In the article When Brothers Share a Wife Among Tibetans, the good life relegates many women to spinsterhood by Melvyn Goldstein states that many Tibetans follow their culture about brothers sharing the same wife. Two or more brothers sharing the same wife and have the same equal access to the wife is referred as fraternal polyandry (Goldstein 1). This type of marriage is basically arranged by parents with children. However, the Westerns do not see this as the right thing to do and they believe that this is structural violence because it harms them from preventing them from meeting their basic needs and therefore they also believe in structural relativism because they are judging them by their own personal perspective. Agency plays a part
…show more content…
When a wife marries multiple husbands there could be some struggles that the younger husband might face because of his age. If the youngest husband is very young he does not participate in actual marriage ceremonies, and they join the marriage when they reach their mid-teens and therefore, has not much of a say growing up because him and his older brother(s) have been joined together with the wife (Goldstein 1). However, the joining together of the wife and the husbands the youngest one has no free will when he grows up. As years pass the youngest husband “may consider his wife “ancient” and would prefer a woman his own age or younger” (Goldstein 2). If he decides to separate from the home, he would have to find a way to find unused land that is not too high or too arid. He would need to farm and maintain animals that would live in that new area (Goldstein 3). Making it very difficult for a very young husband that would no longer want to practice the fraternal polyandry marriage. Being too long when he got married makes it difficult to have a say in issues like these that can be caused. In conclusion structural violence and agency play a major role in Tibetan culture because of their practices of fraternal polyandry marriage when viewed from other society’s perspective. Westerns viewed this from of marriage because they were judging them based of their own personal practices of
When a wife marries multiple husbands there could be some struggles that the younger husband might face because of his age. If the youngest husband is very young he does not participate in actual marriage ceremonies, and they join the marriage when they reach their mid-teens and therefore, has not much of a say growing up because him and his older brother(s) have been joined together with the wife (Goldstein 1). However, the joining together of the wife and the husbands the youngest one has no free will when he grows up. As years pass the youngest husband “may consider his wife “ancient” and would prefer a woman his own age or younger” (Goldstein 2). If he decides to separate from the home, he would have to find a way to find unused land that is not too high or too arid. He would need to farm and maintain animals that would live in that new area (Goldstein 3). Making it very difficult for a very young husband that would no longer want to practice the fraternal polyandry marriage. Being too long when he got married makes it difficult to have a say in issues like these that can be caused. In conclusion structural violence and agency play a major role in Tibetan culture because of their practices of fraternal polyandry marriage when viewed from other society’s perspective. Westerns viewed this from of marriage because they were judging them based of their own personal practices of