Reproductive Choices And The Local Culture

Human is the most creative creature and the most beautiful scene on the earth. The occurrence of human is not independent, but a result of evolution and competition among species. Likewise, human has to reproduce itself, generation after generation. That is, the sustainable development of human and it's society depends on reproduction. Since paternal line times in human history, males' physiological and social dominance have deeply impacted people's fertility Concept: Male babies were preferred all along. Many couples even tried to achieve this goal by means of high technology, which lead to a series of social problems. China is a large agricultural country; therefore we cannot afford to overlook farmers' fertility decisions. Garry S. Becker's introduction of economics into family and fertility research is a great leap forward in bringing economic analysis into sociology study. However, birth decisions are still not completely explained on the very basis. As a part of human culture, fertility is greatly affected by culture. Based in farms and living in countryside, Chinese farmers cannot avoid the influence of local custom and show strong conservative fertility behavior. Taking the A village in Fijian province as a case, applying method of field investigation, I will try to address the effect of local custom on farmers' fertility decisions from the perspective of farmers' fertility behavior.The article is totally divided into six chapters: Chapter 1 introduces previous studies and the motivation, contribution, and methodology of this study and defines key concepts. Chapter 2 is a brief introduction of Ancun's natural and social environment and the life of three generations who dwell there. In Chapter 3 a questionnaire survey among Ancun residents is provided, together with deep interviews. This chapter describes current Ancun residents' fertility concept and fertility desires in four aspects, namely, the purpose of fertility, the sex preference, the number of children they desired, the will of fostering their children..Chapter 4 is a case study of the kid's cost-effect for three generations. In this chapter I question Becker's cost-benefit theory by showing how it does not explain a Chinese case. Chapter 5 discusses the two balancing forces under Ancun residents' birth decision making. On the on hand, the local culture, custom, birth belief, genealogy, and village tradition, encourages more children. On the other hand, China's strongly enforced birth control policy suppresses the residents' desire of more birth. Chapter 6 summarized this study and points out some limitations.