Kinship and Marriage Kinship • Culturally defined relationship established on the basis of blood ties or through marriage • Kinship system - Kin relations, kin groups, and terms for classifying kin in a society Kinship Two main functions of kinship: • Provides continuity between generations • Inheritance and succession • Defines a group on whom a person can rely for aid • Provides allies and marriage partners • Regulates access to land and resource o Kin classification is cultural and may not reflect biology Descent • Descent- Affiliations between children and parents • Descent groups- group of kin who are descendants of a common ancestor, extending beyond 2 generations Descent • Functions of descent groups: • Organize domestic life • Enculturate children • Allow transfer of property • Carry out religious ritual • Settle disputes • Create political organization and monitor warfare Kinship Classification Kinship classification is related to: • The types of social groups that are formed • Systems of marriage and inheritance • Deep and broad cultural values • Roles people play in society based on their kinship association ** It is important to remember that the systems feel as natural to their members as your system does to you Kinship Classification Principles of classifying kin: • Generation • Relative age • Lineality (blood through descent) vs. Collaterality (siblings, cousins etc) • Gender • Consanguineal (blood relative) vs. Affinal kin (marriage relative) • Sex of linking relative • Side of the family- • Parallel cousins vs. Cross-cousins Descent Two main types of descent: Unilineal and Bilineal Lineage: a group of kin whose members trace descent from a known common ancestor • Unilineal Descent: based on links through paternal (patrilineal) or maternal line (matrilineal) Descent • Advantages: • Forms non-overlapping descent groups that perpetuate themselves over time even though membership changes • Provide clear group membership for everyone in the society • Clear rights of ownership, social duties and roles • There is flexibility and change in these systems, and not all unilineal groups operate the same way Patrilineal Descent Patrilineage • Descent is traced through male lineage • Inheritance moves from father to son, as does succession to office • Man’s position as father and husband is the most important source of male authority • Example: Village of Ha Tsuen, Hong Kong Patrilineal Descent Group o Found among 45% of all cultures o Kinship is traced through the male line o Males dominate status, power, and property o Strongest versions found in South Asia (India, Pakistan) and East Asia Matrilineage • Descent is traced through the female line • Membership includes a woman, her siblings, her sister’s children, her own children, and the children of her daughters Matrilineage • Children belong to the mother’s descent group • Many rights and responsibilities belong to the mother’s brother • The inclusion of a husband in the household is less important • Women usually have higher status Matrilineal Descent Group o Found among 15% of all cultures o Kinship is traced through the female line o Women control land and products o Found in Southeast Asia, the South Pacific, and in some parts of Europe and North America o Example: The Minangkabau of Indonesia The Minangkabau of Indonesia • World’s largest matrilineal culture • Economy based mainly on rice farming • Some men and women work in cities and then return home The Minangkabau of Indonesia • Women hold power through control of lineage land • Submatrilineage groups of adult women and girls live together in a lineage house • Men and older boys often live separately • In the household, the senior woman controls the power and makes all decisions Minangkabau Region in Indonesia 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 • Found in foraging and industrial/ informatic cultures • Examples: • Euro-Americans • Ju/’hoansi • Innu (Inuit) Two Kinship Naming Systems Kinship through Sharing In many cultures people create kinship through sharing Food sharing Adoption and fostering Godparents Marriage A Working Definition: • Marriage is a more or less stable union, usually between two people who may or may not be co- residential, sexually involved with each other, and procreative with each other (p. 200) Marriage • Criteria for defining marriage cross-culturally: • Numbers of people involved • Gender/sexual orientation of people involved Marriage • Functions of Marriage: • Regulates sexual access • Creates a family • Expands social groups • legitimacy of children • Shared property • Co-residence The Range of Cultural Preferences for Spouse/Partner Selection • Kinship • Location • Ethnicity • Status/economic position • Appearance (beauty, height, FGC…) • Physical ability • Romantic love Who can we marry? Exogamy: • Rules specifying that a person must marry outside a particular group • Almost universal within the primary family group • Leads to alliances between different families and groups Who can we marry? Endogamy: • Rules that marriage must be within a particular group. • In India, the caste is an endogamous group. • In the U.S., social classes tend to be endogamous Status Considerations in Partner Selection (Heterosexual Pairing) Who can we marry? One universal in marriage rules is incest taboos: • Prohibit sexual relations between relatives • Universal to most cultures • Avoids inbreeding • Prevents disruption in the nuclear family • Directs sexual desires outside the family • Forces people to marry outside the family and create a larger social community • Exceptions: • Brother-sister marriages among elites Cousin Marriage • Forbidden in some cultures • Preferred in some cultures • Various definitions of what is a cousin • Various patterns of preference • For cousins on which “side” of the family (mother’s or father’s) • For cross-cousins or parallel cousins Cousin Marriage Preferential marriage rules: • Rules about the preferred categories of relatives for marriage partners: • Cross cousins The children of a parent’s siblings of the opposite sex (mother’s brothers, father’s sisters) Cousin Marriage Preferential marriage rules: • Parallel cousins • The children of a parent’s same-sex siblings (mother’s sisters, father’s brothers) Cross Cousins and Parallel Cousins South India: Cousin Marriage Highly Preferred Getting Married • Often involves a series of gift/monetary exchanges between the bride’s and groom’s family • The wedding: Ranges from very simple to highly elaborate and expensive • Weddings “crystallize” and highlight cultural meanings of the marital relationship and gender roles Exchange of Goods in Marriage • Primary rights of marriage: • Sexual access to spouse • Rights over children born to wife • Obligation by one or both parent to care for children • Rights of husband and wife to the economic services of the other Exchange of Goods in Marriage • Three primary modes of exchange in marriage: • Bride service: The husband must work for a specified period of time for his wife’s family in exchange for his marital rights • Bridewealth: Cash or goods are given by the groom’s kin to the bride’s kin to seal a marriage. The most common of exchanges • Dowry: A presentation of goods by the bride’s kin to the groom’s. Less common than other exchanges Major Types of Marriage Exchanges Who can we marry? Number of spouses • All societies have rules about how many spouses a person can have at one time • Monogamy is the norm only in Europe and north America • 75% of the world’s societies prefer plural marriage Who can we marry? Monogamy: A rule permitting only one spouse Polygymy: • A rule allowing more than one spouse • Polygyny • A rule permitting a man to have more than one wife at a time • Polyandry • A rule permitting a woman to have more than one husband at a time • What would be the benefits of each of these systems? Rules of Residence • Patrilocal residence - a woman lives with her husband’s family after marriage • Matrilocal residence - a man lives in the household of his wife’s family • Avunculocal residence - a married couple is expected to live with the husband’s mother’s brother • If a couple can choose between living with either the wife’s or the husband’s family, the pattern is called bilocal residence Family versus Household • A family is a group of people who consider themselves related by kinship • A household is a person or persons who live together and may or may not be related by kinship • Both terms are important in anthropology Families • Anthropologists identify two basic types of families: 1. Nuclear families- organized around the relationship between husband and wife 2. Extended family- based on consanguineal, or blood, relations extending over three or more generations 3. There are a number of exceptions now, including single- parent and blended families Does your family follow one of these traditional patterns? Will you have the same pattern as your parents? Nuclear Household • Common worldwide but not universally the preferred form • Found among foragers and industrial/ informatics groups • Classic Nacirema household type, though on the decline as the number of single-person households increases Extended Household • More common among horticulturalists, pastoralists, and agriculturalists • Related to fixed economic base/property • May be extended vertically through parents and sons/daughters or horizontally through