Marriage

===Prescriptive marriage===
{{Main|Arranged marriage}}
[[File:Lodewijk XIV-Marriage.jpg|thumb|left|An arranged marriage between [[Louis XIV of France]] and [[Maria Theresa of Spain]]]]

In a wide array of lineage-based societies with a [[Kinship|classificatory kinship system]], potential spouses are sought from a specific class of relative as determined by a prescriptive marriage rule. This rule may be expressed by anthropologists using a "descriptive" kinship term, such as a "man's mother's brother's daughter" (also known as a "cross-cousin"). Such descriptive rules mask the participant's perspective: a man should marry a woman from his mother's lineage. Within the society's kinship terminology, such relatives are usually indicated by a specific term which sets them apart as potentially marriageable. [[Pierre Bourdieu]] notes, however, that very few marriages ever follow the rule, and that when they do so, it is for "practical kinship" reasons such as the preservation of family property, rather than the "official kinship" ideology.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bourdieu|first=Pierre|title=Outline of a Theory of Practice|year=1972|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge |pages=27–29}}</ref>

[[File:Minangkabau wedding 2.jpg|thumb|right|Indonesian wedding]]

Insofar as regular marriages following prescriptive rules occur, lineages are linked together in fixed relationships; these ties between lineages may form political alliances in kinship dominated societies.<ref>{{cite book|last=Radcliffe-Brown, A.R.|first=Daryll Forde|title=African Systems of Kinship and Marriage|year=1950|publisher=KPI Limited|location=London}}</ref> French [[Structural functionalism|structural]] anthropologist [[Claude Lévi-Strauss]] developed [[alliance theory]] to account for the "elementary" kinship structures created by the limited number of prescriptive marriage rules possible.<ref>{{cite book|last=Lévi-Strauss|first=Claude|title=Structural Anthropology|url=https://archive.org/details/structuralanthro00lv|url-access=registration|year=1963|publisher=Basic Books|location=New York|isbn=978-0-465-08230-8}}</ref>

A pragmatic (or 'arranged') marriage is made easier by formal procedures of family or group politics. A responsible authority sets up or encourages the marriage; they may, indeed, engage a professional [[matchmaking|matchmaker]] to find a suitable spouse for an unmarried person. The authority figure could be parents, family, a religious official, or a group consensus. In some cases, the authority figure may choose a match for purposes other than marital harmony.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Orange County Register|url=https://www.ocregister.com/2021/07/03/south-l-a-man-faces-federal-charges-related-to-fireworks-explosion-that-injured-17/|access-date=2021-07-04|website=Orange County Register|date=4 July 2021|language=en-US}}</ref>