Emic and Etic: A Floral Editorial

From NarratingLandscapes

After all there is something about a wedding-gown prettier than in any other gown in the world.

~Douglas William Jerrold

I have tried, in this project to take both an emic and an etic perspective into account. An emic interpretation is the easier one: I am a bride-to-be. I am planning my wedding. It is personal. I can relate to the idea that having the most beautiful wedding includes having the best of everything. There is so much pressure to be the perfect bride; to throw the perfect wedding. It isn’t even for me – it’s about me, but not for me. Ravenous consumption has become fashionable and with it the desire for instant gratification. It is en-vogue to be hedonistic, especially when it comes to one’s “happily-ever-after.” Of course I want the best flowers for my wedding. I don’t want ‘filler flowers’ or ‘window-box flowers’ in my bouquet; I don’t want my guests to know I planned my wedding from The Budget Wedding Sourcebook.

What I don’t know is why? And why don’t I know why? The emic perspective would suggest that, as a ‘native’ or ‘insider’ I should be able to interpret the customs/beliefs of my ‘society’. Well, I can say that I have bought into the big, beautiful wedding dream, and part of that dream is having the most beautiful blossoms. I read an article in The Vancouver Sun a few months ago that conveyed that modern brides wanted “a more sophisticated look rather than something that says, 'I just went out to the garden and gathered flowers.'” The article used words like “elegant,” “glamorous” and “fashionable” –not to describe the bride, but the flowers!! How’s a girl supposed to compete? I think that this sort of marketing is how a girl like me, who considers herself to be at least moderately intelligent, buys into the whole conspicuous consumption side of things, even when it comes to something which should be as simple and beautiful as including the gift of nature in my special day.

From an etic perspective, I would have to say that there may be some truth to the whole concept of the “bridezilla” but that brides are so heavily sold on the idea that they must have the perfect wedding day and that doing so necessitates all the perfect material trappings of the wedding industry, that in the end, I don’t know that they really have a choice. A wedding is a ceremonial rite of passage that, for women, represents a new social status. A woman who is married is part of the same social culture as her mother and all the mothers that have gone before her. The flowers at a woman’s wedding are a part of the period of liminality, of “betwixt and between” where she has left her single life, but is not yet a part of that new culture of ‘the married people.’

What I have learned is that while rites of passage, that is the idea that they exist and persist, are pretty much fixed, how we perceive them and how we choose to regard them is what changes. As an individual I can choose to be a part of the wedding mania that has become wildly popular for the modern bride. I can choose to rebel against this completely and not subscribe to any of the popular wedding ‘traditions’. In the end, I am hoping for a healthy balance—a little mania and a little rebellion! I hope also that whatever flowers I do choose to include in my rite of passage, are a reflection of my joy and not of my chequebook.

Sources:

Whysall,Steve. Modern-day wedding bouquets. The Vancouver Sun Published: Saturday, March 08, 2008

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liminality