Polygamy vs. Monogamy essays

Polygamy vs. Monogamy essays Monogamy and polygamy are the two distinguishing types of marital structures that exist in modern society, each having differentiating circumstances encompassing their views. Monogamy, universally accepted in the American culture, can be defined as when a single female and male come together, marry, and mate. Polygamy, more formerly accepted in the Arabic and African cultures, is defined as when one single male marries and mates with several single females. The rules of marriage are fairly well drawn out for monogamy, but polygamy is faced with the contrary due its complex nature. Religion plays a vital role in the determination of whether it is religious acceptable for a culture to partake in polygamy as well. Polygamous marriages definitely face more problematic marriages than monogamous. A study of the Palestinian Bedouin-Arab community in the Negev region in Israel was conducted by Salman Elbedour, Anthony J. Onwuegbuzie, and Mohammad Alatamin. In their attempts to find behavioral problems arising from polygamous and monogamous families, they were able to come to the conclusion that polygamous families face more interfamily conflict than that of monogamous families. Uneven treatment of wives by the husband (Hassouneh-Phillips, 2001, as cited in Elbedour, Onwuegbuzie, Alatamin, 2003). This is a problem that has naturally arisen from the polygamous marriage system. The husband can simply not evenly distribute their time to all of his wives. Naturally, this could occur by choice too. A husband can choose to neglect one of his wives and her children, thus creating more problems. The child may feel isolated and too distant from his father due to this conflict between husband and wif e. In a practical monogamous marriage, the husband and wife will attempt to come to an agreement that would be positively suitable for the child. Due to the large nature of a polygamous marriage, the final agreements made by the h...