Chapter 8 Kinship and non-kinship organization Flashcards
What is Residence
principle concerning where people live, especially after marriage
…and therefore what kinds of residential and corporate groups are found in the society and what tasks and values they are assigned
Corporate Groups
A social group that shares some degree of practical interest, identity, residence, and destiny.
The basic organizational and functional units of a society.
Kinship system is a product of what 3 distinct but interconnected principles?
Marriage
Residence
Descent
Marriage
Socially recognized relationship between two or more people that establishes kin-based groups and provides norms and roles for residence, property, ownership and inheritance, labor, sexual relations and/or childrearing.
Incest Taboo
the nearly universal rule against marrying or having sex with kin
Social Reproduction
maintenance and perpetuation of the society
enculturation and teaching of members to take their place in society
Exogamy
Marrying someone who is not in the same cultural category (e.g. marrying someone of a different sex/gender)
Endogamy
Marrying someone who is in the same cultural category (e.g. marrying someone in their own race or religion)
Polygyny
Marriage rule in which a MAN can or should marry two or more women
Women may become co-wife for purposes of shared housework, female companionship, and division among man’s sexual demands.
Polyandry
Marriage rule in which a WOMAN may or should marry two or more men.
Sororal Polygyny
Men marry sisters, which promises (but doesn’t guarantee) to provide more domestic tranquility.
Arranged Marriage
Families of prospective marriage partners make the selection and plan the event.
Bridewealth or Brideprice
Marriage wealth exchange practice in which a man or his family must pay an amount of property to his wife’s kin before he may assume rights over his wife.
Can be construed as “buying a wife”
Closely associated with pastoral societies, where men dominate and have transferable wealth to offer, namely their herds.
Bride Service
Where men are expected give something in exchange but real wealth doesn’t exist, to where they may be required to provide service instead.
e.g. in foraging societies, a many may be obligated to bring meat from his hunts to the woman’s family for a period of years before the marriage is considered fully made or before he can remove her to his family.
Dowry
The women’s family is required to provide the husband with property, money, land, goods, etc, to make the marriage
Levirate
The practice in which the brother of the deceased former husband is expected
Sororate
When the woman is expected to marry the husband of her sister in the event of the married sister’s death
nuer of east africa
- ghost husband” where a woman could be married to a man who had already died, particularly if he died young and without children. Any child she later had were looked upon as the dead man’s children and who would continue his male line.
Preferential Cousin Marriage
the principle where a person ought to marry a preferred cousin
Kindred
all of the people to whom a person considers himself/herself related by blood or marriage.
too large and dispersed to live in one house and can’t be considered a residential group
Household
all the people who live together under one roof and act corporately within the residence.
Patrilocality…for father (Virilocality / for man)
The residence practice of living with or near the husband’s family after marriage.
Matrilocality…for mother (uxorilocality / for wife)
The residence practice of living with or near the residence of the woman or her family.
This practice tended to enhance female status, since, being the consistent factor in the household, women tended to own and control property, land, and wealth
Avunculocal
The residence practice in which a married couple lives with or near an uncle, often a mother’s brother.
An adaptation to male property rights in a society that…you lived with the most important male relative.
Ambilocality
Where a married couple chose which household to live with or elected to divide their time between the two household.
Adaptive for societies that lived in difficult environments or low-yield economies…giving maximal flexibility in their living arrangements. (foraging societies)
