By — K.S. Prathignya

Abstract:

This article examines how certain romantic concepts such as the ‘soulmate’ often restrict the mobility of a woman’s autonomy. This leads to the strengthening of marriage as an institution due to the bargaining of a woman’s autonomy becoming a life-long process.

Introduction

Love refers to an emotion which includes strong senses of affection, attraction, and companionship for another. These are feelings which are concerned with the welfare and goodness of others.

Robert Sternberg’s Triangular Theory of Love (1986) comprises three components which make up love, which are: intimacy, passion, and commitment. Intimacy refers to emotional connectedness that comes from cultivating vulnerability. Passion refers to motivation, drive, and curiosity that leads to the cultivation of overall attraction in an existing bond. Sternberg argues that love can be in various combinations but always with these three components. Therefore, love can fluctuate and is dynamic, providing different experiences overall.

However, Sternberg’s model does not originally take the socialization process into account. The idea of love is constructed by society, surroundings, and upbringings. Prior to the 19th century, courtship was much more popular with families choosing spouses for their children, with more concern for social status than romantic love. Although this concept has mostly died in the West, it still remains extremely alive in Asian countries such as India.

In the 20th century, dating culture became more popular, where individuals had more choice in who to pursue romantic relationships with. While dating culture has also become more popular in India throughout recent years, there seems to be a gendered norm behind the accessibility and autonomy of romantic love, as well as the notion of it being patriarchal.

Purity culture refers to values or norms that circle around sexual autonomy before marriage as well as an emphasis on modesty. It is understood that these values directly affect one’s moral compass. However, in modern day, purity culture is heavily imposed on women, often used as a tool to shame women for using their autonomy. There are outdated traditions to also prove a woman’s purity, such as the ‘two-finger test’ which refers to a virginity test used on women that checks for a broken hymen. 

Concomitantly, ideological purity lies in structuring the notion of how romance should be perceived, which helps conserve the purity of women. Slutshaming is a more explicit method to criticize and question the purity of a woman, as the shame associated with it renders women to be more cognisant of their perception within society. Society often stigmatizes women that choose to exercise their autonomy as undesirable, and associate them with women that actually participate in sex work. Therefore, regardless of what kind of autonomy a woman exercises, if she is slutshamed, it questions her desirability and worth for romantic love.

However, more implicitly, the idea of a soulmate is used as a tool of weaponization by the patriarchy. The soulmate refers to the one who can provide what Sternberg refers to as consummate love, which is the most ideal form of love. However, the soulmate model argues that the romantic partner should fulfill and complete an individual becoming a soulmate.

From a gendered lens, the woman should continuously search for her soulmate, therefore also ‘saving herself’ for her soulmate. As the patriarchy renders women as dependent and passive agents, the idea that romantic love should complete a woman also becomes an inherent idea pushed on women.The importance placed on this idea impacts the autonomy of women. Therefore, a woman’s worth is placed on her body, and if she is undesirable in that sense, then she is not worthy of love and cannot find her soulmate. Similarly, sexual purity is internalized, meaning that her virginity is ‘sacred’ to where only her soulmate can have access to it. As women bargain with exercising their autonomy as per society’s wishes, this also transpires into romantic relationships where she becomes a self-sacrificial figure.

Bargaining of Autonomy

Bina Aggarwal argues how women are always expected to bargain, as their autonomy is conditional. She highlights how women have to bargain for access to basic amenities, and if unable to do so, she has a weaker position in the relationship. The autonomy of a man is assumed, and a woman must negotiate within that framework However, the work in a relationship that is undervalued (such as emotional, care, and domestic labour), is also bargained upon to create equality between two partners.

Firstly, the prior of which leads up to this extreme stage is when the woman begins by bargaining her autonomy (sexually and non-sexually) while single.The restriction of her autonomy leads to constraints on her survival, leaving her at the mercy of her so-called soulmate.. Secondly, slutshaming serves as a method to control what women can bargain about, as she is expected to be more submissive and passive, and when exercising her autonomy is against that, she restricts herself. The concept of soulmates frames the stakes of bargaining: a woman is taught that marriage defines ‘the one’ and that her value depends on how much autonomy she is willing to give up.  Ultimately, this renders women as passive agents and regulates gender roles.

Why and how is there such a heavy emphasis?

The concept of a soulmate is instilled through socialization, a life-long process. For example, as girls participate in princess-play, it shapes identities of what a ‘good woman’ is. As young girls enact the role of an ideal princess, sedimented identities are strengthened. Sedimented identities  refer to a reflection of the available identity performances, social performances, and dispositions learned from peer and family circles through the mode and materials available to a child. The ideal princess bargains with her autonomy and receives her ‘prince charming’. A revolving theme with a number of Disney films circle around the female lead having a purpose and then the plot deterring into her purpose becoming the ‘prince charming’ she fell in love with, the film then ends with her getting married. As young girls consume this material and then reenact it in their peer circles, the concept of a prince charming being the soulmate that completes them, becomes internalized, as well as the idea that bargaining their autonomy is the way to gain that romantic love.

The gender norms that go into the idea of what a good woman is typically equate exercising autonomy to outspokenness, where the ideal woman is to be submissive and passive. As young girls consume this, they internalize that this is how one should be. This passes onto romantic relationships, where the man is expected to take the lead and the woman is expected to sit in the passenger’s seat. This is an example of hegemonic femininity, which refers to the dominant ideals which are culturally and socially accepted and associated with womanhood in different contexts.

A critical lens:

Concomitantly, with an application of a Gramscian and Althusserian framework, hegemony is built through state and civil society. Marriage as an institution leads to procreation, which leads to the reproduction of the labour force.

The state cannot force this belief, therefore this is carried out through ideological state apparatuses within civil societies. The concepts of princess–play and soulmates serve as an ISA, which reinforce the civil society’s function to strengthen hegemonic femininity. Ideological State Apparatus (ISA) refers to how propagative material works for and against the state through civil society to maintain the state’s hegemonic values.

Two apparatuses under civil society are religion and media, the former is where purity culture emerges from, with the latter being where these ideas spread. ISAs serve as specific propagative materials to push an overall narrative.

The soulmate is an idea that strengthens the institution of marriage by reinforcing purity culture, as well as hegemonic femininity. This propagates the internalization of societal norms and equates womanhood with bargaining.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the concept of a soulmate as well as romantic love is used as a method to reinforce hegemonic femininity. This process consists of identity reinforcement from a young age done through princess-play, and as a woman grows she is subjugated to slutshaming for exercising her autonomy. This conditionality of her autonomy leads her to fulfilling concepts such as the soulmate model, therefore strengthening the institution of marriage through the becoming of a self-sacrificial figure.

Author’s Bio:

Prathignya Komandur Sriram is a second-year student majoring in Political Science (Hons.) as well as a minor in Economics. Her interests include applying critical heterodox theory to dissect how ideological apparatuses, contextual climates, and capitalism shape public discourse in the 21st century.

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