Kinship Flashcards
Anthropological interest in relatedness
- Long-standing interest in close relationships that define our lives
- Relatedness is defined as the socially recognized ties that connect people in a variety of ways, such as:
Marriage
Family
Kinship
Friendship
Kinship
Social relationships prototypically derived from the universal human experience of mating, birth and nurturance
Functions of kinship
- how group members are recruited (marriage, birth, adoption)
- where group members live (residence rules)
- how inter-generational links are established (descent)
- how to pass on social positions (succession) or material goods (inheritance)
Kinship studies in the past
First large-scale kinship study was Lewis Henry Morgan’s Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family (1871)
Relatedness through blood and through marriage
Kinship studies in the present
Current kinship studies might focus more on what constitutes a family given the context of new reproductive technologies, increasing numbers of divorce, changing laws about marriage, and the possibilities of DNA testing
Romanticization of “Golden Age” of American Family
- Idea that families in the past – depicted on TV – were more intact, closer, shared the same values
- But in reality, American family has been changing since industrialization
E.g. Lynd and Lynd’s research from 1920s - Examined cross-culturally, the relationship between children and parents/elders always involves some tension
Marriage
- Wide variations across cultures but anthropologists agree that marriage is:
An institution that prototypically involves a man and a woman, transforms the status of the participants, carries implications about sexual access, gives offspring a position in society, and establishes connections between the kin of a husband and the kin of a wife.
May involve more than one man or woman - Marriage involves rights and obligations, establishes roles and alliances, and changes over time
Marriage as a social process
- Anthropologists see marriage as a social process (e.g. forms alliances, reinforces rights and obligations)
- This is why other people often participate in marriage ceremony
- As societal norms change, so do rules around marriage
Bridewealth
The transfer of certain symbolically important goods from the family of the groom to the family of the bride representing compensation to the wife’s lineage for the loss of her labour and for child-bearing capacities
Dowry
Transfer of family wealth from parents to their child (usually a daughter) at marriage
- Potential for tensions and dowry violence
Residence
- Neolocal (major pattern)
- Patrilocal (major)
- Matrilocal (major)
- Avunculocal (major)
- Ambilocal (minor)
- Duolocal (minor)
Neolocal
In a place of the couple’s own choosing
Patrilocal
With/near the husband’s father’s family
Matrilocal
With or near the family in which the wife was raised
Avunlocal
With/near the husband’s mother’s brother
Ambilocal
First with the family of one spouse, then the family of the other
Duolocal
Each partner lives members of his or her own lineage even after marriage
Endogamous marriage
Marriage within a defined social group
Exogamous marriage
Marriage outside a defined social group
Incest taboos
In all societies, some close kin are off limits as spouses or sexual partners, specifically members of the nuclear family
Affinal
Related through marriage
Cosanguines
Related through blood
Levirate
A widow marries her deceased husband’s brother
Sororate
A widower marries a sister (or specific cousin) of his deceased wife
Female “pater” marriage
A woman plays the social role of a man while married to another wife; provides for the wife and the wife’s children, and the wife’s children would call her “father”
Ghost marriage
A man who died without male heirs would become an angry spirit, so to appease that spirit, a kinsman would marry a woman “to his name” - but then this would raise the issue of being able to marry for himself and avoid the same fate, as family would allocate their resources to pay brideswealth to unmarried kin.
Monogamy
A marriage pattern in which a person may be married to only one person at a time
Polygamy
A marriage pattern in which a person may be married to more than one person at a time
Polygyny
Multiple wives
Polyandry
Much rarer than polygyny, but 3 types: associated, fraternal and secondary marriage
Associated polyandry
Starts off as monogamy, but then another husband is added to the mix, and while both looked after his own economic resources, the first husband would have more authority. Both husbands would raise any children bore together without a care for the genitor.
Fraternal polyandry
Oldest son acts as the groom, but all his brothers are also married to his wife and have equal sexual access
Secondary polyandry
Woman marries one or more secondary husbands while being married to the first; can live with only husband at a time but is free to return to any previous ones and have children with them
Nuclear famiy
A family made up of two generations: parents and their unmarried children
Non-conjugal family
A woman (or less commonly a man) and her/his children, with or without a second parent
Conjugal family
A family based on marriage; at minimum, a spousal pair and their children.
Extended family
A family pattern made up of three generations living together: parents, married children, and grandchildren.
Joint family
A family pattern made up of brothers and their wives (or sisters and their husbands) along with their children and sometimes their parents living together.
Blended family
A family created when previously divorced or widowed people marry, bringing with them children from their previous marriages.
Changes to family
- Non-blood relatives can become kin
- Divorce
- Remarriage
- Migration (to find work)
Ego
Person from whose perspective the kinship associations are being mapped or discussed
Lineage
A descent group composed of blood relatives who believe they can trace their descent to a known ancestor
Clan
Groups of lineage whose members believe they have a common ancestor, even if they cannot specify the genealogical links
Descent
Transmission of group membership through parent-child link (what we often refer to as ‘blood’ relatives)
Bilateral descent
The principle that a descent group is formed by people who believe they are related to each other by connections made through their mothers and fathers equally
Unilineal descent
The principle that a descent group is formed by people who believe they are related to each other by connections made through a father (patrilineal descent) OR a mother (matrilineal descent)
Patrilineage
- Trace back to a single male ancestor
- Most common type of unilineal
- Lineage carried through sons
- Father-son bond is paramount
- Daughters leave when marry, new brides live with husbands group (challenge for women in the group)
Matrilineage
- Trace back to a single female ancestor
- Sister-brother pair is paramount (connected only through links made only by women), even more important than spousal pair
- When brothers marry live with family of wives, but still interest in birth lineage
- Not a matriarchy - brothers still have controlling interest in the lineage and inheritance goes from mother’s brother to her son
Categories of kin terminology
Generation, Gender/Sex, Affinity, Collaterality, Sex/Gender of Linking Relative, Bifurcation, Relative Age
Generation
Place in descent group (e.g. cousin is in the same generation as ego but is not a sibling)
Gender/Sex
Male or female (e.g. uncle and aunt are distinguished on the basis of both generation and sex/gender)
Affinity
Connection through marriage (e.g. Mother is distinguished from mother in law)
Collaterality
Direct (linking) or indirect (linked) relative (e.g. mother and father are direct connection, aunt and uncle are not)
Sex/gender of linking relative
Linking relative is male or female (e.g. not a thing in English, but distinguishing your father’s brother’s children from your father’s sister’s children)
Bifurcation
Relation on mother’s or father’s side (e.g. mother’s brother vs. father’s brother)
Relative age
Relatives of the same category who are older or younger than ego (e.g. not in English, but older brother vs. younger brother)
Ascribed status
Social positions people are assigned at birth
Achieved status
Social positions people may attain later in life, often as the result of their own (or other people’s) effort
Kinship and reproductive technologies
- Reproductive technologies reconfigure Euro-American ideas about kinship
- Technologies (e.g. surrogacy, gestational surrogacy, sperm donation) open up possibilities for different kinds of families
- But they also make us question what constitutes a parent/family
Reproducing Jews
- Ethnography examining women in Israel using IVF to have kids
- Jewishness passed down through the mom
- Eggs of married women cannot be donated, as they are seen to carry both genes and marital status
- If conceived with artificial insemination and born to unmarried woman = legitimate citizen
- Sperm has different rules attached to it. Married women can use husband’s or non-Jewish (American or German, but not Palestinian)
Friendship
Unofficial bonds that are personal, affective, matters of choice
Sodalities
Non-kin social groups that may be organized on the basis of age, sex, economic role, and/or personal interest
E.g. social movements, trade unions, extra-curricular groups on campus
