Mating, marriage, and the status of woman / by James Corin.

  • Corin, James.
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Mating, marriage, and the status of woman / by James Corin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    28/204 (page 12)
    That promiscuity was not a feature of the primitive human being has been urged by various writers—for instance, by Dr. Westermarck, in his above-cited work, by Dr. Andrew Lang in an article, “ Tribe and Family,”^ and by other writers whose opinions it will be necessary to consider. But it may be suggested that very much of the difference of opinion expressed by writers is due to a misuse, perhaps, of terms on their part, or to a misunder- standing, perhaps, of their terms by their readers. It is a dangerous practice to employ the terms of ordinary speech to express strictly limited scientific concep- tions : it may seem more simple than to use new terms, but it is a fertile source of error. Thus to most readers promiscuity suggests the most libidinous forms of sexu- ality as developed in civilization ; but nothing of this kind occurs with brutes, and could not have been the case with primitive man, for physiological reasons. It is necessary, then, to be exact with terms : therefore the following suggestions are made :— Mating is the free choice of partners at any time. Marriage (Gamy) is the more ’ Fortnightly Review, Nov. 1903, p. 782.