Three Families in One Marriage

This book provides a systematic psychological study of merged-homes marriage families, a new model of marriage and family arrangement that has emerged in some rural areas of China in the last 20 years. In this arrangement, after the marriage of a couple, three families start living together: the paternal grandparents' family, the maternal grandparents' family and the young couple with their children as a nuclear family. Drawing on rich qualitative fieldwork conducted in the rural area of the city of Suzhou, in eastern China, the volume analyzes how individuals actively construct meaning, negotiate roles, and manage competing obligations across generations within a family model that operates at the intersection of integration and separation. Instead of looking at the macro- and meso- level from a sociological or anthropological perspective, this volume focuses on the micro psychological level and tries to understand the dynamics between the three families and how the traditional values of family life get preserved and transformed into the families’ daily interactions within this new model of marriage. By situating merged-homes marriage families within debates on patriarchy, gender equality, and intergenerational intimacy, the book highlights how traditional patrilineal norms are both challenged and reconfigured in contemporary rural China. Three Families in One Marriage: Chinese Merged-Homes Marriage Families on the Border of Separation and Integration will contribute to interdisciplinary scholarship in cultural and developmental psychology, family sociology, and Chinese studies by offering an empirically grounded and conceptually nuanced account of new family practices and their implications for understanding family change in the Global South.