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The effect of immigration within the last decade has had a growing impact upon coupling patterns in the United States that both challenge and redefine Western frames of partnering and marriage itself. These social structures, subject to reciprocal states of flux, are what I refer to as culturally sanctioned “intimate assignments.” Arranged marriage exists in many forms and encompasses a wide spectrum of degree of choice that situates the couple in extended kinship, religious, political, and economic contexts. Transforming into amalgams of tradition and American frames of marriage following immigration, this synthesis provides a diverse landscape in building foundations for prospective intimacy. In working with these individuals and couples, we, as complexity-oriented analysts, are compelled to stretch our interpretation of the nature of self, love, attachment, agency, and personal freedom.
Thread into the fabric of urban life is the field where these new hoped-for forms of intimacy are portrayed. A Muslim woman in full burka, a “sent for” bride, is newly married to her American husband dressed in hip-hop garb. A Hindu physician plans her dowry with her parents who have been saving since her birth. An ivy-league Ugandan patient worries that she will not be “enough” for her American husband, as her professor father practiced polygamy. A convergence of cultural surrounds are constantly being absorbed, processed consciously and unconsciously in revised organizations of individual experience, written within the American vernacular of hope and freedom.
Simultaneously, a shaping of parameters in transitioning from the familiar and cherished to the untested terrain of American versions of dating and marriage are designed. American practices are often viewed as highly vulnerable to divorce, which remains a pervasive source of stigmatization in many third-world countries. Traditions that protect family breakdown can be seen in arranged marriages. For example, although arrang