Thesis advisor: Alan Rogers / Until the late 20th century marriage in the United States meant "the legal union of a man and a woman as husband and wife." In 2003, this was forever changed when the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court found a state law barring marriage between two individuals of the same sex unconstitutional in Goodridge v. Dept. of Public Health (2003). The case triggered a legal and social transformation for LGBT civil rights. Same-sex marriage has become one of the most widely discussed legal topics in the past ten years. This thesis examines the content, context, and significance of this particular case and the effect it has had on the American legal and cultural landscape. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2015. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Departmental Honors. / Discipline: History.

Marriage has come to be center-stage in a semiotic and ideological “culture war.” The issue of same-sex marriage has emerged as a defining political argument shaping the manner by which the contemporary gay rights movement positions itself. In Georgia’s 2004 election, a constitutional amendment was proposed defining marriage as legal unions between only biological men and women. In response, campaigns were organized by both supporters and opponents to same-sex marriage. This thesis examines the politics of spectacle at play through which both sides of this argument positioned themselves. This thesis employs anthropological theory, queer theory and public sphere literature to illuminate the campaign against same-sex marriage as one of not only the denial of citizenship rights, but of identity recognition. The methods of theatricality employed by both sides of this debate are examined alongside the manners by which they represented themselves as legitimate voices in the fight over “marriage.”

Before we can properly answer the question “What is marriage?,” we must first be able to answer the question “What is marriage for?” Defining what marriage is, before fully understanding what marriage is for, presumes we already know what marriage is for, when in fact we do not. In a moral sense, marriage is for love. And in a legal sense, marriage is for everyone (regardless of sexuality or race). In this paper I discuss how, regardless of whether you view marriage in a purely moral or in a purely legal light, marriage equality should be afforded to all citizens.

Thesis (M.S.W.)--Smith College School for Social Work, Northampton, Mass., 2007 / Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment for the degree of Master of Social Work. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 60-62).

Thesis (M.A.) - Simon Fraser University, 2006. / Theses (Dept. of Sociology/Anthropology) / Simon Fraser University.

Thesis (Ph.D. (Church History and Polity))--Univeristy of Pretoria, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph.D. Law)--University of Waikato, 2009. / Title from PDF cover (viewed December 10, 2009). Includes bibliographical references (p. 501-535)

While same-sex marriage rights have expanded to twelve states, the time-lag in research and publishing has meant that most published studies on same-sex relationships has relied on a hodge-podge of same-sex relationship types. This study uses interview data with same-sex couples who have wed in the years after marriage became available and examines their incentives to wed and the decision making process they go about in planning their weddings. Against a backdrop of larger debates in the queer community surrounding assimilation and access to benefits, couples are changing how we must think about marriage and creating new norms for the institution. This study seeks to answer the following questions: This raises the following questions: How do a group of people previously barred from a legal institution make the decision to enter into that institution? Do they consciously see the act of marrying as a political decision, as a flouting of convention or as a reproduction of it? Does this shift to marriage represent an assimilationist tendency on the part of participants, or are they changing relationship norms and the institution of marriage itself? Studying the ways in which same-sex couples answer these questions allows us to see the meaning making that those couples do when engaging in public rituals and they will be shaped by access to this institution while changing marriage itself.

Same sex couples around the nation have continually fought for their right to marry and in thirty-six states they have been given that right. What same-sex couples did not think to fight for was the right to divorce. There has been a considerable lack of focus on one such issue often left out of the public discourse over marriage equality: determining parental rights for the purposes of child custody/visitation in the context of a homosexual relationship that has broken down. The choice to have a child in a same-sex couple, with the exception of adoption, usually only allows for one parent to serve as the biological parent to the child. These options include: surrogacy, in vitro fertilization, and artificial insemination. What that means is that it leaves the other parent as the nonlegal and nonbiological parent in which they would be given no rights to the child if the relationship were to dissolve. After looking at many cases in Florida, the courts place a significant emphasis on biology in determining child custody in dissolution of marriage or relationship proceedings. In this thesis, we offer solutions in order to allow same-sex couples the equal parental rights they deserve even when they are not the biological parent of the child. Florida statutes have not been updated to reflect the changes in the law such as the recognition of same-sex marriage and the right for same-sex couples to adopt. Although restrictions on adoption and same sex marriages have been found unconstitutional, the implications of these changes in the law regarding custody and parental rights have not changed. Once the proposed solutions have been adopted, same-sex couples will be able to dissolve their relationships and marriages without fear of losing the custody and/or visitation rights to their child while still applying the best interest of the child standard used in heterosexual dissolution of marriage cases.

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