Kinship
Love and Marriage
Week 10
Political organization...
• At all levels above the band, families (with different definitions) form the
backbone of all societies
• Families determine rules, social norms, traditions
• Families impose punishments and provide rewards
• Families serve as the basis for livelihood and production
• But not all families are the same
Kinship
all societies have
kinship - a sense of
being more related to
some people than to
others
often taken for granted
as being “natural”
rather than cultural
not all cultures define
kinship on the basis of
“blood”
“kindness”
kin
American West
“Blood is thicker than water”
Tory Island, Ireland
--everyone is related to
everyone else so friends are
necessarily also kin
Aleut
Behavior is basis for bonds of
kinship
People who are friends are said
to be cousins
People who used to be friends
are ex-cousins
In their societies, these are
REAL relationships
Families
•
A group of people who
are considered to be
related
•
Family of orientation
- the family in which one
is born and grows up
•
Family of procreation
- formed when one
marries and has children
Symbols for Individuals in a
Kinship Diagram
is married to
female
is cohabiting with
male
is divorced from
deceased female
is separated from
deceased male
adopted-in female
female “ego”
adopted-in male
is descended from
male “ego”
is the sibling of
Kinship gets tricky!
=
=
FaFa
FaMo
MoFa
=
=
=
FaBrW
MoFa
FaBr
FaBr
Fa
Mo
=
2Fa
2FaW
=
Co
Br
Z
=
ZH
2Br
Brazil vs US
• In Brazil, família refers to someone's parents,
siblings, aunts, uncles, etc
• Spouses have their own family
• Children are shared by families
• Marriages do not take precedence over other
relationships
Divorce in Brazil / US
5
Divorce is 19x more
common in the U.S
3.75
U.S. has highest
divorce rate in the
world
2.5
1.25
0
U.S
Brazil
Number of divorces per 1,000 people
Nuclear families
• Are impermanent - they last only as long as the parents and
children remain together
• In most societies, relations with nuclear family members
take precedence, but not always
• In many societies, extended families serve many of the
functions of nuclear families
• Bosnian zadrugas
Nayar
•
Southern Indians
•
Live in complexes called tarawads
headed by a senior woman
•
Marriage is little more than a coming of
age ritual
•
Men and women will only spend a few
days together and then return to their
families
•
Children stay with the mothers
•
Children are not considered to be
related to their fathers
Industrialism and family
•
For many Americans and
canadians, the nuclear family is
the only well-defined kin unit
•
Most North Americans leave
home and sell their services to
the market, often moving where
jobs are available
•
This leads to neolocality - the
homes of married people are
determined by their jobs
•
Married couples are expected to
have homes of their own
Middle vs Lower Classes
The incidence of expanded family households is greater
among lower class members than middle class
Extended family - multiple generations
Collateral family - siblings & spouses
Why is this the case?
Nuclear family is the ideal?
1970
2009
50
37.5
25
12.5
0
Married w/
children
Married w/o
children
Men alone
Women alone
Other
Changes in Kinship
Between 1970 and 2010...
Divorce rate in the U.S. increased by 5x
Number of single-parent families increased by 4.5x
Number of unmarried women over the age of 21
doubled
Growing isolation from kin groups is the norm
Formal Study of Kinship:
Typologies and Naming Systems
• Anthropologists collected data on kinship terms and
relationships around the world
• Created categories, or types of kinship systems with
similar features, named after a particular culture, such as
“Eskimo kinship”
• Kinship diagrams used as a descriptive and analytical
tool
Descent
• Kinship through birth into a particular group - this is
permanent
• Two major types:
– Unilineal
– Bilineal
How modes of livelihood fit in with kinship
Foraging
Horticulture
Pastoralism Agriculture
Industrialism
Descent
Bilineal
Unilineal
Bilineal
Marital
Residence
Neolocal /
bilocal
Matrilocal or patrilocal
Neolocal
Household
type
N/A
Extended
Nuclear/Singleparent/singleperson
Unilineal Descent
• Basis of kinship in 60 percent of the world’s cultures
• Most associated with pastoralism, horticulture, and
agricultural modes of livelihood
• Two major types of unilineal descent:
– Patrilineal (through the male line)
– Matrilineal (through the female line)
Patrilineal Descent
• Found among 45% of all
cultures
• Kinship is traced through
the male line
• Males dominate status,
power, and property
• Strongest versions found in
South Asia (India,
Pakistan) and East Asia
Patrilineal descent:
• Ha Tsuen, Hong Kong
• Strong system of patrilineal descent
• Women do not own property and have no
control over household
• Women’s role is to produce sons
Ha Tseun
All males have the same surname
All children are given a first name (Ming)
Boy’s mings are distinctive and flattering
Girls...no so much... “Too Many” or “Little Mistake”
When they get married, men add a marriage name and
a public name
women lose their mings and become “wife of ...”
Matrilineal Descent
Found in 15% of all cultures
Kinship is traced through
the female line
Women control land and
products
Found in SE Asia, South
Pacific, North America
Minangkabau
Victorious buffalo!
World’s largest matrilineal
society
Women control land
Women and men live
separately
Religion is Islam, local beliefs,
and Hinduism
Houses have swept roofs that imitate buffalo horns
Bilineal Descent
• Descent is traced equally
from both parents
• Married couples live away
from their parents (neolocal
residence)
• Inheritance is allocated
equally among all children
regardless of their gender
Descent Groups
Organized group of relatives who descend from an
apical ancestor (person at the apex)
e.g. “Adam” from the Bible would be apical for
everyone
Lineages - demonstrated descent from an apical
ancestor (Jewish and Arabic patrilineages)
Clans - stipulated descent, often from a distant
ancestor or animal (totem)
Residence Rules
Patrilocality - married
couples live in husband’s
community
Matrilocality - married
couples live in wife’s
community
Neolocality - married
couples live apart from
family
Marriage
Marriage?
“Marriage is a union between a man and a woman such
that the children born to the woman are recognized as
legitimate offspring of both partners”
This definition, which comes from a recent California state bill, is probably familiar to you
Your textbook says...
• Marriage is a more or less stable union, usually
between two people who may or may not be coresidential, sexually involved with each other, and
procreative with each other (p. 134)
Polygyny
A man weds two (or
more) women
Polygyny
Common practice (historically) among farming
societies (including Hebrews)
Benefits
More women have access to marrying wealthy
husbands
Women have larger support system when husband
dies
Increases kin group size
de facto polygamy
In many societies, the practice
of keeping “mistresses” is
extremely common
Polyandry
Women who wed two (or
more) men
Polyandry
Most common form is #aternal polyandry - or marriage
to multiple brothers
Benefits
Accomplishes the same effect as primogeniture
(where only eldest son inherits land/title) and...
It keeps members of kin groups from being split
apart
Various forms
technically...you could do all
three at once
Common-law
Civil union
Holy matrimony
Same-sex marriages
In Sudan, a woman could marry another woman if her
father had only daughters but no male heirs
In this situation, the daughter
legally becomes a man
The “wife” in the relationship
would have sex with approved
men until she was pregnant
The child would be the legal
heir of the two women (not the
biological father)
Same-sex marriages
Among many native american groups, there are figures
known as berdaches
Men who took on
the role of women
Commonly married
widowers, thereby
preventing the
children of the
dead wife from
being replaced
In the U.S., marriages:
Establish the legal father of a woman’s children and the
legal mother of a man’s
Give either or both spouses a monopoly in the sexuality of
the other
Give either or both spouses rights to the labor of the other
Give either or both spouses rights over the other’s property
Establish a joint fund of property for the benefit of children
Establish a socially significant “relationship of affinity”
between the spouses and their relatives
Rules for Finding a Marriage
Partner
• All societies have preference and exclusion rules for finding a
spouse
• In our culture, preference rules are...
• Age
• Height / Weight
• Wealth
• Race
• Location
• Physical ability / prowess
• Romantic love
Exclusion Rule
• All cultures have some form of incest taboo
• An incest taboo forbids sexual intercourse and/or
marriage between certain kin
• Some societies include cousins and half-siblings...some
don’t
• Some argue that incest “horror” is instinctive, but there
are many learned behaviors that are universal
• Lévi-Strauss linked the incest taboo with the origin of
exchange among humans
Status Considerations in
Partner Selection
Endogamy and Exogamy as
General Preference Rules
• Endogamy: marriage within a particular region or
social category
• Exogamy: marriage outside a particular region or
social category
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Getting Married
• Often involves a series of gift/monetary exchanges
between the bride’s and groom’s family
• The wedding: range from very simple to highly
elaborate and expensive
–weddings “crystallize” and highlight cultural meanings
of the marital relationship and gender roles
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Major Types of Marriage
Exchanges
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Forms of Marriage
• Polygamy: marriage
with multiple spouses
• Monogamy: marriage
between two people
– Most common form of
marriage cross-culturally
– Polygyny: one man
and more than one
woman
– Polyandry: one
woman and more than
one man
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.