新求婚時代女性求婚不容易

Leap year marriage proposals — where, by custom, women are granted the once-in-four-years privilege of proposing to their beaus — hold the promise of giving women real power in their relationships, but ultimately, they actually undermine women and reinforce long-standing stereotypes about traditional roles, a new paper concludes.
傳統上講，女性在閏年可以向自己的心上人求婚，這可是四年一遇的難得機會，而且有望使女性在戀愛關係中擁有實權，但最新研究表明，閏年求婚從本質上講對女性不利，並會強化人們對傳統男女角色的長期刻板印象。

And after examining a century's worth of evidence of societal views of women who propose marriage, the research concludes that we're not likely to see greater acceptance of these proposals anytime soon.
在研究了一個世紀以來對求婚女性的社會觀念的證據後，研究人員得出結論稱，人們對女性求婚的接受程度近期不會有所提高。

"Women have made tremendous advances in many aspects of their lives, but in courtship, this penultimate act is still not valued or respected," said researcher Katherine Parkin, a professor at Monmouth University in New Jersey.
美國新澤西州孟茅斯大學的研究員、凱瑟琳•帕金教授說：“女性在生活的很多方面都取得了巨大進步，但對求婚而言，這種退而求其次的行爲仍然被認爲毫無意義，也不受尊重。”

Parkin's article was published in the January issue of the journal Family History.
帕金的這篇文章發表在一月份的《家庭史》期刊上。

In her research, Parkin pored over references to leap year proposals in postcards, advertisements and newspaper columns dating back to 1904.
在她的研究中，帕金集中參考了1904年以來明信片、廣告、新聞專欄中提到的女性閏年求婚。

The evidence she found suggests that the proposals have always been fairly unusual, and their rarity and the attention given to them has only underscored the idea that in society's view, men should be the ones to initiate marriage. Leap year proposals are the exception that proves the rule.
她發現的證據表明，女性求婚一直非常少見，而且其罕見性和人們給予它的關注強化了應該是男性求婚這種社會觀念。女性求婚是種例外恰恰證明了這一點。

The custom has really been only a "safety valve" for women's frustrations at being dependent on men, Parkin said. The tradition gives women a supposedly "acceptable" chance to propose, but this chance is given only once every four years, and even then, their right to ask a man to marry has not been taken very seriously.
帕金說，女性在閏年求婚這種習俗實際上僅僅是女性依賴於男性這種挫敗感的“安全門”。這種習俗似乎給了女性一個“可接受”的機會去求婚，而且四年纔有這樣一次機會，但即使這樣，人們對女性求婚的態度也不是很認真。

In fact, Parkin said she was surprised by the "incredible nastiness" toward women in postcards created in the early 20th century. Sending postcards was the craze back then, and leap year postcards depicted women — usually unattractive older women — holding guns to men's head in efforts to extract a promise of marriage. "They really disparaged women in ways that are cruel and heartbreaking," Parkin said.
事實上，帕金說自己看到20世紀早期的明信片對女性的“難以置信的惡意”時非常驚訝。在當時，郵寄明信片還很時尚，但閏年的明信片把女性，通常是沒有姿色的老女人，描繪成拿槍頂着男人的腦袋逼婚的樣子。帕金說：“人們以殘忍和令人心碎的方式污衊女性。”

Her research showed that women who propose seem to lose a bit of their femininity, in the traditional way it is viewed, and likewise men who accept a proposal lose a bit of their masculinity.
她的研究表明，按傳統觀點來看，求婚的女性似乎缺少了一些柔美，同樣，接受求婚的男性也少了幾分陽剛之氣。

Even today, women who propose are the exception, Parkin said, pointing to the example of pop star Britney Spears proposing to then-boyfriend Kevin Federline. "Very few women have the wealth and power of someone like Spears, and her short, troubled marriage, as well as her struggles with her mental health, only make it less likely that other women would want to emulate her," Parkin said.
帕金說，如今女性求婚也是特例，她還以流行歌手布蘭妮•斯皮爾斯曾向當時的男友凱文•費德林求婚爲例。她說：“很少有女性擁有布蘭妮的財富和權力。但她的婚姻很快結束而且麻煩不斷，加之她總是受心理問題的困擾，這也只會使其他女性更不願效仿她。”