I think I look horrible in white, but if I manage to remain a virgin until my wedding day, I’ll probably wear it anyway. I really do value purity, not just sexual purity, but spiritual, relational, and societal purity as well, and white is a good Western way to symbolize that. Mostly, I don’t want to spend more than $200 on my dress. I’d like my future groom to wear white too, if he is a virgin at the time.
Third, I want to get married in a church. But in terms of walking down the aisle, I would like for me and the groom to be escorted down the side aisles at the same time by not just our parents, but by our whole families. And instead of bridesmaids and groomsmen, I want both of us to have anyone who has played a role in our relationship to be up front with us–married couples, mentors, close single friends, children. And they shouldn’t all have to wear the same thing. Then, after the ceremony, everyone will walk out by the center aisle together.
Fourth, vows. I don’t mind including submission into wedding vows, as long as we both take that vow of submission to each other. Whatever we say, I want us to commit to the same things. Writing one’s own vows is all well and good for some people, but I believe that marriage involves a level of commitment beyond one’s personal preferences–”until death,” “in good times and bad,” etc.
I have other thoughts too that don’t have anything to do with feminism, but more about commercialism. That’s a topic for another post I guess.
June 17th, 2009 at 8:49 pm
OK, I’ll play.:)
It was 22 years ago. I wore a champagne white dress my mom made. I made my own hairpiece (a wreath of flowers – and was teased that I was Mother Nature – whatever) My sister made fabric baskets for the flowers. We had only potted chrysanthemums for flowers up front. No funereal-looking flowers!!!
I changed my name for the sake of family expectations. Our names didn’t hyphenate well. Trust me.
We didn’t promise to obey etc. My dad did walk me down the aisle. I was the only daughter with a church wedding where he could.
Centerpieces we used potted annuals wrapped in foil by the greenhouse.
The ‘head table’ was actually for our cake. We sat at a long table down the middle of the floor, surrounded by friends. All of our family sat with us.
Oh – I think the dresses I chose were unfortunate. And we all had those horrible but-so-stylish-at-the-time butt bows AND shoulder bows.
All this to say – we are still married. Egalitarian. I’m a pastor and he’s the pastor’s wife.
June 18th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
I hope I am allowed to speak as a guy.
Our wedding was so planned to be just how we wanted it! There was nothing traditional about it! It was awesome! Then ALL THE OTHER PEOPLE GOT INVOLVED!
We both regret the fact that we let people shape our wedding into the more traditional look.
In the end we only had to changes to the “formal event” that made it through the myriad of people who think they have a right to alter what you are doing. We were married by a pastoral couple rather than a man, who remain important in our lives today. I also wrote vows for us both, that looked NOTHING like any vows from another wedding people had been to. Probably the biggest difference from the traditional wedding, was that I planned it, and my wife just showed up!
June 18th, 2009 at 1:25 pm
I got married in a civil ceremony. I wore a white dress and heels and we exchanged rings, but other than that nothing about our ceremony was traditional. Nobody changed their name or was given away. For the most part, our relationship has never been traditional either.
It’s been a conscious choice we’ve made to remake the institution of marriage to suit our relationship. The wedding was just the beginning, andI don’t regret any of it (well, other than the wearing heels part.
)
June 18th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
I got married 12 years ago and my husband and I walked down the aisle together. I don’t know that we gave it a lot of thought back then (I was 19), but there was something that felt creepy or odd to me about being given away. Now I’m sure it was becasue of the “property” overtones that might have been felt in that situation. We didn’t promise to obey/submit and we asked the pastor not to introduce us as “mrs. joe smith” at the end of the ceremony(he forgot, and did anyway). I didn’t wear a veil, only b/c I didn’t care about it. Our wedding was very low budget. We planned a large wedding initially and then realized the stress of doing something so big and traditional was not worth it for us and we scaled everything back, including our budget. I’m glad we did. I took my husband’s last name, but after we got married felt very uneasy about my choice. After many long and difficult conversations we both arrived at the conclusion that we’d both be satisfied if we both took each other’s name, but went by his as our official public last name. Legally, my maiden name would become like an extra middle name for both of us.I felt really good about that as a solution and so did he.
Here’s one thing that has always bothered me about tradition: the proposal. Has anyone had a unique proposal situation? Why is that the man is always the one assumed to have “popped the question”? Has anyone done something different? Looking back, I always felt sort of yukky that we made such a big deal about the proposal. We’d already talked about getting married, had already decided we wanted to do that, but we were both laboring under this assumption that he had to be the one to stage some official thing where he officially asked. In retrospect, I wish we could have just been comfortable deciding this sort of thing togheter, instead of making it feel as if the relationship was entirely contingent on one person doing the asking and the initiating….
June 18th, 2009 at 6:17 pm
Heather – I agree about the proposal thing. We too had already decided on getting married, but just waited for the right time for him to ask the question. Which, granted, was romantic and really sweet, but I totally get the weirdness of it. But a lot of what we did was simply because others expected it of us. My husband asked my dad for my hand in marriage, because that was expected. I took my husbands name mostly because his (and my) family would have been too upset if I didn’t. Its a strange balance caring about relationships and trying to love your family, while still attempting to be true to yourself and your own beliefs.
June 19th, 2009 at 8:40 am
“Has anyone had a unique proposal situation?”
After having a conversation about where our relationship was going, we took turns proposing to one another. He did ask me first, so there was some concession to gender norms, but I also popped the question that night.
It’s tough to work around things like proposals that are so steeped in tradition.
June 20th, 2009 at 6:25 am
My husband and I both came from split families -up both sides of the tree, all the branches … divorce everywhere – and were very aware of the empty ritual of marriage in light of the likelihood of divorce according to what we saw around us. Nonetheless, we were under a great deal of pressure to “make it official”. We started down the traditional wedding path, mostly for the sake of our families … they had expectations that needed to be met. It wasn’t long before I realized how much it felt like the whole thing was more about satisfying their expectations and buying into industry standards than the two of us making a proclamation of our commitment to each other (not that *we* needed it). So we canned the whole thing, eloped, and had a civil ceremony. We had a couple of small parties afterwards, hosted by family, friends, etc. No industry. It was perfect … just us making our commitment official/legal and sharing that with friends and family. It didn’t add one bit to our devotion to each other, nor did our lack of “Wedding” detract from it. 15 years and growing strong.
Changing my last name was psychologically weirder than I expected. It’s not something I feel any need to fight in my lifetime but I do have hopes that someday it won’t just be the woman’s public/legal identity that is so obviously, outwardly changed.
June 25th, 2009 at 2:10 am
We got married 25 years ago. On the weddingday my mother in law proudly announced that from this day I could present myself as Mrs (my husbands name). I can still recall the uneasiness I felt that moment. Although I did use my husbands name together with my maiden name, I never felt comfortable about it. In fact, we never put a nameplate on our front door because we could not agree what to put on it. I wanted both our last names together, but he did not want to be called by my name. A couple of years ago, when I changed jobs and started to publish as a researcher, I decided to use my maiden name and had my name officially changed. For my husband this is not an issue any more but among family and churchrelations it is frowned upon. Lately someone in church asked my daughter whether her parents were married or not. The fact that my name is different from my children is a consequence that I don’t like. When I call their school I always have to add that I am the mother of so and so. Otherwise, I am very happy to have my name ‘back’.
June 25th, 2009 at 11:37 pm
Our wedding was mostly ours. I agree that an important part of the whole life committment thing is the presence and affirmation of the community.
Proposal- We decided to get married. In fact, we picked a wedding date together. JLW asked my entire family – parents, sister, grandmother if they would bless our joining one another’s families.
We proposed to one another on a trip we took together. He decided on the place and moment to make our decision to share life with one another official. We both wore rings. (Those were the same rings we took off and put on the other’s hand during our wedding ceremony. To us they symbolized our decision to share life. )
Wedding – our parents,all of them, prayed blessing over us.
We wrote our own vows, together. We said exactly the same thing. They were reflective of our commitment to the other.
We washed each other’s feet. We did not do the candle thing or the sand…etc.
We were introduced as each first name and out new last name. We both hyphenated. (For all intensive purposes, JLW is an only child. I think his parents might internally struggle with this choice. They are lovely, supportive people but this has been hard for them. It was equally important for us)
Some of the things that were important to us were struggles for family members in the beginning. After our wedding, the people who we talked to expressed that it was a most unique and the loveliest wedding. In the end, it was us – nothing else matters.
I come from the strongest of women. Both my mother and grantmother have always used all their names. It makes sense to me that I have walked this road. My encouragement to any who are trying to figure out a wedding – find something that reflects the two of you and your commitment to one another. That matters!
June 29th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
got thinking about this exact thing last week as my girlfriends and I were gathered together and we started commenting about wedding bands. One of my friends said, “wow Katie, look at the bling.” And then later that evening, we were talking and she had mentioned wearing a very simple band, or not wearing it all while she traveled in Mexico. My other friend who was getting married (correction, got married on saturday!) mentioned getting a very very simple band so that as she and her husband did ministry together, she could wear the plain bad and not worry about making someone feel bad because of economic disparity.
And I wanted to just slap myself over the head because I hadn’t even really thought about it. As my hubby and I looked for wedding bands, we looked for something reasonably priced that matched my engagement ring.
Now, feminism and economics aren’t exactly the same thing, but they are related. And it is so easy to get caught up in what is expected, or even those childhood dreams about what your wedding would someday be like. I spent way more than I had planned on a beautiful dress that I don’t really regret. And I was able to craft my ceremony to be a reflection not only of my theology, but also the fact that my husband and I came to this point after being together for 7.5 years and having lived together for the previous two. We found some really neat liturgical piece from New Zealand that talked about cairn stones and marking this point on our journey. We had both of our families affirm their blessings upon us. So, parts of the ceremony and reception were uniquely crafted to be about the relationship we had and our equality in it. I danced with my dad at the same time as he danced with hims momBut there were so many things that we could have done without… including floating candles. =)
The one thing that I was pretty adamant about was not wearing a veil because of the cultural trappings associated with it. I was dead set against it. Until the stupid lady at the bridal salon came out with one and my friends encouraged me to try it on since I had the dress on anyways and it just looked amazing. But I think with all of my protesting in the months before, people at least knew that I was against what it meant.
Name wise, I struggled. I took my husband’s last name, but changed my middle name to be both my middle and my maiden name. Mainly because hyphenating our names was a little rediculous. It was a compromise for me. I was always known as Katie Z. because no one could pronounce my last name anyways… now I’m just Katie Z. with another name tacked on.
July 6th, 2009 at 8:53 am
when we got married, much of our ceremony was traditional, and some of it was not. there was talk about submission (because submission is an issue, in my opinion, not just for a wife but for a husband too!), but not in the vows, and nobody promised to obey anybody.
i wore a beautiful white dress, my parents both walked me down the aisle. the pastor introduced us as “Mr & Mrs Hisfirstname & Myfirstname Hissurname”, since i had chosen to take his name for several reasons. (not the least of which is that my maiden name is uncommon, often pronounced and spelled incorrectly, and i never really liked it)
after being introduced as husband and wife, my husband’s best man pulled out two cold cans of Coca Cola from his tux, and we opened them up and toasted before we went back down the aisle… i’ve never been so thirsty in my life, and that Coke was a welcome surprise!
when it all came right down to it… we did things the way we really wanted. my parents had a lot of input into the party (their money was paying for it!), but i had the blue wedding cake i’d always wanted, and we had fun. the ceremony, however, was all about us.
and at the end of the day… the most important part is the marriage anyway. 10 years down the road, i look back on that day with pleasant memories for the most part, and yet they are all overshadowed by the 10 years we’ve spent together and the joys & sorrows that go along with those years.
July 9th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
We got married last month, and we definitely did our fair share of wresting with expectations! As a Catholic couple who wanted to celebrate a full Catholic wedding, we were very lucky to have a priest willing to let us write the language for our ceremony. Mostly we ended up editing out the gender bias in the traditional script.
I did wear white- but only because it was a gorgeous ivory that gave me an itty-bitty waist! And I wore a veil, because the bridal shop owner tossed it in to the bargain for free. I did put the blusher over my face going down the aisle, but as soon as I was standing in front of my groom, I took it off!
As for the name question, we are both very attached to our names and hyphenating would be quite a mouthful, plus I agree with the desire to have one new family with the same name. Our solution was for both of us to drop our given middle name and take my maiden name as our new middle name. So our family name will be his surname, but our middle names will be my surname.
Mostly I’m glad we gave serious consideration to our values and stood our ground on what was important. I think it was worth the stress and the gruff with the family.
July 12th, 2009 at 9:37 pm
It was important for my husband to propose, as well as to have “the conversation” with my dad – both felt like steps of adulthood for him. I decided to respect both of those needs for him, acknowledging that my dad would appreciate it as well and it would actually set a better foundation for their relationship in the future than if my mom had been included. I wonder actually how it might change and even help women’s relationships with our mothers-in-law if we were expected to have conversations like that before engagement!!
And with the proposal, I proposed back – not with fancy words or anything, that’s just not me – but I had a simple ring for him as well. Why should I be the only one given a gift? (Or, the more skeptical version, wearing a mark that I’m taken?) I really appreciate how wearing my ring made this wonderful new stage of life, this awesome commitment, feel more real, and my husband felt the same way.
I had a nightmare wedding in so many ways – I was sick and fainted at the rehearsal dinner, the outdoor reception was rained out, the caterer turned out to be quite dishonest – but I think the process of planning it with my then-fiance, now husband, and starting to find ways to work together and deal with each other’s families was so important! I also remember the ceremony with so much joy – we purposely included a lot of familiar ritual in an effort to include others in shared tradition, but we tailored it as well to reflect our core values. No big budget on flowers or dresses or tuxes – save it for the food and celebrating together afterwards! No veil – I wasn’t interested in showing submission. Our parents walked down the aisle with us and gave us their blessing, rather than giving us away, and of course we didn’t use the word “obey”
The best part was that we each stood with our family and friends to worship and really invite God into the moment before joining together for the vows – I had no voice, but I croaked along as loudly and happily as I could anyway!
October 31st, 2010 at 7:18 am
wedding bands that perform with classical instruments are the best! ~
January 14th, 2011 at 12:18 pm
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