The Effect of the Identities Acquired Through Marriage on Reproducing Gender Roles: The Identity Example Of “Bride” - “Sister-In-Law”

Social relations are shaped by the status and roles that individuals have. Marriage relationships and the new roles acquired by these relationships have important influence on identity acquisition process of individuals. The functioning of roles and statuses within the family are established by marital bonding and also become evident by the influence of the families of spouses. Within the traditional family structure, each status has a role to play, and these roles are both the carrier and the convertor of gender roles. It is seen that gender roles are reproduced and transformed by two of these roles, the bride and the sister-in-law. In this study, it is aimed to explain the perceptions and attitudes of the individuals influenced by the roles; “bride” and “sister-in-law” within social gender concept. Research was conducted by using discourse analysis approach. In this research how people who are referred both as the “bride” and the “sister-in-law” identity perceive each other over the status they have, and the situations that go beyond the meanings of the discourses is analyzed. The research has two dimensions. The first dimension is defined as content analysis. In the content analysis, the opinions and descriptions of the interviewers during the interview are summarized in a table according to subjects. Then, in order to reach the meaning beyond the text, critical discourse analysis was used and thus the relevant issues and definitions and the processes and expectations were tried to be reached. According to the analysis, how the roles and responsibilities are defined/how they should be defined in terms of “bride” and “sister-in-law” identities and how these discourses determine social relations and in particular family relations are discussed. According to the results of the study, even if the social relations and practices have changed, the expectations and attitudes about the identity of the “bride” and the sister-in-law” in particular have not changed to the same extent. This has shown that sexist approaches are more common, especially in the acquisition of marital identities