“I am handsome, economic, caring, I love her, what else do you need?”: anthropological description of the marriage strategy
The article is considered some gender aspects of marriage practices modern urban family. The work is based on the materials of the field research of young Perm families in the 2016-2020, using semi-formal interview and case-studies. The appeal to qualitative methods is conditional upon the study’s specifics - the aspiration to get a lot of information about gender demonstration of at various stages of the marriage strategy. The result of research was the reconstruction of the evolution of relationships and gender identifications of 13 young families. This article founds on the narrative of informants about the main stages of the development of their relationship, which ended with the conclusion of marriage. In the process of analyzing narratives, it turned out that informants falsify practices. They relationship similar to the game with specific signs (special body language, etc.). In this game, the man is given a dominant role; he represents the “macho” image. The woman represents the image of a “small girl”. However, in real life, the leading role is played by a woman. She has higher status positions: the higher education, the senior position, large income. The inequality of respondents is highlighted by the difference in age and an experience of socialization. He is a resident citizen; she has grown up in a village. According to the author, the status inequality of informants, as well as the discrepancy between their public presentations and real images, were updated and emphasized by the mother-in-law. She spoke out against the wedding, because she wanted a more “profitable match” for her son: equal in age and without the experience of past long-term relationships.