How has the American wedding changed?
If you’re over the age of 30 you may remember being one of the 750 million television viewers worldwide who watched the broadcast of Princess Diana’s 1981 wedding. From the cathedral to the carriage to the gown, the ceremony embodied the fairy-tale wedding ideal that many brides since have strived to emulate. In the past twenty years, the extravagant “white wedding”—a term connoting the Western tradition of a white wedding dress, made popular in the Victorian era—has become the norm in America, says Beth Montemurro, associate professor of sociology at Penn State Abington. Until the 1980s, only the well-to-do engaged in lavish weddings, she explains. But thanks to the affluence of that decade and an increasingly celebrity-obsessed consumer culture, expensive weddings have become the standard. “The lavish wedding has allowed people to have a little bit of celebrity for one day. The image of the indulgent wedding is so prevalent in the media, you feel like that’s what you’re supposed to d
