Abstract
Contrasting two examples, we examine the ideology of marriage, seeing marriage itself as the product of social scripts and bribes, which foster the illusion of choice. We analyze the languages used in a reality television program called Married by America and the announcement of President Bush’s proposed welfare reform act, to show how internalizing the ideology of marriage induces individuals to take on responsibility not only for the failings of their own relationships, but for the failings of marriage as an institution and of American society as a whole. This ideology is critiqued from a historical perspective.
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Moon, D., Whitehead, J.C. (2006). Marrying for America. In: Kowaleski-Jones, L., Wolfinger, N.H. (eds) Fragile Families and the Marriage Agenda. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-26025-0_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-26025-0_2
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