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Katie Oliviero analyzes the campaign by the Protect Marriage Coalition for Proposition 8 in California. She argues that the opponents of same-sex marriage share with supporters the insistence that marriage is a public institution, not simply a private act between two people. Ironically, defenders of traditional marriage mimicked the performative tactics used by LGBT activists—including staging public weddings—with the goal of depicting same-sex marriage as a threat to traditional American values.

Amy Stone finds that the Christian Right has developed anti-same-sex marriage discourse that appeals not just to conservative voters, but to liberal and undecided voters as well. She argues that, while same-sex marriage may seem to some like assimilation, the strong opposition it has generated suggests that it continues to challenge dominant cultural norms.

Jeffrey Kosbie examines the ways in which the meaning of marriage is constructed by Mass Equality, the social movement organization behind the campaign to protect marriage equality in Massachusetts. He finds that Mass Equality defined same-sex marriage as a “battleground” issue that was important not because it represented the assimilation of same-sex couples into the mainstream, but because it garnered significant opposition among the general public

Introduces the volume by setting the chapters squarely in the context of the debate within the movement over the desirability of marriage. Mary Bernstein and Verta Taylor survey the history of same-sex marriage, outline the different positions from which gay and lesbian activists have critiqued marriage, and address the projected consequences of marriage for the gay and lesbian community and movement.

Mary Bernstein and Mary C. Burke analyze cultural representations of and discourse about gay marriage in mainstream and LGBT newspapers in Vermont. They find that normalizing arguments predominated in mainstream newspapers, yet marriage equality activism was ultimately responsible for making the public aware of the criticisms that have been leveled against marriage by LGBT activists.

Adam Isaiah Green draws on interviews with legally married same-sex Canadian couples to assess the impact of marriage on their relationships. He finds that marriage has complex consequences, both assimilating couples into the mainstream but also providing some with the security to engage in non-monogamy and an unconventional gendered division of labor.

Melanie Heath explores the deeply personal stories of Oklahoma couples who traveled to San Francisco to marry in 2004. She finds that rather than using marriage as a way to assimilate into dominant heterosexual culture, lesbian and gay couples viewed marrying as a political act to resist conservative backlash and discrimination in an environment that is decidedly not post-gay.

Verta Taylor, Katrina Kimport, Nella Van Dyke, and Ellen Andersen draw on interviews and a random survey of couples who married in San Francisco in 2004 to examine the impact of marriage equality activism on activists themselves. They show that the lesbian and gay couples who participated in this event viewed their weddings as intentional contentious public performances and that the solidarity and collective identity created among participants sparked court action and other forms of collective action geared toward policy change. This article, which is the only previously published chapter in the book, won the 2010 Best Paper Award from the Collective Behavior and Social Movements Section of the American Sociological Association.

Kristine A. Olsen examines why Connecticut’s highly successful marriage equality organization, Love Makes a Family (LMF), decided to close its doors after the 2008 Kerrigan v. Commission of Public Health ruling made Connecticut the second state to legalize same-sex marriage. She argues that the exclusive collective identity of LMF equated same-sex marriage with complete equality for gay men and lesbians, reflecting the worst fears of queer critics who argue that the achievement of same-sex marriage will signal an end of the LGBT movement.

Katrina Kimport Kimport analyzes wedding pictures of lesbians who married in San Francisco in 2004, arguing that such photos force the onlooker to read the women as a sexual couple, thus challenging deeply held assumptions about normative sex, gender, and sexuality.

Kathleen E. Hull and Timothy Ortyl consider whether LGBTQ people support the movement’s focus on the right to marry. Through in-depth interviews with community members, Hull and Ortyl show that there is substantial support among LGBTQ constituents for the movement’s broad goals, including the focus on marriage and family concerns.

Arlene Stein compares two cities—Newark, New Jersey, a low income predominantly Black and Latino/a city, and Maplewood, New Jersey, an ethnically diverse middle-class suburb. She argues that poor people in the city are less likely to benefit from marriage, while middle-class same-sex couples living in the suburbs find that marriage facilitates coming out in multiple areas of their lives.