Love in the Time of Coronavirus: Innovation and Tradition in the World of Quarantine Weddings

Abstract

International sociological research based on demographic data has shown that the COVID-19 pandemic significantly shaped the way of getting married. According to this research, varying from minimal to dramatic, there was a decrease in marriage rates worldwide. The marriage rate in Hungary showed a different picture. The number of weddings increased by 3%. It can also be seen that the number of marriages per month during the pandemic tended to decrease in periods of severe restrictions and lockdowns and to increase in periods of temporary loosening. While the period of restrictions was characterized by civil ceremonies and micro-weddings, the period of loosening the restrictions saw a mixture of large and tiny weddings, with or without civil marriages. So, people did not postpone or proceed with their weddings but tried to stick to their original plans despite, or rather besides, the changed circumstances; or, abandoning certain expectations and inventing new ones, they rescheduled their wedding. Based on my digital anthropological research, this paper raises questions: why did some people get married during the lockdown periods, or why did others postpone their weddings until after the restrictions were loosened? In the following, I aim to explore the modified wedding practices adapted to newer circumstances and analyze the ways of selecting and constituting the wedding “tradition” (“bricolage of traditions”).