R. Needham Notes on Comparative Method and Prescriptive Alliance. (Met 1 Figuur)

R. Needham Notes on comparative method and prescriptive alliance. (Met 1 figuur). (A reply to nr. 1604)

In: Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde 118 (1962), no: 1, Leiden, 160-182

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ne must regret to see Berting and Philipsen so exercised (1962), and in a personal fashion, by my critical examination (1961a) of their approach to the study of asymmetrie prescriptive alliance (1960), and if I have given them just cause for offence I offer them my apologies. But I must say at once that they have misconceived my concern: I was not worried on my own account, but was perturbed by erroneous argument. Their own emphasis on "tone" and "bitter- ness" makes me wonder how I could have made myself clearer, for I began with the express and sincere affirmation that I did not wish to reply in any contentious spirit or with any conviction that my own views were finally correct (1961a, p. 93) ; and I waited nearly a year before writing my rejoinder, surely a period long enough to permit the evaporation of any sentiments of the kind they apparently infer.1 I shall try to make clear my intentions, as well as emphasise my attitude to rejoinders (cf. 1961a, pp. 94—5), by presenting another article of the same kind. That is, in what follows I shall first deal as expeditiously as possible (in section I) with particular points in Berting and Philipsen's surrejoinder, and then proceed (in sections II and III) to more positive and extended discussion of issues in the study of prescriptive alliance which the present debate has brought into prominence.2

1 The point of my first footnote, indeed, was precisely to show sign of having attained a proper state of detachment in composing the rejoinder (1961a, p. 94). I cannot help feeling, therefore, that it is scarcely gallant of Berting and Philipsen polemically to exploit the candour of my admission by giving the word "piqued" a misleading prominence to their own advantage (1962, p. 155). 2 I am grateful to the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences for a Fellowship (1961-2) which provided the idyllic liberty in which this paper was written, and to the University of Oxford for generously permitting me to enjoy it.

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1. It was no part of my purpose to complain of mere neglect of my work. I was concerned, riot with what Berting and Philipsen did not say about it (whatever the reasons), but with what they did say; and what they did say was almost totally incorrect, as I tried to demonstrate in empirical detail. I note with disappointment that they pass over nearly every one of these issues of factual debate without mention, either to concede my arguments or to try to rebut them. 2. At least half of my 24 pages were not concerned directly with their article, but consisted of what I explicitly intended as independent- ly useful observations on asymmetrie alliance. As f or the space required by direct rejoinder concerning the Purum analysis, my response is that it was necessary: a false assertion may be agreeably brief, but to refute it is commonly a task of tedious and unavoidable length. Their numerous critical comments, incidentally, fall on six pages (viz. 57—8, 59, 60, 67, 68), and are not confined to "only one page". 3. The very advance of any science entails a search for novelty, which I do indeed regard as highly important, and I am perplexed that Berting and Philipsen should seem to deny this. My point in this regard was that it seemed improper on their part so to castigate my alleged amusing errors while at the same refraining from recognising that I had already arrived in print at certain of their own conclusions. Berting and Philipsen themselves seem in fact to think novelty and priority of some importance, for they devote most of one footnote expressly to the claim that Dutch anthropologists had recognised the phenomenon of asymmetrie alliance "sooner" than others (1960, p. 60, n. 13). If they do think this an issue of importance they will not object if I point out that I said this first too (1957, p. 169; 1958a, p. 99, n. 16; 1958b, pp. 199—200). 4. The use of a significance test is not relevant to the issue of whether or not systems of patrilateral prescriptive alliance actually exist. All we have to do is read the books and see if one solitary case can be discovered. The more books we read, the more significant the conclusion that there is no such case. 5. The part played by formal argument in Berting and Philipsen's article is not the same as in mine. They state that there is no need to discover the empirical correspondences of asymmetrie alliance with the cyclic character of the model. Now societies of this type actually exist, and I tried to show in what respects the notion of "cycle" is empirically Dl. 118 11

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access 162 RODNEY NEEDHAM. usef ul in their analysis. On the other hand, I reported that no instances of patrilateral alliance were to be found in the ethnographic literature, and it was thus in necessarily formal terms that I then tried to show just why such a system did not exist. Berting and Philipsen make no error (nor did I accuse them of one) in merely saying that it is logical that alliance cycles should "exist". Their error lay in supposing that this logical consequence of the marriage rule absolved them of the obligation to discover what kind and degree of correspondence was to be established between the formal features of the model and the way people organised their social lives. Furthermore, theoretical propositions have been advanced which depend on the notion of "cycle", and to test their validity it is necessary to establish empirically the social facts to which these propositions relate (Needham, 1961a, pp. 102—11). 6. What is wrong with Berting and Philipsen's belief that Lévi- Strauss thinks matrilateral cross-cousin marriage to be simply "better" than patrilateral is, in the first place, that he nowhere employs such an expression. I deal with this point in another place (1962a, pp. 17—18), and confine myself here to a brief elaborative comment. Lévi-Strauss himself uses the word "better", in connexion with matrilateral cross-cousin marriage, at only two places in his book, of which Berting and Philipsen quote one. This quotation clearly shows that Lévi-Strauss is concerned expressly with a "better integration". This expression may be easily interpreted in its context, and its validity is subject to test (Needham, 1962a, pp. 109—115, 117—8). To say that Lévi-Strauss thinks the matrilateral form is simply "better", on the other hand, is so vague as to be almost meaningless, and is certainly not an exact characterisation of his position.3 It might mean, for example, that the anthropologist considers the matrilateral form a better one because it is morally superior, securing a more harmonious moral consciousness, or that it is economically a more efficiënt form of distribution of scarce goods, that it is sentimentally more satisfying in that it prevents continual breaches of affective ties, that it is a neater arrangement and therefore less wasteful of energy, that it constitutes a form of organisation from which superior social advances of some kind can be made, that it more satisfactorily meets the evolutionary requirements of a certain type of society at a particular

3 Still less is it so to say that he regards the matrilateral form as "finer", which is an elaboration of Berting and Philipsen's own (1960, pp. 58, 74).

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access NOTES ON COMPARATIVE METHOD. 163 point in its development, that it is esthetically a more pleasing kind of order, that it accords more closely with certain values of societies that employ it, or that it more easily permits the attainment of certain ends. These propositions are some of many plausible inferences from the mere statement, ascribed to Lévi-Strauss by Homans and Schneider and then by Berting and Philipsen, that the "matrilateral form is 'better' for the society"; but none of them is stated or intended by Lévi-Strauss himself. Berting and Philipsen may or may not have adopted their phrasing from Homans and Schneider (they decline to say whether my inference was correct), but one may continue to think it significant that no other critics, reviewers, or commentators characterised Lévi-Strauss's work in this fashion until Homans and Schneider, in the attractive but seductive simplicity of their monograph, induced people not familiar with the original to believe that this was his argument.4 7. In the light of their elucidation of the passages in question, I can see that I misinterpreted Berting and Philipsen on the issue of efficiënt cause in relation to Lévi-Strauss's theory; but I must ask them to believe that my reading of their position was due to an idiomatic diffi- culty and not to the carelessness they suppose. It rested on the use of the words "for the theory of Lévi-Strauss . .. ", which would commonly be interpreted as meaning "for the purposes of", or "in the context of", or "according to" Lévi-Strauss's theory. That is, if Lévi-Strauss were explicitly to supply the efficiënt cause which he is inferred to assume, his argument would then be that "a man marries his mother's brother's daughter ... because he is aware of the structural consequences of this marriage". Indeed, it is Homans and Schneider's argument that this actually is his intention, and that "Lévi-Strauss's efficiënt cause is human intelligence. . ." (1955, p. 19). Berting and Philipsen's paragraph reads in the main simply as a rendering of Homans and Schneider's characterisation of Lévi-Strauss's position, with the addition of the point about constant relations between descent groups, and no

Perhap.s I may mention that a dominant motive in writing Structure and Sentiment was my concern that the argument and principles of a masterly theoretical work had been traduced, and that academies daunted by the length and complexity of Les Structures élémentaires de la Parenté itself were turning to Marriage, Authority, and Final Causes for an account of its thesis and were concluding thence that it was false. Very few of the laudatory reviewers of Homans and Schneider's boók, I may say, or of those who have incorporated its conclusions in their own publications, appear to have read the work which it attacks.

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access 164 RODNEY NEEDHAM'. other intention can readily be inferred from its actual form of words. I am sorry to be forced to reduce the issue to one of uncertainty in the use of English, for one must appreciate the fact that Berting and Philipsen courteously and usefully present their argument in a language which is not their own, but their words do not convey to an English reader the meaning they intend. In any case, the clarification of their position does not achieve very much. I now understand them to have been saying that to make unilateral cross-cousin marriage "wholly understandable" we need, in addition to Lévi-Strauss's theory, (o) evidence of individual intentions to secure certain structural advantages, and (b) demonstration of constant relations between descent groups. But there is no conceivable empirical evidence on the first point which could isolate such efficiënt causes for known systems of asymmetrie alliance; and the second had already been made in outline by Lévi-Strauss (1949, pp. 309—10, 328—9) and carried out in detail by myself in the Sumba and Purum analyses (1957; 1958a). Berting and Philipsen write that Lévi-Strauss has not "proyed" the latter point (1960, p. 57), but in the light of the pages I have cited, and considering that they also deny the validity of my Purum analysis, it is difrïcult to conjecture what they would regard as proof. 8. There is no means of telling what degree of importance Berting and Philipsen ascribe to the supposed total of 208 alliance cycles among the Purum other than that they find it a rather large number for a population of 303, but the figure itself is their own and they printed it, and I must assume that they did so af ter due deliberation. The word "perhaps" merely introduces a gratuitous note of ambiguity; it does not reduce their responsibility for having proposed an inapt arithmetical procedure as a means to establishing the total number of cycles. To adopt a particular procedure and propose a particular numerical conclusion is not to "hint" at anything: it is to make a precise argumenta- tive assertion, and in this case a fallacious one.5 Berting and Philipsen now compound their error, moreover, by writing: "Our argument on p. 58 still holds with regard to a number

5 I should remark that the importance I attach to this point here is largely methodological. I first made numerical analyses of groups and their alliance cycles with the aim of exploiting certain theoretical notions, but I have come to see that these are inconsequential in the respects I imagined, and I no longer think that the sheer numbêrs of cycles, or the proportional involvement of descent groups, have the particular importance with which I credited them (see e.g. Needham, 1961a, pp. 106-7, propositions 3 and 4).

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access NOTES ON COMPARATIVE METHOD. 165 of 74 cycles, which too seems to us a rather large number." I am bewildered that my observations on this issue should receive so un- comprehending a response, and cannot convince myself that it is due to unclarity on my part. There is little more that I can do than reproduce the basic points. Let me say simply that nowhere do Berting and Philipsen actually present the shadow of an argument in favour of their view: they merely assert flatly that 208 is a rather large number. What their formal or empirical reasons may be is nowhere so much as hinted at, and even my express and italicised demands for an argument now produce no more useful a reply than the new and equally unevidential assertion that a total of 74 cycles "seems" rather large. I must urge them again to consider the circumstance that there exists no published body of facts, comparable to that contained in the Purum ethnography, on which an empirical argument to this effect could possibly be based.6 9. Whether I have "missed the point" concerning the applicability of numerical data to Homans and Schneider's argument about norms is a matter for debate, but as I have elsewhere gone into it in some detail (1962a, especially chapter 4) there is no need to enter elaborate discussion here. I need only state my conclusion that the gravest defect of Homans and Schneider's work is that actually they disregard the norms held to by members of societies practising asymmetrie alliance. If the facts of matrilateral cross-cousin marriage, as it is really practised, are indeed not important to them, then I can only say that they ought to be, and I have tried to show why. 10. As to whether Berting and Philipsen's article as a whole is devoid of merit, I said nothing. I would wish only to claim evidentially that it is mistaken in the respects I argued.

So far I have dealt with Berting and Philipsen's points seriatim, as they raise them, with one exception, viz. that concerning "the functional-comparative method", and it is to this issue of structural analysis and comparative method that I now direct my attention and

6 I can promise, though, a future record of the alliance system of Mamboru, Sumba, which is factually far fuller and more complex than that of the Purum. When this is published we shall really be in a position to make comparative observations about the significance of the number of alliance cycles.

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access 166 RODNEY NEEDHAM. the bulk of this paper. I shall leave it to Berting and Philipsen to mark the relevance to their own position, and to conclude with what justice I spoke of "superficial comparison" in connexion with their method. No one would wish to deny that comparison can produce useful results which may be complementary to those arrived at by intensive analysis of particular cases. The point is that comparison cannot usefully be undertaken unless one has first acquired some systematic understanding of the institution or type of society concerned (Needham, 1958a, p. 100; 1962a, pp. 72—3). However interpreted, this appears axiomatic, and so obvious as to make it seem improbable that anyone should challenge it. Yet in recent years there has been a vogue for large-scale statistical comparisons, almost inevitably carried out in disregard of this commonsensical precept; and there are disquieting signs that the seemingly greater sociological significance of such investigations is misleading students of social anthropology away from the laborious but indispensable procedures of traditional scholarship. To begin with an elementary pedagogical point, it may fairly con- f idently be urged that persons beginning in social anthropology should first of all acquire and demonstrate analytical competence in the study of quite limited issues and, above all, in the intensive factual examination of particular cases. Sociology is notorious for its predilection for the grand design at the expense of less stupendous and apparently less rewarding investigations, and this tendency is not only reflected in the natural ambitions of students but in some quarters is fostered as a matter of methodological principle. Let us now examine certain empirical grounds for unease at this situation. The first and most fundamental is that the only way of being sure of the facts is by carefully reading the ethnographic sources, and the only way to be sure of having all the relevant facts at one's command is to read all the sources.7 Now to read a source carefully may itself entail a full-scale analysis if one is to be sure that one has correctly characterised the society it describes; and in order to characterise a descent system, for example, it may even be necessary to establish the terminology critically as a Hterary scholar establishes a text (cf. Needham, 1960a, pp. 100—4, 117). This may be a difficult task even if one is examining only a single publication, and it becomes more difficult and protracted in proportion with the number of publish-

7 This does sound a ponderous enunciation of a trite truism, but certain publications demonstrate that it needs to be said (see, e.g., Needham, 1962a, pp. 54-5, 58-60, 65-7; 1962b, concluding section).

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access NOTES ON COMPARATIVE METHOD. 167 ed sources on the society one is dealing with; but not until one has gone through them all analytically can one be sure that one has got things right. So much, in the briefest terms, for the consideration of one society. These taxing circumstances are multiplied, moreover, when a comparative study is undertaken; for all this has to be gone through in each individual case before any attempt at intensive comparison or generalisation or abstract formulation can be made. Note that I am not saying merely that this ought to be done, but that it has to be done, that there is no scholarly alternative. There is absolutely no point in formulating comparative propositions unless the facts with which they deal are correct, and there is simply no other way than this of making certain that they are correct. One prominent proponent of large-scale comparison, however, reports that he "secured data on" 165 societies, by "the usual methods of library research", in a period covering no more than "well over a year", and the evidence thus accumulated and catalogued constitutes the empirical material for theoretical investigations. If we assume that the period was as long as eighteen months, and devoted exclusively to research at the expense of all teaching, administration, and personal interests, this works out at approximately 3.31 days per society. The survey was completed so rapidly by using in most instances only "a single book or article", though whether this is the usual method of library research if one really wants to get things straight is susceptible to doubt. The author himself acknowledges the consequent possibility of inferior results, and observes that factual gaps or errors will normally be f ound to be due to the failure to use some recognised source; but he excuses his incomplete coverage on the ground that he could not afford the time to be thorough in his research (Murdock, 1949, p. viii). In a later comparative survey, covering 565 societies this time, he expressly admits the possibility of faulty judgement in the categorisation of data or failure to use important sources (Murdock, 1957, p. 687); but such admissions, though made with due modesty and accompanied by a request for corrections or additions, do not diminish the weaknesses of the method itself. The method is perturbing enough, on practical grounds alone, but it is the results that are decisive and their theoretical consequences that count. Without making special search, and adducing only certain instances that I have happened to encöunter recently in my own work, I think the following will serve as preliminary indications of the uncertainty of results in the simple characterisation of societies.

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To begin with a minor example, Murdock describes the Lamet relationship terminology as having cousin terms of "Murngin" type (1957, p. 680), whereas by the criteria he employs in his survey they should actually be listed as "Omaha" (Needham, 1960a, p. 108). This feature, incidentally, is clearly enough indicated in the ethnographic source and does not depend on a critical examination of the facts as reported. Such an examination shows in addition, however, that Lamet society belongs precisely to a type of which "Omaha" terminological equations are characteristic. In the first comparative project mentioned above, Murdock lists the rule of descent of the Sirionó as "bilateral" (1949, p. 234),8 i.e. cognatic, and in the second he again lists it as bilateral (1957, p. 685); yet the ethnographer on whose reports he relies clearly states that the Sirionó are matrilineal, to the extent even of having what would conventionally be called a "Crow" terminology (cf. Needham, 1961b, pp. 242 n. 10, 249—50). Now whether a simple society of this kind has a cognatic or a lineal descent system is a fact of radical sociologicai importance, and we may reasonably demand that this at least be got right.9 Moreover, if even such a feature is not correctly reported we may be afflicted with doubt concerning the categorisation of other features of the society, and then with unease about the reliability of the categorisation of the other societies in the sample. It is not at all entailed, of course, that one mistake invalidates an entire comparative project, but it may seriously affect the confidence with which it or its theoretical applications are received. The former mischaracterisation is probably not so consequential as that concerning the Sirionó, but one cannot forecast to what problems the listings may be relevant, or how serious the effects of employing a mistaken description may prove to be. One direct consequence of the second of these examples, however, is actually to be seen in a recent article which is based on the material in Murdock's "World

8 The page-reference is misprinted, I fear, as p. 243 in the place where this point is first made (Needham, 1961b, p. 242). I have no excuse for my failure to detect this transposition in proof, though the fact asserted is correct. I take this opportunity to affirm expressly that I do not imagine my own work to be always free of certain failings with which I reproach that of others (cf. 1962a, pp. 54-5)), but in matters of method and analytical principle there nevertheless remains a distinction to be made, I think. 9 Actually, in both the Lamet and the Sirionó cases Professor Murdock wavers in his characterisation in different publications, so that one is not sure what he really thinks the situation is (for illustration see my papers at the places cited), but I shall not labour this point.

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Ethnographic Sample" and is itself a large-scale exercise in comparison, viz. Eyde and Postal's "Avunculocality and Incest" (1961). In acknow- ledging Murdock's tables as their source of information, they point out that they have made certain changes, one of which concerns the Sirionó: "The Siriono are listed as having bilateral descent, but we consider them to be matrilineal" (1961, p. 769 n. 3). They elaborate on this decision in another note, where they write:

"... The Siriono are the only society in a sample of 204 which violate the rule that preferential cross-cousin marriage does not occur in societies with bilateral descent. Because of this uniqueness and because there are strong theoretical grounds for believing that preferential unilateral cross-cousin marriage can only arise in unilineal societies, we feel that the Siriono must be matrilineal, since their marriage rule appears indubitable... We therefore take the always dangerous step of disregarding the published ethnography and consider the Siriono as matrilineal in this paper" (1961, p. 769 n. 6; authors' italics).

They further underline this conclusion in yet another note, in which they write that they have interpreted the Kaska and Sirionó "somewhat differently from the original ethnographies" (p. 770 n. 15). But it is evident that the authors have in f act taken the really dangerous step of not reading the original ethnography on the Sirionó at all, and have thus caused themselves unnecessary perturbation by their temerity in controverting Murdock's rendering of the facts. It may be conjectured, too, that they have given themselves more trouble in coping with the supposedly singular system presented by the Sirionó, and in defending their speculative manipulation of what they take to be the facts, than they would have had to go to in reading the single monograph which practically comprises the original ethnography. Eyde and Postal do not specifically mention the Lamet, but since this society is included in the survey on which they rely, and since their argument is especially concerned with "Crow-Omaha kinship systems", it is a sure inference that the failure to list the Lamet correctly as "Omaha" has had some effect on their statistical com- putations. We all make mistakes, of course, and it is not my intention simply to point out that these are mistakes. The point is that they derive directly from a particular method of sociological investigation, and from the relative neglect of conventional scholarly considerations that it entails. What, then, ought we to do instead? Let me take as illustration the issue of the supposedly anomalous Apinayé system.

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Since the publication of Nimuendajü's description in 1939, this society has been the object of repeated attention from anthropologists, primarily because it is reported to be organised in a remarkable fashion. The society is divided into four groups called kiyé, which are said to regulate marriage, and membership of these groups is, surprisingly, determined matrilineally for women and patrilineally for men. This intriguing system has been examined by some of the most distinguished anthropologists, including Kroeber, Lowie, Lévi-Strauss, and Murdock. Without attributing any specially grave misunderstanding to Murdock in comparison with the others,10 we may most usefully in this place glance at one element in his interpretations of the system. In his Social Structure, Murdock lists the Apinayé as employing "Eskimo" cousin terms (1949, p. 242). Yet in his "World Ethno- graphic Sample" the kinship terminology is characterised as possessing extremely different "Crow" cousin terms (1957, p. 686). We might well assume that the latter is a corrected characterisation and the more reliable; but when Eyde and, Postal deal with the Apinayé they feel constrained to change it. "The Apinayé, listed as having Crow cousin terms, are actually Eskimo" (1961, p. 769 n. 3). They do not refer to Murdock's earlier characterisation, they explicitly indicate that the correction is not taken from certain addenda and corrigenda which he had privately appended to the sample, and they do not cite Nimuen- dajü's monograph, so there is no clue to the evidential grounds on which they make their change. Now as a matter of fact the Apinayé do not employ "Eskimo" cousin terms, and the terminology can be shown, on the contrary, to exhibit the features by which Murdock defines a "Crow" terminology. But to establish this fact is a difficult and lengthy process, as Maybury-

10 I particularly want to make it clear that if I do not similarly single out Professor Lévi-Strauss for critical attention here, it is not because I think Les Structures élémentaire* de la Parenté is irreproachable in scholarship. In a number of places, indeed, I have had to observe that Professor Lévi- Strauss has sometimes neglected theoretical predecessors and failed to use important ethnographic sources, that he has incorrectly analysed certain systems and wrongly supposed diagnostic signs of others, that he has mis- rendered ethnographic reports, and that he has even ascribed to one society facts relating to another. If I attribute extraordinary value to his work, and go to considerable lengths elsewhere to defend it (particularly in Structure and Sentiment), it is not primarily on such scholarly counts but because of his genial quality of imaginative intellect, and, in the field of prescriptive alliance, because his analytical notions have proved empirically to bring a uniquely useful understanding and to establish a satisfying theoretical order.

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Lewis has shown (1960), and without an original analysis such as his it is not possible to assert securely that the Crow features exist. More- over, it is not a matter simply of discerning certain terminological equations, but the total society has to be systematically analysed, and only when this has been done is it possible to evalute alternative reports and interpretations or to assess the likelihood of the actual existence of Crow terms. In the Apinayé case, as in the Lamet, the terminology itself has to be established by means of intensive analysis. With this consideration we leave such particulars as the inaccurate or variant characterisation of certain features of particular societies, and ta~ka up the issue of structural analysis and comparative method. Maybury-Lewis has already briefly discussed Murdock's interpretation of the Apinayé system (Maybury-Lewis, 1960, pp. 194—5), and there is no need to expand on the marter here. Murdock, after all, is only one of a mimber of writers of whom Maybury-Lewis says that they have either limited themselves to repeating that the Apinayé system was unique or have incorrectly analysed its features (p. 213). This observation introduces certain lessons which I believe Maybury-Lewis's analysis conveys, and it is these that I wish to stress. It was twenty years after the publication of Nimuendajü's account, a period in which the Apinayé repeatedly attracted scholarly remark, beïore a full-scale and intensive reinterpretation of the data was pablished; and only now that we have at last been shown that Apinayé society is not founded on "parallel descent" and marriage in all probability not regulated by the kiyê, and that the terminology has been reasonably established, is it feasible to categorise the features of this society for comparative projects such as we have been referring toi Maybury-Lewis is able to elucidate a notoriously anomalous and very puzzling situation, not only by structural analysis of the Apinayé facte, but also by his scholarly command of the literature on a range of other South American societies; and his interpretation is inspired, too, by precise theoretical concerns, not by typological interests. More- over, the culmination of his analysis lies not simply in an increased understanding of Apinayé society, but in the examination of "parallel descent", a notion of literally fundamental importance in the comparative study of descent systems.n I am suggesting, then, that this is the kind of enquiry that we should first of xall pursue, both in our technical progress as individual scholars 11 Dr. Maybury-Lewis has promised (1960, p. 191) a complementary paper on the same theme, dealing with the Mundugamor.

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access 172 EODNEY NEEDHAM. and in the method we adopt to advance the science.12 The effect of Maybury-Lewis's conclusions on the statistics of Eyde and Postal's argument may be left for them to calculate, but the contrast of his analysis with their unevidenced and incorrect assertion that the Apinayé employ Eskimo cousin terms is of general methodological significance.

III Having considered certain points of principle, we may now pass on to a more particular concern, viz. the applicability of large-scale statistical comparison to the study of asymmetrie prescriptive alliance. An appropriate introduction is offered by the Sirionó case again. One of the conclusions of Eyde and Postal's article is: "Prescriptive MCCM [i.e. matrilateral cross-cousin marriage] does not occur in matrilineal societies" (1961, p. 768, proposition 16). Now they include the Sirionó in their sample, and take the rule of descent (correctly, as it happens) to be matrilineal; but they do not, as we have seen, examine the published ethnographic facts. If they had done so, however, they could have perceived that the Sirionó practise asymmetrie alliance, and that prescriptive matrilateral cross-cousin marriage does therefore occur in at least one matrilineal society (Needham, 1961b). Moreover, they also include the Mnong Gar in their study, relying in this single case on the original ethnography (Eyde and Postal, 1961, pp. 762, 770 n. 15), and the information in the source consulted indicates that this matrilineal society also practises prescriptive matrilateral cross-cousin marriage (cf. Needham, 1961b, p. 241 n. 8). Then there are the matrilineal Belu of central Timor, also included in their study (p. 762), and these too have a matrilateral prescription (Need- ham, 1960b, p. 70; 1961b, p. 241; 1962a, pp. 67, 71; Leach, 1961, p. 54). One of Eyde and Postal's conclusions, then, is certainly false;

12 I do not maintain, however, that the Apinayé analysis is perfect. Dr. Maybury- Lewis would probably agree that it could be improved in exposition, and that in spite of the cogency of the analysis its conclusions might be made more exact in a comparative context. But I regard it nevertheless as one of the most useful papers in the history of the study of descent systems, and I think it demonstrates, in contrast to superficial comparison, the most pro- fitable way of understanding them. More widely, it may be thought desirable that I should also give an indication of what I consider a genuine comparative study, i.e. one which first makes a minute examination of particular societies and then compares them structurally in an historical frame of reference, and to this end I should cite as one example Fred Eggan's admirable work Social Organisation of the Western Pueblos (1950).

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access NOTES ON COMPAEATIVE METHOD. 173 and it could readily have been seen to be false if they had systematically examined the facts on these three societies in their own sample. In two of the three cases they rely instead on the characterisations of the rule of marriage provided by Murdock (1957, pp. 681, 685), and I now wish to take up the question of prescriptive alliance in relation to his own comparative projects.13 The most ambitious part of Murdock's Social Structure is his attempt to construct a scheme of evolution of social organisation. In order to do this he has first of all to work out a typology of social systems. The types are defined by terms for female cross-cousins and by rule of descent. The combinations of six varieties of cross-cousin terms and four rules of descent yield eleven "major types of socialorganization", each mnemonically designated by ' the name of a particular society (1949, pp. 222—4). For each of these types he proposes particular "derivations", i.e. other types from which, by certain structural changes, the type concerned could have evolved, and particular "possibilities of change", i.e. a structurally limited number of types of social organisation into which the case concerned could develop. In an appendix, "A Technique of Historical Reconstruction" (pp. 323—52), Murdock lists in detail the derivations and possibilities of change for each of the 250 societies in his sample; and he reports from his own particular researches a striking agreement of his deductions of antecedent types of social structure, by internal analysis of social organisation, with historical evidence, analyses of linguistic relationships, and with the results of distributional studies (pp. 258, 323). It is claimed, then, that the scheme of evolution proposed is not önly formally valid, on certain premises, but can be demonstrated empirically to be historically correct. Murdock takes no account of prescriptive alliance in any of his writings, but a consideration of certain societies in his Social Structure sample may show that the issue is relevant both to his typology and to his scheme of social evolution. The societies are listed in Table 1, together with the primary type of social organisation to which each

13 It should be noted that my observations here relate solely to the study of prescriptive alliance, and do not in themselves constitute the "radical criticism" that I have alluded to elsewhere (1960a, p. 108 n. 9). The fprce of this section depends on the acceptance of prescriptive alliance as a distinct mode of relation, and on the empirical legitimacy of the social types defined by it; but a radical critique of the aims, methods, and theoretical applications of such comparative projects involves general issues in social anthropology which have no exclusive connexion with prescriptive alliance.

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174 RODNEY NEEDHAM. is assigned, the rule of descent, and the kind of cross-cousin terminology (Murdock, 1949, pp. 234, 235, 237, 239, 240, 244). The gap in the Mikir listings is due to the fact that the "cousin terms are lacking" in the source consulted (Murdock, 1949, p. 340).

TABLE 1 type descent cousin terms 1. Sirionó Fox cognatic Crow 2. Lakher Guinea patrilineal Hawaiian 3. Mikir Dakota patrilineal 4. Batak Sudanese patrilineal Sudanese S. Gilyak Sudanese patrilineal Sudanese 6. Miwok Omaha patrilineal Omaha 7. Thado Omaha patrilineal Omaha 8. Venda Iroquois bilineal Iroquois

These eight societies are thus seen to be assigned to six separate types of social organisation, a point that I wish especially to emphasise. But all of them except the Lakher can be shown to practise, or to have practised, asymmetrie prescriptive alliance, and it can reasonably be argued that the Lakher probably do as well (cf. Needham, 1962a, p. 55). By this I mean, briefly, that all these societies employ the same principles of social classification, while the majority indeed have relationship terminologies which are not only structurally equivalent but are of practically identical form. The only marked exception is the Sironó case, for the terminology is of a singular kind, but its application in the context of marriage is governed in such a way as to make the mode of relation of asymmetrie alliance clearly discernible (Needham, 1961b, pp. 246, 251—2). It would be more satisfactory, of course, and ultimately is essential, to demonstrate this characterisation of the eight societies by means of particular analysis of each case, something that I have so f ar done only for the Sirionó; but although I have actually made such analyses it will take considerable time yet to present them in print, and I prefer not to delay so long in making the methodological points which are my concern here.14 For the present, I merely assert the common structure which these societies

14 As a matter of record, I have in fact publicly analysed Mikir society as a system of asymmetrie prescriptive alliance in a paper delivered to a seminar of the Department of Cultural Anthropology, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, in March 19S9. This and the other analyses will each include, when eventually published, an examination of previous interpretations, which is the reason that I pay no attention here to Professor Murdock's categorisation of particular institutions in these societies. It is

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access NOTES ON COMPAEATIVE METHOD. 175 exhibit, and promise future demonstration. Also, I may adduce the conclusions of Lévi-Strauss, summary though his investigations are in most cases, to the effect that the Lakher, Mikir, Batak, Gilyak, Miwok, and Thado are all instances of the simple form of échange généralisé (Lévi-Strauss, 1949), i.e. asymmetrie alliance, and this support justifies me considerably in arguing about these societies without first proving that they belong to the type of social system I claim. Murdock may properly classify the eight societies, by his own criteria and for his own purposes, under six different types of social organisation; but as systems of prescriptive alliance they all belong structurally to one and the; same type, viz. asymmetrie alliance. This conclusion has certain important consequences. The first is to cast doubt on the comparative validity of Murdock's classification, for the differences between the majority of these societies (such as the Miwok moieties, Venda matrilineal gKOups) are not distinctive of the different types of social organisation, to which they are severally assigned. That is, the Miwok certainly differ f rom the other societies in having exogamous moieties, but it is no part of the "Omaha" type of social organisation to which they are assigned that societies belonging to this type shall characteristically possess such moieties; and it is not required of "Iroquois"-type societiet; that they shall be bilineal, like the Venda, though some are. It cannot theref ore be maintained that the similarities of these societies in alliance structure are over-ridden by more fundamental differences which force their assignment to different types of social organisation. That the assignment to six different types may be mistaken is further indicated by the positions of these societies in Murdock's scheme of social evolution. The typology was constructed, after all, as part of an evolutionary argument. But if these societies are all systems of asymmetrie alliance, consider the effect on the situation displayed in Table 2, which shows the derivations of the types to which they are assigned. It must be admitted that these are astonishingly numerous and variant antecedents for so few societies of the same alliance structure; and the evolutionary complexity is increased, f urther- more, when the similarly variant possibilities of change (Murdock,

relevant to the present paper, however, to report that the Mikir ethnography — there are at least 25 sources other than the one he uses — permits the establishment of a relationship terminology showing "Sudanese" cross-cousin terms for men and very probably the same for wonen.

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1949, pp. 252—7, Table 73) are also taken into account. It is not impossible that societies of the same type, defined by alliance, should deviously have followed such separate but convergent evolutionary paths, or that from asymmetrie alliance they might equally variously diverge again, but such inferential courses seem highly unlikely.

TABLE 2 Sirionó: Matri-Fox, from Matri-Hawaiian or Matri-Eskimo. Lakher: Normal Guinea, from Patri-Hawaiian, from Normal Hawaiian. Mikir: Normal Dakota, [from Normal Guinea, Normal Yuman, or Duo- Iroquois]. Batak, Gilyak: Normal Sudanese, from Normal Dakota, Normal Guinea, Normal Fox, or Duo-Crow. Miwok, Thado: Normal Omaha, from Normal Dakota, Normal Fox, Normal Guinea, Normal Sudanese, or Duo-Crow. Venda: Duo-Iroquois, from Patri-Iroquois, from Bi-Iroquois, from Normal Iroquois, from Normal Nankanse or Matri-Yuman.

Moreover, the scheme posits evolutionary connexions between types of social organisation to which certain of the societies belong, and these are difricult to interpret significantly in the present particulars. For example, the Lakher, Batak, and Thado are typologically related in the f ollowing manner:

Lakher (Normal Guinea) > Batak (Normal Sudanese) > Thado (Normal Omaha)

But, if these three societies all similarly practise asymmetrie alliance, this is a strange formula. Even when it is conceded that the Lakher are not certainly known to practise asymmetrie alliance, the situation is scarcely less dubious in principle. The Batak and the Thado not only possess social classifications of very similar form, and accordingly practise asymmetrie alliance, but a conventional comparison of institutions shows them to be practically identical in such respects as type of descent system, political organisation, local groups, land tenure, economy, marriage payments, marital residence, authority, and social stratification. They are indeed remarkably similar societies, yet in Murdock's evolutionary scheme Batak can typologically "become" Thado. Alternatively, by supposed changes in cousin terms (Murdock, 1949, p. 255), we may make the reverse connexion:

Thado (Normal Omaha) > Batak (Normal Sudanese).

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It might be objected; that, according to Murdock, the transition Normal Omaha > Normal Sudanese is "rare or exceptional" (cf. 1949, p. 250), but it is nevertheless listed as a possibility. We therefore have two societies of the same strueture assigned to two different major types of social organisation, and these are so related that each can change into the other. Similarly, the Sirionó also can be connected in an evolutionary sense with the Thado:

Sirionó (Matri-Fox) > (Normal Fox) > Thado (Normal Omaha).

Alternatively, a reverse relation is listed as possible (Murdock, 1949, pp. 255, 253), even if the intervening stages are rare or exceptional, viz.:

Thado (Normal Omaha) > (Normal Fox) > (Bi-Fox) > Sirionó (Matri-Fóx).

According to Murdock's scheme, either series of transitions is as possible as the other. We thus have a matrilineal system of asymmetrie alliance (Sirionó) and a patrilineal system (Thado), each of which, typologically speaking, is represented as being able to change, through intermediary stages, into the other. This situation is compounded, moreover, by the f ollowing examples of simple evolutionary connexions extracted from the scheme:

Mikir (Normal Dakota) > Gilyak (Normal Sudanese) Gilyak (Normal Sudanese) > Mikir (Normal Dakota) Mikir (Normal Dakota) > Thado (Normal Omaha) Thado (Normal Omaha) > Mikir (Normal Dakota) Venda (Duo-Iroquois) > Mikir (Normal Dakota) Lakher (Normal Guinea) > Thado (Normal Omaha) Lakher (Normal Guinea) > Mikir (Normal Dakota).

This list could easily be extended by advancing to intricate series of transitions, of the sort that Murdock himself posits in certain other cases, such as: Venda (Duo-Iroquois) > Mikir (Normal Dakota) > Batak/Gilyak (Normal Sudanese) > Miwok/Thado (Normal Omaha). Dl. 118 12

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This formula links six of the eight societies directly in an evolutionary chain, each type in which is supposedly representative of a distinct developmental stage;15 but prescriptive alliance is a more fundamental principle of order than descent (Lévi-Strauss, 1949, p. 334; Dumont, 1957; Needham, 1961b, pp. 253—4), which is the major of the two defining features of Murdock's primary types of social organisation, and since these societies belong to the same type of alliance system they cannot be so connected. The evolutionary scheme, in short, permits the establishment of such a prolif eration of transitional connexions, many of which are reversible, between these èight societies of the same alliance structure (Fig. 1) as to demonstrate that it cannot cope with prescriptive alliance, at least,

Venda

Batak/Gilyak •<- Mikir

Lakher • Miwok/Thado

(Normal Fox)

(Bi-Fox)

Sirionó

Fig. 1. Examples of "evolutionary" connexions.

15 Academie suspicion should not inspire the inference that I am simply juggling with Professor Murdock's categories and evolutionary connexions. On the contrary, I am showing what happens when they are taken seriously.

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access NOTES ON COMPAKATIVE METHOD. 179 and to provoke doubt concerning its application to other types of society also. I do not say, of course, that there are no significant differences between the societies in question, or that evolutionary connexions might not be made between social types defined by these differences (e.g. Miwok moieties, Venda bilineal descent) to which they may be assigned. In another place, indeed, I might well try to establish developmental — and unidirectional — connexions between (in typological terms) the Miwok and the Thado (cf. Needham, 1961a, pp. 109—10), the Mikir and the Venda, or even the Miwok and the Sirionó (cf. Needham, 1961b, p. 253). But it would occur to me to postulate evolutionary transitions between such secondary social types only because these societies all exhibit in the f irst place a more radical similarity as systems of prescriptive alliance. These considerations derive their f orce, admittedly, f rom the premise that all (or the majority) of the eight societies in question do indeed belong to the same kind of prescriptive alliance system; but there is in any case further ground for doubt about the validity of Murdock's comparative method, and this is not dependent on such an assumption, though prescriptive alliance is still my particular concern. The converse of the ascription of societies of the same structure to different types of social organisation is the inclusion of societies of different structure in the same type, and this also is to be seen in Social Structure. Under the "Iroquois" type of social organisation, for example, and in the same sub-type (viz. "Duo-Iroquois"), we find (Murdock, 1949, p. 244) the Herero, who have no form of prescriptive alliance, the Kariera, who have a four-section system, the Arunta, with an eight-section system, and the Venda, with asymmetrie alliance. This disparity of types of social system needs no demonstration here, and it prompts one to wonder what features they have in common which could possibly make it usef ui to group them together in this way. The criteria actually employed are simply bilineal descent and "Iroquois" terms for cross- cousins, but these are not systematically consequential enough to justify the grouping of very different systems in one sub-type. In the context of prescriptive alliance, in particular, three of the four societies belong each to a different type of system, and even the Kariera and the Arunta (both instances of symmetrie alliance) differ in systematic respects which are likely to qualify any sociological proposition linking the two. It may similarly be wondered what systematic connexion there is between the Iatmül, with no prescriptive alliance and a marked

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access 180 RODNEY NEEDHAM. patrilateral preference, and the Thado, with an asymmetrie system defined by a matrilateral prescription, which makes it useful to class them together as "Normal Omaha" (Murdock, 1949, p. 240). As a final example, it is especially difïïcult to see any theoretical justification for grouping together, under the "Sudanese" type (Murdock, 1949, p. 239), societies so disparate as the Batak, with a matrilateral prescription, and the Sherente ("Cherente"), with their reportedly strong patrilateral emphasis; for not only are they very different in almost every respect of sociological importance (except Murdock's criteria, and whatever they may imply), but the. Sherente are confusedly described by the ethnographer as having a system of a quite singular kind which has never been properly analysed.16 There is another doubtful matter to be taken into account also. We have seen above that societies of the same type of alliance system are assigned to different positions in the evolutionary scheme, and here we have the converse, viz. that societies of different structure are assigned to the same position. But it is difficult to accept without demonstration that, for example, the structural antecedents of the Herero should significantly resemble those of the Arunta (Murdock, 1949, pp. 332, 336).

The difficulties summarily indicated in these notes seriously affect, I suggest, the reliability and the theoretical application of the comparative surveys which Murdock has made, and they particularly underline the effects on his own aims of the failure to take prescriptive alliance into consideration. It should not be thought, however, that I deny all value to his projects,17 especially with regard to certain of the practical contri-

16 I have suggested elsewhere an interpretation of the reported marriage preference and have characterised the structural principle by which I think this society may be understood (1958b, pp. 212-3; 1962a, pp. 66, 102-3), and I intend to publish an analysis, relating to problems of prescriptive alliance, at some future time. I understand that Dr. Maybury-Lewis, who has the advantage of field experience among the Sherente, also intends to produce an analysis, relating to his comparative studies of moiety systems in general and the Gê-speaking tribes in particular. Such independent but complementary analyses offer unusual theoretical promise (cf. Needham, 1961a, p. 94), and it is to be hoped that in this especially intriguing instance it will be fulfilled. 17 Nor, incidentally, do I at all wish to disparage the analytical content (the ideas, as distinct from the method) of Eyde and Postal's interesting paper.

Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 12:32:45PM via free access NOTES ON COMPARATIVE METHOD. 181 butions which Murdock first suggested might be made by the original cross-cultural survey (1940, p. 370). Social anthropologists may be gratefui to the author of Social Structure f or its use as index, catalogue, and bibliographical guide in the study of descent systems; and the world ethnographic sample is of even wider preliminary use in explor- ing unfamiliar ethnographic territories. It is an immense and ungrateful labour to compile such tabulated comparative surveys, and I do not f or a moment wish to seem to deprecate the real services they perform. My first concern here is to emphasise that, whatever criteria of categorisation are employed, the f acts must be right; and to urge that there is no means by which this result may be achieved except by the laborious and unspectacular procedures of traditional scholarship. The second is that in order to make a comparative study one must first of all understand in some compreherisive degree that which is to be compared; and this understanding, similarly, can only be arrived at by systematic study. In sum, whatever the aim or method of comparison, it must be preceded by intensive structural analysis and be conducted in terms of the relations thus established, and this is an especially urgent consideration in the study of prescriptive alliance. •""•'•W-i RODNEY NEEDHAM

Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences Stanford, California, 1961.

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Leach, E. R. 1961 Rethinking Anthropology. (London School of Economics Monographs on Social Anthropology, No. 22). London. Lévi-Strauss, Claude 1949 Les Structures élémentaires de la Parenté. Paris. Maybury-Lewis, David 1960 Parallel descent and the Apinayé anomaly. Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, 16, pp. 191-216. Murdock, George Peter 1940 The cross-cultural survey. American Sociological Review, 5, pp. 361-70. 1949 Social Structure. New York. 1957 World ethnographic sample. American Anthropologist, 59, pp. 664-687. Needham, Rodney 1957 Circulating connubium in eastern Sumba: a Hterary analysis. Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde, 113, pp. 68-78. 1958a A structural analysis of Purum society. American Anthropologist, 60, pp. 75-101. 1958b The formal analysis of prescriptive patrilateral cross-cousin marriage. Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, 14, pp. 199-219. 1960a Alliance and classification among the Lamet. Sociologus, 10, pp. 97-118. 1960b Research projects in Southeats Asia. Bulletin of the International Com- mittee on Urgent Anthropological and Ethnological Research, No. 3, pp. 63-71. 1961a Notes on the analysis of asymmetrie alliance. Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde, 117, pp. 93-117. 1961b An analytical note on the structure of Sirionó society. Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, 17, pp. 239-255. 1962a'Structure and Sentiment: a test case in social anthropology. Chicago. 1962b Genealogy and category in Wikmunkan society. Ethnology, 1 (in press).

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