The Importance of Being Monogamous: Marriage and Nation Building in Western Canada to 1915 (The West Unbound: Social and Cultural Studies) - Softcover

Carter, Sarah

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0888644906 ISBN 13: 9780888644909

Publisher: University of Alberta Press, 2008

Synopsis

Sarah Carter provides a detailed description of marriage as a diverse social institution in nineteenth-century Western Canada, and the subsequent ascendancy of Christian, lifelong, heterosexual, monogamous marriage as an instrument to implement dominant British-Canadian values. It took work to impose the monogamous model of marriage as the region was home to a varied population of Aboriginal people and newcomers such as the Mormons, each of whom had their own definitions of marriage, including polygamy and flexible attitudes toward divorce. The work concludes with an explanation of the negative social consequences for women, particularly Aboriginal women, that arose as a result of the imposition of monogamous marriage.

"Of an immense amount of new and pathbreaking research on Native people over the past 20 years, this work stands out." -Sidney L. Harring, Professor of Law at City University of New York and author of White Man's Law: Native People in Nineteenth-Century Canadian Jurisprudence

About this title

Book Description:

Examination of marriage as a diverse social institution in nineteenth-century Western Canada.

From the Back Cover:

"The Importance of Being Monogamous revises what we know about marriage and the gendered politics of the late nineteenth century. [It] shifts our understanding of Aboriginal history during [these] critical years and brings together the fields of Indigenous and migrant history in new and important ways." Adele Perry, Associate Professor of History, University of Manitoba Sarah Carter provides a detailed description of marriage as a diverse social institution in nineteenth-century Western Canada. She charts the ascendancy of Christian, lifelong, heterosexual, monogamous marriage as an instrument to shape and institutionalize the gender order as the foundation of this new region of the nation. It took great effort to impose the monogamous model of marriage on a varied population of Aboriginal people and newcomers such as the Mormons, each with their own definitions of marriage, including polygamy and flexible attitudes toward divorce. The work concludes with an explanation of the negative social consequences for women, particularly Aboriginal women, that arose as a result of the imposition of monogamous marriage. Sarah Carter, F.R.S.C., is H.M. Tory Chair and Professor in the Department of History and Classics, and the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. She is a specialist in the history of Western Canada and is the author of Aboriginal People and Colonizers of Western Canada to 1900, Capturing Women, and Lost Harvests. Sarah Carter was awarded the Jensen-Miller Prize by the Coalition for Women's History for the best article published in 2006 in the field of women and gender in the trans-Mississippi West.

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Alberta Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0888644906
• ISBN 13: 9780888644909
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 400