ANTH 112
Feb. 27, Mar. 1, 6: Kinship
READ: Course notes on Kinship
ALSO READ: Schiller, Chapter Three
ALSO READ: Kral, M. J. (2012) “Postcolonial suicide among Inuit in arctic Canada.” Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry. 36(2), 306-325.

What tools have been developed to study kinship, in its different forms?
How do people use kin relations? What is its societal importance?

Where kinship exists, what conceptual tools have been developed to study it?
    - Basic Kin Symbols and Terminology

On what kinds of things is kinship based?
    - consanguineal (socially perceived blood ties, shared substance, sharing food, etc.)
    - affinal (on the basis of marriage)
    - fictive

Kin Diagrams/ Genealogies:
    Some common symbols:
    
    Ego: the person from whose point of view the diagram is understood.
    F - father    
    Z - sister        
    S - son        
    H - husband
    M - mother        
    B - brother        
    D - daughter        
    W - wife

Consanguineal Descent Terms
    - Bilateral descent
    - Unilineal descent
        - patrilineal/agnatic (includes children of men in the lineage)
        - matrilineal (includes children of women in the lineage)

    Note:  lineages are considered to be corporate descent groups (i.e. of political and economic importance in social organization). The standard example is considered to be the segmentary lineage system.

Affinal Kinship Terms
    Marriage: very complex and variable cross culturally
        a possible definition: “Marriage is a socially binding contract that usually involves some definition of sexual relationship, access to property, mutual obligations for the provision of income or services, and outlines obligations and rights to children.”
    Monogamy - one spouse
        Serial monogamy: one spouse at a time, but several through one’s life
    Polygamy - multiple spouses:
        - polygyny (one man, several wives)
         - polyandry (one woman, several husbands [usually brothers])
        - group marriage
    Preferences:
        e.g. for cross cousins or parallel cousins; members of specific groups or with specific personal characteristics
            -notion of romantic love versus arranged marriages
        Exogamy:    rule that prescribes marriage outside a specific group
            -NOTE: NEEDS AN ADJECTIVE
        Endogamy:    rule that prescribes marriage within a specific group
            -NOTE: NEEDS AN ADJECTIVE
        Incest taboo:    rule that prohibits marriage within a specific subset of kin
        Hypergamy: Bride marries up
        Hypogamy: Bride marries down
        Isogamy: Bride and groom of equivalent status
        
    Marital exchanges:
        - bridewealth:  goods that go from the groom’s family to the wife’s family
        - brideservice: work performed by the groom for the wife’s family
        - dowry: goods given by the wife’s family to the groom, or the groom’s family, or held in trust for the children
        - groom price: goods that go from bride’s family to married couple and groom’s family
        - wedding presents: goods given by family and friends to the bride and groom

    Location after marriage:
        - neolocal: separately from wife’s and husband’s families
        - patrilocal: with the husband’s family, usually patrilineage
        - matrilocal: with the wife’s family, usually matrilineage
        - avunculocal: with the husband’s mother’s brother (that is, his matrilineage rather than hers); in matrilineal societies
        - ambilocal: couple chooses to live with either his or her family, and stays there
        - bilocal: couple shifts between both families

Fictive Kinship
    Examples include godparenthood, use of kin terms in worker  unions, use of kin terms for close family friends, etc.

Schiller
- how have kin ties been used to get access to vending licenses and locations, to learn the work of vending, and to do the work of vending?
- how is this changing now, given different aspirations for children of vendors and the presence of immigrants who can do some of the jobs children would have done in the past?
- note also the discussion of the different immigrant groups and tourist groups.

Kral
- how did kinship operate before the 1950s?
- what impact did settlement, day and residential schools have on kin patterns?
- how is the loss of the combined duo of affection-closeness and respect-obedience related to increasing inter-generational segregation?
- how has the loss of parenting skills led to young male suicide?
- how has changing romantic partnership led to young male suicide?
- how have Inuit in the communities Kral studied worked to prevent young male suicide?

Debate: Resolved: That romantic love causes more harm than good; all intimate relationships should be arranged.

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