XXIIL
Matnlineal Kin Groups
the Saipan Carolinians there are two types of matrigroup: the clan and the lineage. Neither of these appears
The characteristics of clan
to have the vitality it once possessed.
and lineage are described below.
Among
lineal kin
Maternal Clan
On Saipan the maternal clan is a group consisting of individuals
both sexes who count descent through the maternal line and
believe they are all related, though an actual genealogical relationEach clan has a name and
ship usually cannot be demonstrated.
of
is
traditionally exogamous.
Although some of the young people were uncertain of their clan
affiliation and had to check with an older relative when questioned,
only one Carolinian adult was completely ignorant of clan affiliation,
and this person was an orphan. Clan names are still remembered
and are passed down to the young. Often, however, an adult will
know his own clan but will be ignorant of more than one or two other
clan names.
As a social unit, the clan is called an ainang. The recorded
names of the Carolinian clans are given in the following list.
ailingaitau
SAIPAN
334
In former times, the clan functioned to extend hospitality,
of visiting canoes were provided for by their clan
activities.
as
when the crews
mates on Saipan, but this kind of event lies well in the past.
To judge from the seriousness with which elderly Carolinians
discussed the matter, the clan was until recently exogamous. Neither
marriages nor casual sexual relations were permitted between members of the
of one's
same
clan.
Kinship terms were extended to
all
members
own
situation
is
clan and they were all considered related. Today, the
by no means the same. There are at least three intra-
clan marriages and I found few young Carolinians who would consider the former exogamy a bar to either sex relations or marriage
with a person of the same clan. There is in this matter a very marked
contrast between old people and young adults in the way in which
clan
exogamy
is
regarded.
Although there is no accepted, negative
who break clan exogamy, elderly in-
social sanction against those
formants were most positive in their expressed attitudes against such
infractions of custom, whereas young adults regarded clanship as an
interesting part of Carolinian tradition but of minor significance in
their lives.
The
today a traditional entity with little or no actual
ban on sex relations and marriage seems to have
been the property longest retained and last to disappear. On Saipan,
clan
is
function, but the
the lingering sentiments against sex relations within the clan bear
on the general problem of incest regulations. Although it is obvious
that incest within the nuclear or elementary family is not the same
as sexual intercourse between members of an exogamous clan, it is
not difficult to find societies where there is a strong aversion to sex
relations among clan mates and where strong negative sanctions
are applied to offenders. In cases where clan organization is breaking
down, as on Saipan, attitudes against clan incest are among the last
properties of the clan to disappear. At the same time, when clans
cease to be functional and when an increasing number of clan mates
have casual sex relations or enter into formal marriage, I have personally never found that parties to this breaking with custom were
bothered by the fact. The decline of clan organization among societies
such as the Saipan Carolinians
is
one further bit of evidence
that incest regulations have a social and cultural basis rather than
an instinctive one, and that when an exogamous group loses its
social functions
exogamy itself also eventually disappears.
In summary, the maternal clan on Saipan today exists primarily
as an element of Carolinian tradition rather than as a fully functioning social group.
MATRILINEAL KIN GROUPS
335
Maternal Lineage
Of more importance in the contemporary scene is the maternal
For the purposes of this report, the maternal lineage is
lineage.
defined as a group whose members trace descent In the maternal
line from a known ancestor by virtue of a known genealogical rela-
The Saipan Carolinians today are not particularly contionship.
cerned with genealogy and seldom go back more than two or three
ascending generations in tracing relationships. Maximal lineages
among the Saipan Carolinians do not cover a span of more than
two above and two below a hypothetical
Socially, furthermore, these maximal lineages are not very
ego).
significant. A minimal lineage whose core is a grandmother-motherdaughter line is much more important, for these minimal lineages
still have relevance to land tenure and formerly had to residence.
Even then, the minimal lineage can not always be sharply differentiated from larger and more inclusive maximal lineages, because in
some cases the actual functioning group may expand beyond the
minimal lineage; in other cases it will not. For this reason, I have
five generations (usually
not differentiated the lineage into smaller component lineal units, or
descent lines, in Goodenough's usage (Goodenough, 1951, pp. 65 ff.).
The
lineage
composed
is
unnamed and has no formal
of a series of lineages,
though
head.
all the members can trace an actual genealogical
and hence the maximal lineage and clan coincide.
clan
Each
in the case of
clan
is
one small
relationship,
Although the nineteenth century social organization of the major
atolls of the Saipan Carolinians is only sketchily known, the
home
German period of administration, as well as
Murdock and Goodenough's (1947) recent studies of Truk, an island
data gathered during the
complex which greatly influenced the atolls to the west, demonstrate
that lineage groups are highly important functional units in the
social organization of this area.
On Saipan today, lineages have
in
declined
social significance, a fact that can be demonstrated
community alone. The important point in any
analysis of contemporary Saipan Carolinian social structure is the
extent to which lineality as a principle, rather than as manifest in
within the Saipan
clearly constituted descent groups with well-defined functions, tends
to survive. Rather than devote further space at this point to lineage
groups per
se, I shall
reserve further discussion of lineality to those
where it is most relevant, namely,
dence patterns, family organization, and land tenure.
aspects of Carolinian life
in resi-