I. What is kinship?

A. Social structure: blueprint for how society is set up
B. Kinship is:

1. family
2. social organization of reproductive activity
3. Radcliffe-Brown: system of relatedness by biology and marriage

C. Kinship is culturally specific, cultural construction

1. US: biological relatedness, "real" relatives
2. David Schneider and pigs in Yap

D. Ways of making kinship in Euro-American culture

1. birth
2. adoption
3. marriage
4. fictive kin

E. Other ways of reckoning relatedness

1. Patriliny in China
2. Matrinliny in Trobriand Islands

 

II. The Evolution of Family Systems

A. Tylor, Morgan, and kinship

1. Every society has kinship
2. Morgan and the evolution of kinship systems

a. Kin Terms = conception of biological relatedness, represent system of marriage
b. Hawaiian kinship

c. Rank kinship systems on evolutionary scale
d. Notions of biological relatedness assumed to become more specific over time
e. Morgan's logical flaw: terminology doesn't equal conception of biological relatedness

 

III. Radcliffe-Brown and the comparison of kinship systems

A. Rejected Morgan's conjectural history
B. Kin terms = "best possible approach to the investigation of the kinship system as a whole" (62).

1. Classificatory
2. English kinship = example of Eskimo system

a. lack of distinction between uncles
b. distinction among close relatives

3. Kinship terminology yields structural skeleton of society
4. Problems with Radcliffe-Brown's approach

a. primogeniture in English system
b. Need to study kinship system to know whether conceptions are reflected in terminology, can't deduce those conceptions from terminology alone

 

IV. Types of Kinship Systems

A. Family forms

1. Nuclear (Inuit and US)
2. Extended
3. Polygamous

a. polygyny
b. polyandry

B. Types of Descent

1. unilineal

a. patrilineal
b. matrilineal

2. bilateral

C. Residence patterns

1. virilocal
2. uxorilocal
3. neolocal

D. China: extended, patrilineal, patrilocal
E. US: nuclear, bilateral, neolocal

 

For more information, contact:  aleshkow@holycross.edu