The Wedding Complex

“This subtly argued book provides welcome relief from the predictable debates that often surround the issue of same-sex marriage. Uncoupling the ritual of the wedding from the legal reality of the marriage, Elizabeth Freeman demonstrates that weddings are, in and of themselves, quite queer indeed. . . . She provides a cogent argument for avoiding the marriage trap while encouraging us to throw all the parties we want.” - Out

"[Freeman] concludes with a good discussion of gay marriage, and a suggestion that the gay community might be better off avoiding wedding rituals and looking for alternative forms of recognition and parity." - Elaine Showalter, TLS

"[I]nteresting and insightful. Freeman’s work creatively illustrates how deeply entrenched notions of marriage are in American society, defining our conceptions of national and personal attachment solely through a monogamous, dyadic couple." - Priscilla Yamin , New Formulation

"[I]ntriguing and original. . . .The Wedding Complex shows that weddings don't equal marriage, and Freeman's divorcing this couple shows us just how rocky their relationship has always been." - Chris Freeman , CLGH Newsletter

"[T]he timeliness, sophistication, and originality of the argument make this a worthwhile book, even (actually, especially) for those beyond the field of 'wedding studies.' It's also well written and occasionally hilarious." - Karen Dubinsky , Journal of the History of Sexuality

"Freeman presents highly original but historically-grounded readings of early modern wedding law and ritual. . . . [She] achieve[s] extraordinarily detailed, original, and incisive readings. . . . The Wedding Complex stands as our most original and theoretically sophisticated work to date on the American wedding. It establishes Freeman as an exciting and important scholar not only in popular culture, but also in American literature, queer studies, antebellum history, and race theory." - Stephanie Harzewski, Iowa Journal of Cultural Studies

"Freeman's work has the joy and playfulness of new scholarship. . . . The work as a whole is both fresh and timely. . . ." - Lori Askeland, American Quarterly

"With catchy quotes and anecdotes throughout, this [bbok] would be suitable for any reader interested in the concept of weddings." - Gemma England, M/C Reviews

“The Wedding Complex by Elizabeth Freeman is an extremely original and important work. Freeman takes a distinctly new and different approach to American canonical texts, asking what forms of belonging and desire they produce outside of normative marital unions. For Freeman, the wedding produces and imagines social and cultural relations and kinship forms even as the heterosexual marriage erases these other modes of desire.” - Jack Halberstam, author of Female Masculinity

“Elizabeth Freeman’s The Wedding Complex performs a crucial scholarly and public service—disentangling the messy, expansive, uncontainable work of the wedding from the normative regulation of the law of marriage. This book is sharp, funny, and deeply significant to current understandings of what is at stake in what are reductively called ‘the marriage debates.’ A must-read for activists and policymakers as well as across the disciplines.” - Lisa Duggan, author of Sapphic Slashers: Sex, Violence, and American Modernity