A poignant account of everyday polygamy and what its regulation reveals about who is viewed as an ‘Other’
In the past thirty years, polygamy has become a flashpoint of conflict as Western governments attempt to regulate certain cultural and religious practices that challenge seemingly central principles of family and justice. In Forbidden Intimacies, Melanie Heath comparatively investigates the regulation of polygamy in the United States, Canada, France, and Mayotte. Drawing on a wealth of ethnographic and archival sources, Heath uncovers the ways in which intimacies framed as ‘other’ and ‘offensive’ serve to define the very limits of Western tolerance.
These regulation efforts, counterintuitively, allow the flourishing of polygamies on the ground. The case studies illustrate a continuum of justice, in which some groups, like white fundamentalist Mormons in the U.S., organize to fight against the prohibition of their families’ existence, whereas African migrants in France face racialized discrimination in addition to rigid migration policies. The matrix of legal and social contexts, informed by gender, race, sexuality, and class, shapes the everyday experiences of these relationships. Heath uses the term ‘labyrinthine love’ to conceptualize the complex ways individuals negotiate different kinds of relationships, ranging from romantic to coercive.
What unites these families is the secrecy in which they must operate. As government intervention erodes their abilities to secure housing, welfare, work, and even protection from abuse, Heath exposes the huge variety of intimacies, and the power they hold to challenge heteronormative, Western ideals of love.
Table des matières
Introduction: Forbidden Intimacies in Global Perspective
1. Racial Projects and Unexpected Divergences in Regulating Polygyny
2. Labyrinthine Love and Homegrown Polygamies
3. Migratory Polygamies: Racialization and Colonial Reckonings
4. Patriarchal Musings: Gender, Power, and Agency in Living Forbidden Intimacies
5. Race, Religion, and Stigmatized Intimacies: Pushing Polygynous Families Underground
6. Recognizing Polygamies: Fighting Over Intimacy
Conclusion: Forbidden Intimacies, Racial Projects, and Legal Jeopardy
A propos de l’auteur
Melanie Heath is Associate Professor of Sociology at Mc Master University. She is the author of
One Marriage Under God: The Campaign to Promote Marriage in America (2012) and co-author of
The How To of Qualitative Research, second edition (2022).
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