8
October - William Jankowiak
UNLV
Anthropology
A
Case for Emotional Monogamy
Ethnographic
Inquiries into Sex, Love and Intimacy
No culture is ever completely successful, or satisfied, with its synthesis
or reconciliation of love and sex, though every culture is compelled to
attempt one. No matter how socially humane, politically enlightened, spiritually
attuned or technologically adapted, failure is the name of the game.
Dissatisfaction to some degree is everywhere, since we rarely, if ever,
can have both. Its dissonance sounds in all spheres of culture. To
date, either cultural anthropologists or evolutionary oriented researchers
have confront this eternal human conundrum.
Evolutionary theory is relentless in documenting the sex link differences
in erotic perception and behavior, while virtually silent in its
examination of emotional intimacy. In this paper I want to explore the
human pair bond from the other side of the equation - emotional intimacy.
Specifically I want to construct an ideal type of the human pair bond all
toward the end of constructing a case for the universality of emotional
monogamy. In support of my analysis, I will present the results of several
recently competed and several on going field research projects conducted
among American swingers, in an American polygamous community, contemporary
People's Republic of China husband-mistress entanglements, and the results
of a cross-cultural survey examining the ways women respond to infidelity.
The
implications of my findings for evolutionary and cultural theories of the
sexuality will also be explored.