Bali Fantasy

 

 

Secondary negative restrictions

Many Balinese texts list varieties of incest and near incest (garnia). For example, real sibling-sibling marriage and real sibling-parent marriages are taboo. Marriage between the senior-fernale generation and the junior-female generation is prohibited, as is marriage between higher caste females and lower caste males; marriage between the senior-male generation and the junior-female generation is possible but discouraged. Client-guru marriage is also characterized as incestuous." If we consider incestuous unions and intergenerational endogamous ones, especially aunt-nephew, as a core of prohibitions that underlies the three positive marriage types, there remain secondary

prohibitions which call influence marriage decisions and thus shed light on tile positive standards already reviewed.
Restriction L One strategical marriage prohibition implements a status relation between two groups to the advantage of both. This is possible because of the range of indexes of rank: title, caste, temple type, legends, and so on. For example, in a newly settled area a temple group claiming noble or even Brahmana status might deem a lower (Sudra) group as unmarriageable. Such a rule also implicitly elevates the lower group by distinguishing it from ordinary, potential wife-providers to the superior group. Institutionalized as unsuitable spouses, the elevated Sudra group can cultivate specialized service or ritual bonds with the superior group. The lower group might even explain its relation to the higher group as that of junior to elder 'brothers,' who are prohibited from exchanging sisters, as will be discussed later. III short, prohibiting an ordinarily acceptable hypergamous union helps to actualize a full range of status distinctions ill a given locality: high-caste group, privileged-Sudra-ancestor group, both set off against commoners in general.

Restriction IL Mention of the possible codification of higher and lower groups as brotherlike brings us to provisos that restrict marriage options in light of prior unions. The general principle is that a woman may not marry back to the place of origin of either her sister or her mother; this can be brought to bear on group
endogamous marriages as well as outside marriages. First there is a prohibition on sister exchange between terminological brothers. Or, two 'brothers' may not arrange an exchange of daughters as spouses for their sons. This restriction qualifies patri-paralel cousin -marriage preferences, since not every such cousin is a permissible spouse. Moreover, the restriction guarantees that within an endogamous group, the flow of women of one generation between two collateral lines will not be reversed. If applied, the restriction supports hypergamous implications even of endogamous unions and thus accentuates rank between collateral lines.

A related restriction applies to subsequent generations. The rule states that a girl may not return to the origin-place of her mother. Or from the male's point of view, the son of one's 'brother-in-law' may not marry one's daughter. This formula extends the one-way flow of women into subsequent generations by banning father's sister's dau-11ter (FZD) marriages. Both rules are secondary devices for programming consistent marriage directions - one within a generation, the other across real generations. Groups with ritual experts who invoke these restrictions reveal pockets of actualized hypergamy in their marriages. By the same token providers of' wives can cite these rules as an hierarchically neutralized explanation of their alliance position, which is otherwise liable to be construed as inferior. That is, an ancestor group that has provided wives for another group over several generations can argue that this is simply because a girl cannot marry back to her mother's house. At the level of structure these rules establish a short-term unidirectional flow of women.
But at the level of actor rationalizations, they allow the inferior party to explain away hypergamous overtones in the marriage relationship. The rules help to explain how the Balinese value system supports ancestor-group endogamy as well as hypergamy between either different groups or divisions of the same group.

Previous Next

 

More

Pages