Ethnoautobiography definition of marriage

In order to first answer the question of how anthropologists define marriage, we checked out a couple introductory anthropology texts from the library, including:

From these texts, it became evident that anthropologists struggle just as much as we did when it comes to determining a clear, universal definition for marriage.  This is because a universal definition really doesn&#;t exist: marriage is complex and takes on many definitions and diverse practices around the world.

Marriage can be a legal contract, a religious covenant, and a social union. It can occur between a man and a woman, two men, two women, a man and multiple women (polygyny), and a woman and multiple men (polyandry). Polygamy is against the law in contemporary North America, but polyandry and polygyny are both practiced in other societies around the world; however, polygyny is far more common. There is no single explanation for polygyny; rather, its context and function vary among societies and even within