Border Marriage and Border Polygyny

In the literature of anthropology, although being given importance to the cultural borders in the context of relations between social groups, it is noticed that the political borders are mostly neglected. This study realized as a field research discusses various appearances of cross-border marriages that political borders cause in historical development. The field of study is two districts in the border between Turkey and Syria, Nusaybin in Mardin city and Qamişlo in Cezire region.The main reason of why these two cities are selected is that Nusaybin and Qamişlo were divided as two different districts with the new borders drawn in the beginning years of 20th century and were positioned as two cities against one another. After all, the crucial part of the findings of that field study is from Nusaybin. The individual experiences and their life stories of “Syrian brides” who got married and then came to Nusaybin are collected with the way of doing in-depth interviews. For understanding and analyzing the dynamics of tensions and competitions between “Syrian brides” and “local women”, it is taken care to getting these two groups of women together and is done participant observation when these women get together. When examining the conclusions of this research with all findings, although in the beginning the ethnic continuities betweeen these two districts influence in cross-border marriages, it is seen that the poverty is the main reason for these marriages for last years