The book in which “amatonormativity” was first coined and defined is Minimizing Marriage by Elizabeth Brake.
some quick quotes from the book (if you think the quotes aren’t so quick, consider that they’re a lot quicker than reading the entire book):
““amatonormativity”—the focus on marital and amorous love relationships as special sites of value”
“The belief that marriage and companionate romantic love have special value leads to overlooking the value of other caring relationships. I call this disproportionate focus on marital and amorous love relationships as special sites of value, and the assumption that romantic love is a universal goal, “amatonormativity”: This consists in the assumptions that a central, exclusive, amorous relationship is normal for humans, in that it is a universally shared goal, and that such a relationship is normative, in that it should be aimed at in preference to other relationship types. The assumption that valuable relationships must be marital or amorous devalues friendships and other caring relationships, as recent manifestos by urban tribalists, quirkyalones, polyamorists, and asexuals have insisted.”
“Violations of amatonormativity would include dining alone by choice, putting friendship above romance, bringing a friend to a formal event or attending alone, cohabiting with friends, or not searching for romance” [note/analysis from me: this specifically applies to situations where these things are considered unusual. Going alone to get a bite to eat at a taco truck while single is not considered unusual or something that one “should” have a partner for, so it doesn’t violate amatonormativity, while preferentially dining without one’s partner and eating dinner alone at a nice sit-down restaurant may. Having roommates while single in college does not violate amatonormativity, choosing to live with friends instead of one’s partner does. Use your discretion to figure out what would actually register as “abnormal” in your social context.]
“Amatonormativity wrongly privileges the central, dyadic, exclusive, enduring amorous relationship associated with, but not limited to, marriage. By “central,” I mean the relationship is prioritized by the partners over other relationships and projects. Such relationships tend to be characterized by sexual exclusivity, domesticity, and shared property, but need not be: Couples who maintain an enduring amorous relationship but refrain from sex, maintain separate domiciles, or keep their property disentangled, can still be recognized socially as amorous partners. Conversely, two friends who have sex, live together, or share property would not be privileged by amatonormativity if the friends did not present themselves as romantic partners. Thus, legal marriage, sex, shared domicile, or shared property are not necessary conditions for privilege; an amorous, enduring, central love relationship is. While marriage is not necessary for privilege, it is usually sufficient for it. While amorous love, endurance, and centrality are jointly sufficient for privilege, no one of these features is independently sufficient. A brief, amorous summer fling or extramarital affair would not be privileged, and friendships may be central and enduring but still not privileged”
“The relationships penalized by amatonormativity may or may not involve sex and romantic love. Polyamorous relationships fail to meet the norm, just as groups of friends do. Polyamorists have multiple domestic or sexual partners, who in turn also typically have other partners, and these multiple relationships are character- ized by affectionate bonds as well as sex (although there is some debate within the polyamorous community as to whether polyamory must involve love). Elizabeth Emens gives examples of the range of polyamorous configurations falling outside the norm of “compulsory monogamy” as well as amatonormativity: Mormon polygyny, an “ethical slut,” a woman with two “husbands,” and a four-partner family or “multi- party marriage.”” [note/analysis from me: because Brake is writing from and to a USAmerican perspective, her examples relate to what is normative in the USA as a whole. Polygyny may be amatonormative in a social context where it’s normative, like within a Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints community or in Saudi Arabia. Even then, however, the same behavior that may be normative in an accepting community is still non-normative when the Mormon or Saudi polygamist is talking about it with a circle of secular Americans in New York.]
“One way of demarcating the privilege accorded by amatonormativity is that the privileged relationships are given family status. Family tends to be understood, for legal and census purposes, either by marriage or a marriage-like relationship (such as monogamous cohabitation or “common-law” marriage) or by the presence of chil- dren. Further, the reproductive family tends to be understood in marital terms… while single parents and married or “common law” parents are recognized in law, extended-family or friend parental groups tend to remain invisible.”
“Amatonormative discrimination does not consist merely in stereotyping and lack of social recognition. Much tangible discrimination attaches to marital status. Discrimination in housing, with preferential treatment for the married, is legally permitted in the United States, and is official government policy in military housing. An array of government benefits is accessible by the married, widowed, and divorced. Married or formerly married persons qualify for U.S. Social Security payments based on their spouse’s employment. Married workers receive significantly higher benefit packages when these include spousal health insurance at a reduced rate, while unmarried persons receive no opportunity to purchase health insurance for a friend. Workplace discrimination is the apparent cause of the fact that married men receive significantly higher pay than their unmarried male peers with similar levels of achievement; moreover, singles widely report being expected to work evenings and holidays, to take on assignments involving extensive travel, and otherwise being treated by employers as if their nonwork commitments were less important than those of married co-workers. Physicians report providing better care to patients whom they saw as family members. Finally, law enforces “compulsory monogamy” by imposing penalties—not just in criminal law penalizing adultery and bigamy, including bigamous cohabitation in some states, but through residential zoning laws limiting numbers of unrelated cohabitants and in child custody decisions. (For example, the child of a woman with two “husbands” was removed due to the judgment that her lifestyle was immoral.)”
A lot of people in the aromantic community online use “amatonormativity” to mean, basically, alloromonormativity, that is, an expectation that people will feel an emotion of romantic love and engage in romantic relationships based on it. Sometimes they will use amatonormativity to refer to the expectation that people feel emotions of love at all, including love toward family and friends. I would caution against using it in the former way and I would caution strongly against using it in the latter way. That said, Brake’s definitions and analysis aren’t the last word on amatonormativity just because they’re the first words. There are valuable expansions on the idea of amatonormativity from aromantics, and you should use your own judgment to think critically about how this term and idea should best be understood.
