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Articles on Romantic love

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Figuring out what to do with the ‘Song of Songs’ has preoccupied people reading the Bible for centuries. 'Song of Songs' illustrated by Florence Kingsford/Southern Methodist University/Wikimedia Commons

Why is a love poem full of sex in the Bible? Readers have been struggling with the Song of Songs for 2,000 years

The famous biblical book alludes to God only once. Historically, though, most interpreters have argued the poem’s about love between the divine and his people.
Evolutionary psychology may explain why magical thinking is so central to love. Viva Luna Studios via Unsplash

Why does love feel magical? It’s an evolutionary advantage

It’s not logical to believe your relationship is “meant to be.” But believing in destined love may have evolved as a way to keep couples together long enough to reproduce and raise children.
Tamil cinema’s breakup songs favour men. Here Dhanush consoles Sivakarthikeyan in the 2013 film ‘Ethir Neechal’ (‘Swimming Against the Tide’). (Wunderbar Films)

Tamil cinema’s breakup songs need a little more love

‘Soup songs,’ a genre of Tamil breakup songs, refer to a man’s emotional state after being dumped and are full of blame for women. A more nuanced approach to love would be better for everyone.
The myth that educated women over 40 find it impossible to find a mate to marry prevails - but it has long been debunked. What are the actual impacts of higher education on a women’s ‘marriageability?’ Here a wedding pic from Cambridge Mill, Cambridge, Canada. Anne Edgar/Unsplash

Does being smart and successful lower your chances of getting married?

The old myth that it’s impossible for educated women over 40 to get married still lingers. Actually, educated women are doing OK in the U.S. In China, however, the story changes.
Augustin Burdet (engraver) French active (19th century) Victor Marie Picot (after) Cupid and Psyche (c. 1817) engraving. 39.9 x 49.2 cm (image), 49.4 x 57.5 cm (sheet) National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne Felton Bequest, 1927 (3506-3)

Friday essay: finding spaces for love

In early modern times, wooing happened at balls and markets and in churches; while sex was obtained in bathhouses, inns, brothels and alleyways. Art tells the story.
Sexuality presents us with personal and private concerns that are also very political. Shutterstock

Of love letters and other gestures of romantic love

Perhaps we can think of the love letter and other gestures of romantic love as forms or techniques that mediate the violence of time, dispossession and exclusion.

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