Search

Using data from a survey of cultural transmission of son preference in Lueyang county, this article reports on a quantitative comparative study on acceptance of two types of uxorilocal marriage in contemporary rural China: contingent, driven by household demographic factors, and institutional, driven by practical economic factors. It is shown that the contingent type is more likely to occur than the institutional, and the latter is transmissible within the household while the former is not. Conditions, motivations, and purposes of uxorilocal marriage differ between the two types, as do their determinants. The findings are important for understanding the changing family systems and marriage customs in contemporary rural China.

In this article, the authors report on a study of the cultural transmission of uxorilocal marriage in Lueyang, China. They find that uxorilocal marriage has been commonly accepted and practiced in Lueyang since the beginning of this century, and uxorilocal marriage has been both a contingent and an institutional option for farmers with both preservative and practical purposes. Causes underlying contingent uxorilocal marriage are mostly demographic, and causes underlying institutional uxorilocal marriage are mostly economic, but a weak patriarchal family system, lack of dominant family clans in villages, and relaxed village regulation of uxorilocal marriage in Lueyang also play decisive roles. The occurrence of uxorilocal marriage is transmitted both from parents to children and from nonparental members of communities to couples. Rural economic reform since 1978 has had important influences on the transmission effects of uxorilocal marriage.