A step towards marriage : perceptions of early marriages in contemporary Singapore

• Main Author: Ong, Clarinda
• Other Authors: Premchand Varma Dommaraju
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2016
• Subjects: DRNTU::Humanities
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/66158
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

In changing times, contemporary lifestyles motivate people to think about marriage and family with relevance to the society’s progress from a primitive state to a modernised and high-technology era. Through interviews with young married Singaporeans (age ranging from 21 to 26), this study further highlights the citizens’ perspectives of early marriages instead of the usual rhetorical research on late marriages and low fertility rates. Theoretical frameworks such as modernisation theory and gender roles have been used to explain young Singaporeans’ perceptions of early marriages shaped by national rhetorics and policies alongside nation’s economical and technological advancements. We argue that this interest in early marriage would spark off new insights as to why people step into early marriages and in turn, create new possibilities for government’s pro-marriage and pro-natal social policies. Keywords: early marriage, family, pro-marriage, modernisation