What are the different gender roles in courting in today 's society compared to the novels?
This is going to be my research of the novel , which was situated in Georgian England during the Regency period before the Victorian Era, towards contemporary American culture. I found out that, for a woman, finding a husband was a serious issue in upper class to middle class families. For the most part, these affluent women had no further duty than to get married, most of their talents were centered around impressing the suitors. This code of where the man must court the woman protected a woman 's reputation. It was the father 's, or other elders responsibility to actively seek out suitors for his daughter at parties and dances (Goddard, 2014). In …show more content…
Collins proposes to Elizabeth his hand in marriage with a huge soliloquy of reasons why she should marry him. He keeps going on and on how they should marry for the money, the property, that they would be a good match since they are cousins, and that HE would be happy, essentially the motive for their marriage should be practicality. (Austen, p. 65) This was rather common in the Regency era. Couples of the wealthier social class would marry within their social class to retain family wealth. In this case, the Bennett daughters would need to get married to maintain their social status since women could not inherit property, thus they could not support themselves. Similar to today, arranged marriage were atypical. When being courted the woman also had the right to accept or reject the proposal thus they had a choice of "love". Most of the arranged marriage were from the monarchy (Bolen. 2011). Today when we think about marriage we picture two love birds who are still in the honeymoon stage that make a formal commitment to be with one another, most people nowadays marry for love. People today make an active choice of whether to marry another person because they feel an emotional connection with another individual. In this individualistic society we are raised up with the idea of a romantic companionship, with the majority of Americans that are married (54%) and have never married but would like to someday (21%) saying that 85% of American seek/sought marriage …show more content…
Marriage was not only a big deal because it involved a lot of money and emotional connection but because it was a set in stone final decision. A man could not just divorce a women without risk of hurting his name among the people. In Chapter 42, Elizabeth thoughts are narrated "But she had never felt so strongly as now the disadvantages which must attend the children of so unsuitable marriage," this reflects the stakes of Elizabeth 's marriage with Mr. Darcy. (Austen 138) One bad move in marriage could ruin the life of both the spouse and all the people whom the spouse is in charge of, especially with the size of Darcy 's estate. Aside from divorce not being an option, marriage and the proposal into the marriage must be witnessed by third party to prevent fraudulence. This was why Darcy had to re-propose to Elizabeth after they came back from their afternoon walk. Going back to the topic of divorce, people nowadays find divorce extremely common. About 45%-50% of people end their first marriages in divorce (Divorce Magazine). America is rated to have the highest divorce out of all the countries in the world. The problems of marriage in the past no longer exist here in the future. People of today have marriage like an open door, they come and go as they please, and they can do whatever they want with it. There are no legal limitations to marriage once occurs aside from the social obligation to
This is going to be my research of the novel , which was situated in Georgian England during the Regency period before the Victorian Era, towards contemporary American culture. I found out that, for a woman, finding a husband was a serious issue in upper class to middle class families. For the most part, these affluent women had no further duty than to get married, most of their talents were centered around impressing the suitors. This code of where the man must court the woman protected a woman 's reputation. It was the father 's, or other elders responsibility to actively seek out suitors for his daughter at parties and dances (Goddard, 2014). In …show more content…
Collins proposes to Elizabeth his hand in marriage with a huge soliloquy of reasons why she should marry him. He keeps going on and on how they should marry for the money, the property, that they would be a good match since they are cousins, and that HE would be happy, essentially the motive for their marriage should be practicality. (Austen, p. 65) This was rather common in the Regency era. Couples of the wealthier social class would marry within their social class to retain family wealth. In this case, the Bennett daughters would need to get married to maintain their social status since women could not inherit property, thus they could not support themselves. Similar to today, arranged marriage were atypical. When being courted the woman also had the right to accept or reject the proposal thus they had a choice of "love". Most of the arranged marriage were from the monarchy (Bolen. 2011). Today when we think about marriage we picture two love birds who are still in the honeymoon stage that make a formal commitment to be with one another, most people nowadays marry for love. People today make an active choice of whether to marry another person because they feel an emotional connection with another individual. In this individualistic society we are raised up with the idea of a romantic companionship, with the majority of Americans that are married (54%) and have never married but would like to someday (21%) saying that 85% of American seek/sought marriage …show more content…
Marriage was not only a big deal because it involved a lot of money and emotional connection but because it was a set in stone final decision. A man could not just divorce a women without risk of hurting his name among the people. In Chapter 42, Elizabeth thoughts are narrated "But she had never felt so strongly as now the disadvantages which must attend the children of so unsuitable marriage," this reflects the stakes of Elizabeth 's marriage with Mr. Darcy. (Austen 138) One bad move in marriage could ruin the life of both the spouse and all the people whom the spouse is in charge of, especially with the size of Darcy 's estate. Aside from divorce not being an option, marriage and the proposal into the marriage must be witnessed by third party to prevent fraudulence. This was why Darcy had to re-propose to Elizabeth after they came back from their afternoon walk. Going back to the topic of divorce, people nowadays find divorce extremely common. About 45%-50% of people end their first marriages in divorce (Divorce Magazine). America is rated to have the highest divorce out of all the countries in the world. The problems of marriage in the past no longer exist here in the future. People of today have marriage like an open door, they come and go as they please, and they can do whatever they want with it. There are no legal limitations to marriage once occurs aside from the social obligation to