Intermarriage

Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 2009

In this paper I review and examine the assumed link between intermarriage and integration. I focus primarily on literature from the US and Britain. Intermarriage is said to signal a significant lessening of 'social distance' between a minority group and the White majority, enabling unions between groups which would previously have been taboo. It is often assumed that intermarriage for ethnic minorities is the ultimate litmus test of integration, but is it? And if there is a link between intermarriage and integration, what is the nature and extent of 'integration' achieved by minority groups and by the minority partner? I argue that the link between intermarriage and integration is both more tenuous and more complex than many social scientists have argued, and needs a critical reappraisal, especially in multiethnic societies which are witnessing unprecedented levels of diversity, both across and within their ethnic minority groups.

2013

Some speak in tones of sorrow and defeat. Encouraging endogamy, they say, has become a fool’s errand; few Jews are receptive to the message, and short of a wholesale retreat into the ghetto, no prophylactic measure will prevent them from marrying non-Jews. For others, the battle is over because it should be over. Not only, they say, are high rates of intermarriage inevitable in an open society, but they constitute glorious proof of just how fully Jews have been accepted in today’s America. The real threat, according to this view, emanates from those who stigmatize intermarried families as somehow deficient; with a less judgmental and more hospitable attitude on the part of communal institutions, many more intermarried families would be casting their lot with the Jewish people.1

Rodríguez-García, Dan (2015) "Introduction: Intermarriage and Integration Revisited: International Experiences and Cross-disciplinary Approaches". The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 662 (1): 8-36., 2015

The Introduction to this special issue of The ANNALS offers a comprehensive state of the art on the nexus between intermarriage (including mixed individuals and families) and societal integration. It addresses key theoretical and methodological research challenges, considers international and transatlantic comparisons, and also provides useful information to policy-makers and third-sector practitioners. Additionally, it summarizes and comments on the twelve articles—written by leading experts in the field—in this special issue, some of which deal with political and socioeconomic dimensions of integration, and others of which focus on cultural dimensions, daily life, and identity issues. The Introduction concludes that through the investigation of this very complex and multifaceted subject, we can explore the ever-complex dynamics of pluralism, cultural diversity, and social inclusion/exclusion in the twenty-first century and beyond, and evaluate the impact that mixed marriages, families, and individuals are having on shaping and transforming modern societies. Importantly, the study of the growing reality of “mixedness”—an encompassing concept that refers to both intermarriage, mixed families, and the sociocultural processes involved—can tell us not only about the socially transformative value of mixedness but can also shed light on the disheartening persistence of ethnic and cultural divides that hinder inclusion and social cohesion.

Demography, 2010

Little is known about the validity of group-level theories of ethnic intermarriage despite the fact that such theories are often invoked in explaining why certain ethnic groups are "closed," whereas others are relatively "open." We develop a comparative perspective by analyzing the marriage choices of 94 national-origin groups in the United States, using pooled data from the Current Population Surveys, 1994Surveys, -2006, and multilevel models in which individual and contextual determinants of intermarriage are included simultaneously. Our analyses show large differences in endogamy across groups. After taking compositional effects into account, we fi nd that both structural and cultural group-level factors have signifi cant effects on endogamy. Cultural explanations (which focus on the role of norms and preferences) play a more important role than structural explanations (which focus on meeting and mating opportunities). Our results reinforce the common but untested interpretation of endogamy in terms of group boundaries.

The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 2015

Intermarriage is of great interest to analysts because a group's tendency to partner across ethnic boundaries is usually seen as a key indicator of the social distance between groups in a multiethnic society. Theories of intermarriage as a key indicator of integration are, however, typically premised upon the union of white and nonwhite individuals, and we know very little about what happens in the unions of multiracial people, who are the children of intermarried couples. What constitutes intermarriage for multiracial people? Do multiracial individuals think that ethnic or racial ancestries are a defining aspect of their relationships with their partners? In this article, I argue that there are no conventions for how we characterize endogamous or exogamous relationships for multiracial people. I then draw on examples of how multiracial people and their partners in Britain regard their relationships with their partners and the significance of their and their partners' ethnic...

American Sociological Review, 2007

Interracial/interethnic marriage in America is a barometer of racial/ethnic relations and intergroup social distance. Using data from the 5-percent Public Use Microdata Sample of the 1990 and 2000 censuses, we interpret trends in intermarriage in light of new assimilation theory, recent changes in racial classification, and rapid demographic changes in American society. Our results indicate that changes in marital assimilation have taken on momentum of their own; that is, America's growing biracial population has fueled the growth of interracial marriages with whites. Analyses also shed new light on the effects of rapid immigration, rising cohabitation, and educational upgrading on intermarriage patterns, and yield both continuities and departures from the past. Historic patterns of racial/ethnic differences in intermarriage persist—Hispanics and American Indians are most likely to marry whites, followed closely by Asian Americans. African Americans are least likely to marry whi...

One of the consequences of international migration and the permanent settlement of immigrants in southern EU countries is the growing number of inter-country marriages and the formation of transnational families. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, this article examines patterns of endogamy and exogamy (i.e., marriage within/outside a particular group or category) among African immigrants in Catalonia, focusing on bi-national Senegalese– and Gambian–Spanish couples. Socio-demographic profiles, transnationality, the dynamics of cultural change or retention, and the formation of transcultural identities are explored. The evidence presented suggests that social-class factors are more important than cultural origins in patterns of endogamy and exogamy, in the dynamics of living together and in the bringing-up of children of mixed unions. Such a conclusion negates culturalists’ explanations of endogamy and exogamy while, at the same time, emphasising the role of social actors as active subjects in these processes. I further argue that mixed couples and their offspring deal—to a greater or lesser extent—with multiple localisations and cultural backgrounds (i.e. here and there), rather than experiencing a ‘clash between two cultures’. Therefore, it would be a mistake to pretend that multicultural links do not exist and that they cannot be revitalised and functional. The paper starts and ends by addressing the complexities of processes of interculturalism, resisting an interpretation of hybridity and segregation as contradictory or exclusive realities.

2016

This study investigates formation of endogamous and exogamous marriages among immigrants and their descendants in the UK. While there is a growing literature on various aspects of ethnic minorities’ lives in Britain, their marriage patterns have been little studied and understood. Applying event-history analysis to retrospective data from the Understanding Society study the analysis shows, first, significant differences among immigrants and their descendants in the likelihood of marrying within and outside of their ethnic groups. While immigrants from European countries have relatively high exogamous marriage rates, South Asians exhibit a high likelihood of marrying a partner from their own ethnic group. Second, the descendants of immigrants have lower endogamous and higher exogamous marriage rates than their parents; however, for some ethnic groups, particularly for South Asians the differences across generations are small. Third, the exogamy rates are high among ethnic minority wo...

Research on mixed couples goes back to the early 20 th century. Quantitative studies mainly use the term intermarriage and concentrate on integration or group barriers; other approaches speak of transnational marriage: mixed couples are seen as a consequence of migration. In this article, we will define conjugal mixedness as involving all sorts of interethnic or interreligious couples, even those who are not directly linked to migration. What makes them mixed is not their cultural differences, but the inequality between the majority and the minority partner. Prevalent in-marriage norms (endogamy) and conjugal inequality lead to social disapproval, which varies historically and depends on the societal context. Conjugal mixedness furthermore requires an intersectional approach; questions of ethno-cultural, racial or religious belonging are linked to gender, social class and migration. Illustrated by empirical examples in France, we show how conjugal mixedness is defined from the outside, i.e. through social perceptions or disapproval, and constructed from the inside (the couples' own experiences of mixedness in daily life and the adjustments they make). We argue that the way spouses deal with mixedness depends on factors other than ethnic belonging, namely gender, class and migration history.