ABSTRACT
Susan Squire traces marriage back to 10,000-8,000 BCE when she suggests that an important discovery was made after a previously nomadic tribe, located in the vicinity of the Mediterranean Sea, settled down at a fertile field in an area with a salubrious climate. Important as these histories of marriage are in demonstrating the variety of human experience, they underplay the politics of recent marriage models as well as their relationship to the nuclear family and different forms of oppression. The ceremony has become a bigger and more drawn out affair 'an individualistic adventure rather than a community sacrament, as one American commentator put it. Further evidence of the continued commodification of marriage is the growth in so called 'destination weddings, whereby bride and groom invite guests, at great expense, to join them at an exotic location offshore. Humanity may yet fulfil the forestalled hopes of '60s radicals by constructing more liberating affiliations than the legally-bound couple.
