Jenny Munro, Lyn Parker, Dyah Rahayuningtyas, Tengku Syawila Fithry, Yohana Baransano
Recent trends in marriage include delaying marriage, the rise of singlehood, and romantic or companionate marriage. In studying these developments, including in Indonesia, anthropologists have largely focused on urban, educated, middle class youth, where ideals of romantic love and couple-focused fulfilment are evident. To broaden this perspective, this article focuses on the experiences of young, lower-class, low-income newlyweds. Drawing on diverse ethnographic life stories from Indonesia (metropolitan Java, rural West Sumatra, and coastal Papua), we show that marital ideas and practices stressed broader family expectations and social legitimacy, social and economic forms of care, and interdependence with extended kin. They did not generally express middle class romantic and companionate notions of love or marriage. These accounts highlight the salience of everyday material, social and economic aspects of care in marriage that have received less consideration recently due to the anthropological interest in romance, intimacy, and care as loving attention. © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
University of Queensland, Australia; University of Western Australia and the Australian National University, Australia; Universitas Brawijaya, Indonesia; Independent Researcher, Indonesia; Yum Yaf Papua Foundation, Indonesia
