1. Marriage, Family and Kinship
Chapter 9
Marriage, Family and Kinship

2. Class Exercise & Discussion
What is family?
What is marriage?
What are your personal ideals and ideas of marriage?
comment on who should be partnered
how partners should meet (i.e., autonomous versus arranged marriage)
where they should live after marriage
what qualities your partner should have.
For most North Americans, the ideal match is a “love” marriage. But to what extent are people constrained by their families, friends, and social norms in their choice of a spouse?
How do North American parents try to ensure that their children marry the “right” person? Think carefully. How do North American parents directly and indirectly encourage endogamy (marriage within one’s social, economic, ethnic, or cultural group)?

3. The “New” Family- Donor 150
This story reveals some of our most basic questions about ourselves- who is a part of the group that we call family? Who decides who is related to who? Whose decision on family should prevail? Is it possible to choose one’s family like one chooses one’s friends?
Jeffrey Harrison (Donor 150) with JoEllen

4. The “New” Family

5. Marriage, Family, and Kinship
Humans live in groups
Creation of relatives- kinship
Effective strategy to form
Stable
Reliable
Separate
Deeply
connected group/s
To last over time and through generations

6. Kinship Definition
Culturally defined relationship established on the basis of blood ties or through marriage.

7. Kinship Terms Consanguinal- (sang=blood)- relations through blood
Parents and child, siblings, grandparents
Affinal- relations through marriage
In-laws
Fictive/Putative- relations through neither blood nor marriage
“Brother by another mother”
Adoption
Godchild

8. Examples
Write an example of fictive/putative, affinal, consanguinal kin in your life.

9. Family
Nuclear- is organized around the conjugal tie, the relationship between husband and wife (and their children).
Joint or extended- is based on consanguineal, or blood, relations extending over three or more generations.

10. Nuclear Family Parents and their children Advantages: Mobility
Flexibility
Personal space and privacy
Economic resources are one’s own

11. Nuclear Family
Disadvantages: No immediate care for older and younger family members
No security in times of crisis

12. Extended Family
Blood relations extending over three or more generations
Advantages: Keeps land intact
Provides security in times of crisis
Provides care for the older family members
Provides care for younger
family members

13. Extended Family
Disadvantages: Personalities
Conflict
Mismanagement

14. Types of Extended Families
A matrilineal family is organized around a woman, her daughters and the daughters’ husbands and children.
Iroquois longhouse
A patrilineal extended family is organized around a man, his sons, and the sons’ wives and children.
Osama Bin Laden’s Family

15. Marriage Customs, rules, and obligations for relationships between:
Sexually cohabiting adults
Parents and children
Families of the bride and groom

16. A Society without Marriage: The Na of China
Marriage is not a universal institution.
The Na do not practice marriage, or even have a word for it.
In the idealized Na partnership, men pass nights in a lover’s household and return to their families in the morning.
All sexual activity takes place during this concealed visit.

17. A Society without Marriage: The Na of China
Concealment is necessary because of a Na taboo.
Both women and men have multiple partners, no records are kept to determine paternity and the Na have no word for incest, illegitimate child, infidelity, or promiscuity.

18. Functions of Marriage 1) Regulates sexual access
Limits sexual competition
Provides stability for children
Allows for stable economic exchange
2) Provides a relatively stable structure:
The male can provide food and
protection.
The female can nurse and nurture the
children.

19. Functions of Marriage (contd.)
3) Expands social group
Links different families and kin groups.
Leads to cooperation beyond the
primary husband-wife pair.
Allows people to share resources.
Benefits the survival of the species.

20. Marriage Dominant marriage type in the United States Heterosexual
Monogamous
Other types of marriage fulfill the same functions.

21. Arranged Marriage Arranged Marriage
In some societies, marriage is important because it links kin groups of the married couple.
This accounts for the practice of arranged marriages.

22. What Does Love Have To Do With Marriage?

23. South Asian Indian Arranged Marriage

24. Arranged Marriage in North America
Matched by Mom- NPR
The Bachelor/Bachelorette

25. Arranged Marriage=Forced Marriage

26. Love Marriage or Marriages of Choice

27. Marriage Rules
Every society has culturally defined rules concerning sexual relations and marriage.
Marriage rules may:
Who to marry
Determine how many people one can marry
Allow for ending marriages
Dictate the rituals that legitimate marriage
Determine the rights established by marriage

28. Incest Taboo
Prohibits certain individuals from having sex with each other
The most widespread taboo is mating between primary family members.
Incest taboos effectively prohibit marriage among certain kin.

29. Reasons for Incest Taboo
Avoids inbreeding (Inbreeding theory)
Prevents disruption in the nuclear family (Family Disruption theory)
Directs sexual desires outside the family (Natural Aversion theory)
Forces people to marry outside the family and create a larger social community (Theory of Expanding Social Alliances)
The Westermarck Effect-

30. Endogamy Rules that marriage must be within a particular group
In India, each caste is an endogamous group.
In the U.S., social classes tend to be endogamous.

31. 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.

32. 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
Parallel cousins:
The children of a parent’s same-sex siblings

33. Kinship Diagram of Cousins

34. Preferential Marriage Rules
Levirate: A man marries the
widow of his deceased
brother.
Sororate: When a man’s wife dies, her sister is given to him as a wife.

35. 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.
Why is it the norm?

36. Polygamy A rule allowing more than one spouse Polygyny:
A rule permitting a man to have more than one wife at a time
Found in ancient texts including the bible
Advantages and Disadvantages
One husband, chosen by multiple wives
ABC News, 2013

37. Polyandry
Polyandry:
A rule permitting a woman to have more than one husband at a time
Also found in ancient texts- one woman with five husbands (Mahabharata)
Advantages and Disadvantages

38. Polyandry
Multiple Husbands National Geographic

39. Exchange of Goods in Marriage
Three kinds of exchanges made in connection with marriage:
Bride service
Bridewealth
Dowry

40. Bride Service
The husband must work for a specified period of time for his wife’s family in exchange for his marital rights.
Occurs mainly in foraging societies, where accumulating material goods for an exchange at marriage is difficult
Among the Ju/’hoansi a man may work for his wife’s family until the birth of the third child.

41. Bridewealth The most common form of marriage exchange
Cash or goods are given by the groom’s kin to the bride’s kin to seal a marriage.
Legitimates the new reproductive and socioeconomic unit created by the marriage
Bridewealth paid at marriage is returned if a marriage is terminated.

42. Dowry A presentation of goods by the bride’s kin to the groom’s family
Less common than other forms of exchange at marriage
Dowry has different meanings and functions in different societies.
a woman’s share of her family inheritance.
a payment transferred from the bride’s family to the groom’s family.
Dowry Deaths

43. Wedding Ceremony
Each cultural group celebrates marriage in a unique way. How does a wedding ceremony/rituals reflect:
the type of family that the couple will establish?
tell you about the culture as a whole? Consider what you know and what you’ve heard as well as seen in the media about weddings and wedding rituals.

44. Rules of Residence Neolocal Residence: Couple -> new residence
Patrilocal residence: Woman-> Husband’s family
Matrilocal residence: Man-> Wife’s family

45. Rules of Residence
Avunculocal residence: Couple-> husband’s mother’s brother.
Bilocal residence: Couple-> Choice between wife’s or husband’s family.

46. Descent Affiliations between children and parents
Types of Descent Groups
Unilineal
Patrilineal
Matrilineal

47. Kinship Diagram of Patrilineal Descent
Sons and daughters belong to their father’s descent group (shown in dark green), as do the children of sons — but not of daughters.

48. Kinship Diagram of Matrilineal Descent
Sons and daughters are members of their mother’s descent group (shown in dark green), as are the children of daughters — but not of sons.

49. Double Descent
Tracing descent through both matrilineal and patrilineal links.
Bilateral: both maternal and paternal lines are used to trace descent
Ambilineal: You get to choose which side you want to trace your descent through

50. Bringing it Back Home: Caring for the Elderly
Aging is a biological process that must be understood within a cultural context.
With modern medicine, people are living to older ages with chronic diseases and physical diminishment; this has caused cultural changes in many societies.

51. Bringing it Back Home: Caring for the Elderly
In China, families are beginning to value female children more for their potential emotional connections to their parents and devotion in their old age.
Japanese elderly are frequently concerned today about the financial burdens their deaths may cause to their children; the elderly are choosing less elaborate death rituals to help their children.

52. Bringing it Back Home: Caring for the Elderly
American Muslims are challenged in some cases to provide in-home care, as dictated by the Koran. Now nursing facilities are making changes to make them more acceptable for Muslims who need them for elderly parents.
In the United States many elderly people prefer to live alone to save their children the burden of increasing costs related to their care.

53. Bringing it Back Home: Caring for the Elderly
You decide:
Who do you think should bear the major burden for caring for the elderly in American society?
What options would you/could you choose for caring for the elderly in your own family?

54. Bringing it Back Home: Caring for the Elderly
You decide:
How does gender affect the experience of elder care? For example, the differences between caring for a widowed father or a widowed mother, or whether this responsibility should fall more on sons or daughters. Explain your response.

55. Bringing it Back Home: Polygamy in the United States
You decide:
Many of the attacks on Mormon polygamy stress its oppression of women.
Consider the different possible perceptions of polygamy in the United States today from a male and female point of view.

56. Quick Quiz

57. Explanations for the function of incest taboos include all EXCEPT which of the following?
It forces people to make alliances with other families, expanding societal links.
Taboos prohibiting mating between closely-related individuals arose because of the higher incidence of deleterious traits.
Incest taboos restrict damaging consequences of inbreeding.

58. Answer: b
Explanations regarding the function of familial incest taboos don’t include the following:
Taboos prohibiting mating between closely-related individuals arose because of the higher incidence of deleterious traits.

59. A young husband has an unfortunate encounter with a crocodile as he is herding his cows along the banks of the Nile River. As custom dictates, his brother marries the bereaved widow, adding her to his polygynous household. This is an example of:
the sororate.
the practice of bride-service.
the levirate.
an arranged marriage.

60. Answer: c
A young husband has an unfortunate encounter with a crocodile as he is herding his cows along the banks of the Nile River. As custom dictates, his brother subsequently marries the bereaved widow, adding her to his polygynous household. This is an example of the levirate.

61. In the United States and in many foraging cultures, we primarily practice _________ descent.
patrilineal
bilateral
matrilineal
ambilineal

62. Answer: b
In the United States and in many foraging cultures, we primarily practice bilateral descent.

63. Which statement best summarizes anthropological thinking on the functions of dowry?
The dowry is a woman's wealth to keep as her own economic security.
Dowry is compensation from the groom's family since the bride will not inherit from her family.
In societies that practice the dowry, it is part of the process of legitimization of the new alliance formed by a marriage.

64. Answer: c
The following statement best summarizes anthropological thinking on the functions of dowry across the societies in which this custom is practiced:
In societies that practice the dowry, it is part of the process of legitimization of the new alliance formed by a marriage.