American Orthodox Wedding Rituals (AOWR)

It is interesting that the non-Jewish world, and the non-Orthodox world, and now the Orthodox world have this whole thing with engagement rings and wedding rings. Engagement rings are always in one direction: The bridegroom buys a very expensive item, with real economic value, for the bride -- and receives nothing in exchange.

Then (except in certain sectors of the Orthodox world), afterwards, the two parties perform a ceremony, in which each gives the other a ring, which is much less expensive than the engagement ring.

Thus, the engagement-ring thing is really a sort of a קנין -- the husband buys the wife with a 20K diamond ring. On the other hand, the wedding-ring thing is just a ceremony.

This is parallel to the halakhic Jewish way, in which Qiddushin (a קנין) is followed by Nissu'in (some kind of ritual).

But it's interesting, because the Orthodox Jews of today's America have grafted the WESTERN nissu'in onto the JEWISH qiddushin, by doing the wedding-ring ritual at the moment of the qiddushin

Isn't that interesting?