The demographers of the world have established the following: Americans get married more often than our counterparts in other wealthy nations, we get divorced more often, and when we’re living with someone and the relationship goes south, we’re quicker than most to hit the escape hatch.
But, why?
That’s the question that has consumed Andrew Cherlin, a Johns Hopkins University sociologist, for the past few years. Why do we, as a society, trade in our significant others so much? And what does that mean for our kids?
“There’s more turnover in American families,” said Cherlin, 60, during a recent interview from his Baltimore office. “I wanted … to go back in history and think hard about culture and look at economics and figure out why that might be.”
The result of that inquiry is Cherlin’s new tome, “The Marriage-Go-Round: The State of Marriage and the Family in America Today.” The statistic-heavy 288-page book, ($25.95), walks readers through the history of marriage in this country starting from the 17th century.
In that evolution, he writes, lies the answer to “why.” As a society, we developed competing priorities: We at once revere the institution of marriage but put personal fulfillment above almost all else.
Almost 90 percent of Americans will marry during their lifetimes; the divorce rate hovers around 50 percent. Other developed nations, Cherlin found, place strong emphasis on either relationships or individualism, but in no other place is there such heavy belief in both.
Cherlin believes it may turn out to be a good thing for the longevity of their relationships that people are waiting longer to get married. Many of the Gen-Xers tying the knot today are themselves children of divorce, he said, but it’s too early to know if they’ll repeat their parents’ patterns.
Of one thing he is sure: Divorce has done little to lessen our veneration of marriage.
“It’s becoming a symbol of living a successful personal life,” Cherlin said. “It’s as if marriage is the ultimate personal badge, and everyone wants to wear it.”
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