this post was submitted on 17 Jan 2024
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Believe it or not cousin marriages are not a big deal in most countries/cultures around the world.
You say that, but it's still really rare in most countries with only about 10% in the entire world. It seems that Arab countries are typically the exception and are responsible for most of that 10%. There is probably a lot of cultural nuance there that I'm missing, but the link below has a world map that really illustrates that it occurs mostly in the Middle East.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cousin_marriage
I did some searching and you're right that it is practiced in high amounts in the middle east however you also find the same in North Africa and parts of Asia (specifically the Indian subcontinent, parts of India and southeast Asia). You also see its practiced in smaller amounts around the world. Including Europe and South America as well some countries to a lesser extent in North America. I'll provide one source below but you can search for more.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.0906079106
It would be interesting to see cultural attitudes towards it around the world though.