IntroductionThe societies anthropologists traditionally have studied have stimulated a strong interest in families, along with larger systems of kinship and marriage.
Ethnographers quickly recognize social divisions, or groups, within any society they study. They learn about significant groups by observing their activities and membership.
The nuclear family (parents and children) is one kind of kin group that is widespread, but is far from universal.
Much of kinship is culturally constructed, that is, based on learning and variable from culture to culture.
A family is a group of people (e.g., parents, children, siblings, grandparents, grandchildren, uncles, aunts, nephews, nieces, cousins, spouses, siblings-in-law, parents-in-law, children-in-law) who are considered to be related in some way, e.g., by "blood," common ancestry or descent, or marriage. This definition is broad enough to account for the many ways family is defined cross-culturally.
FamiliesNuclear and Extended Families
A nuclear family is impermanent; it lasts only as long as the parents and children remain together.
The nuclear family consists of parents and their children.
Most people belong to at least two nuclear families at different times in their lives: a family of orientation and a family of procreation.
A Family of orientation is the family in which one is born and grows up.
A family of procreation is formed when one marries and has children.
Nuclear family organization is widespread but not universal.
In certain societies, the nuclear family is rare or nonexistent or has no special role in social life.
In some societies, social units such as extended families and descent groups assume most or all of the functions otherwise associated with the nuclear family.
In Brazil, the family of orientation predominates, whereas in the United States it is the family of procreation.
Among the Muslims of western Bosnia, nuclear families were embedded within large extended families called zadrugas, each headed by a male household head and his wife.
The Nayars of southern India lived in matrilineal extended family compounds called tarawads, each headed by a senior woman.
Industrialism and Family OrganizationFor many North Americans, the nuclear family is the only well defined kin group.
The most prevalent residence pattern among middle-class North Americans is neolocality—married couples are expected to establish a new place of residence.
Expanded family households (those that include nonnuclear relatives) are more common among lower-class North Americans.
An extended family household includes three or more generations.
A collateral household includes siblings and their spouses and children.
The greater frequency of expanded family households among poorer Americans is an adaptation to poverty that enables relatives to pool their resources.
Changes in North American KinshipAlthough the nuclear family remains a cultural ideal for many Americans, other domestic arrangements now outnumber the "traditional" American household more than three to one.
With more women joining the workforce, the age of first marriage has increased.
The divorce rate has also risen dramatically as has the number of single-parent families.
The percentage of adults who are married has decreased.
The trend toward smaller families and living units in the United States also is detectable in western Europe and other industrial nations.
The Family among ForagersForaging societies are far removed from industrial nations in terms of social complexity, but they do feature geographic mobility, which is associated with nomadic or seminomadic hunting and gathering.
The two basic social units of traditional foraging societies are the nuclear family and the band.
Although nuclear families are as impermanent among foragers as they are in any other society, they usually are more stable than bands are.
Typically, the band exists only seasonally, breaking up into nuclear families when resources become scarce.
Mobility and the emphasis on small, economically self-sufficient family units promote the nuclear family as a basic kin group in both industrial and foraging societies.
DescentDescent GroupsA descent group is a permanent social unit whose members claim common ancestry.
There are two types of unilineal descent: patrilineal and matrilineal.With patrilineal descent, people automatically have lifetime membership in their father's group; the children of the group's men join the group, but the children of the group's women are excluded.
With matrilineal descent, people join the mother's group automatically at birth and stay members throughout life; matrilineal descent groups include only the children of the group's women.
Patrilineal descent is much more common than matrilineal descent is.
Descent groups may be lineages or clans.A lineage is a descent group whose members can demonstrate their common descent from an apical ancestor (demonstrated descent).
A Clans use stipulated descent. Clan members merely say they descend from the apical ancestor, without trying to trace the actual genealogical links.
When a clan's apical ancestor is nonhuman (an animal or a plant), it is called a totem.
Lineages, Clans, and ResidenceDescent groups are permanent and enduring units whose members have access to lineage estates.
Patrilineal and matrilineal descent, and the post-marital residence rules that usually accompany them, ensure that about half the people born in each generation will spend their lives on the ancestral estate.
There are two different unilocal rules of post-marital residence: patrilocality and matrilocality.Patrilocality—the rule that when a couple marries, it moves to the husband's community, so that their children will grow up in their father's village—is associated with patrilineal descent.
Matrilocality—the rule stipulating that married couples live in the wife's community, so that their children grow up in their mother's village—is less common and associated with matrilineal descent.
MarriageThere is no single definition of marriage that is adequate to account for all of the diversity found in marriages cross-culturally.The genitor is a child's actual father.
The pater is the socially recognized father.
Incest and Exogamy
Exogamy is the practice of seeking a spouse outside one's own group.This practice forces people to create and maintain a wide social network.
This wider social network nurtures, helps, and protects one's group during times of need.
Although Tabooed, Incest Does Happen
Incest refers to sexual relations with a close relative.
The incest taboo is a cultural universal.
There is no simple or universally accepted explanation for the fact that all cultures ban incest.
A cross-cultural study of 87 societies revealed that incest did occur in several of them.
For Western societies with nuclear family organization, father-daughter incest is most common with stepfathers, but it also happens with biological fathers, especially those who were absent or did little caretaking of their daughters in childhood.
It has been argued that the incest taboo is universal because incest horror is instinctive. However, cultural universality doesn't necessarily entail an instinctual basis. What constitutes incest varies widely from culture to culture.EndogamyEndogamy rules dictate mating or marriage within a group to which one belongs.
Most cultures are endogamous units (although they usually do not have formal endogamy rules), while classes and ethnic groups within a society may also be quasi-endogamous.
CasteIndia's caste system is an extreme example of endogamy.
Castes are stratified groups in which membership is ascribed at birth and is lifelong.
Occupational specialization often sets off one caste from another.
The belief that intercaste sexual unions lead to ritual impurity for the higher-caste partner has helped to maintain endogamy and to ensure the pure ancestry of high-caste children.
While castes are endogamous groups, many are internally subdivided into exogamous lineages.
Marital Rights and Same-Sex MarriageEdmund Leach observed that several kinds of rights may be allocated by marriage.Marriage can establish the legal father of a woman's children and the legal mother of a man's.
Marriage can give either or both spouses a monopoly in the sexuality of the other.
Marriage can give either or both spouses rights to the labor of the other.
Marriage can give either or both spouses rights over the other's property.
Marriage can establish a joint fund of property—a partnership—for the benefit of the children.
Marriage can establish a socially significant "relationship of affinity" between spouses and their relatives.
There are no logical reasons why same-sex marriage could not allocate all of the rights discussed by Leach.There's no logical reason why same-sex marriage cannot give spouses rights over the other's property.
Because same-sex marriage is illegal in most of the United States, same-sex couples are denied many of the rights and benefits enjoyed by different-sex couples (e.g., rights to the labor and property of a spouse, the ability to establish a joint fund of property, relationships of affinity with a spouse's relatives).
Same-sex unions have been recognized in various historical and cultural settings (e.g., Native American berdaches; the marriage of two women among the Igbo and the Lovedu in Africa).
Marriage Across Cultures
In nonindustrial societies, marriage often is more a relationship between groups than one between individuals.
Bridewealth and DowryIn societies with descent groups, descent-group members often have to contribute to the bridewealth—a customary gift before, at, or after the marriage from the husband and his kin to the wife and her kin.Bridewealth compensates the bride's group for the loss of her companionship and labor.
Bridewealth also is known as progeny price, because it makes the children born to the woman full members of her husband's descent group.
Bridewealth is common in patrilineal groups.
As the value of bridewealth increases, marriages become more stable; thus, bridewealth is insurance against divorce.
Dowry is a marital exchange in which the wife's group provides substantial gifts to the husband's family.Dowry correlates with low female status.
Dowry is much less common than bridewealth.
In societies with bridewealth, a woman's ability to bear children is essential to the stability of her marriage.
Most nonindustrial food-producing societies allow plural marriages, or polygamy.Polygyny, in which a man has more than one wife, is common.
Polyandry, in which a woman has more than one husband, is very rare.
Polygyny may result from an infertile wife remaining married to her husband after he has taken a substitute wife provided by her descent group.
Durable AlliancesCustoms such as the sororate and the levirate highlight the importance of marriage as an alliance between groups.In a sororate marriage, a widower marries one of his deceased wife's sisters (or another woman from her group if she has no sister or if all her sisters already are married).
In a levirate marriage, a widow marries one of her deceased husband's brothers.
DivorceEase of divorce varies across cultures.Marriages that are political alliances between groups are harder to break up than are marriages that are more individual affairs.
Substantial bridewealth discourages divorce, and replacement marriages (levirate and sororate) also help to preserve group alliances.
Divorce is more common in matrilineal and matrilocal societies (e.g., the Hopi of the American Southwest).
Divorce is harder in patrilocal societies, as a woman may be less inclined to leave her children, who as members of their father's lineage would be expected to remain with him.
In foraging societies, different factors favor or oppose divorce. Factors favoring divorce:Since foragers tend to lack descent groups, the political alliance functions of marriage are less important to them than they are to food producers.
Foragers also tend to have few material possessions, making the process of dissolving a joint fund of property easier.
Factors opposing divorce:Ties between spouses tend to be durable in societies in which the family is an important year-round unit with a gender-based division of labor.
Sparse populations mean there are few alternative spouses.
In contemporary Western societies, divorce may occur when sex, romance, and/or companionship fade, while economic ties, obligations to children, concern about public opinion, or simple inertia may keep marriages intact.
Plural MarriagesPolygamy (marriage to more than one spouse at a time) is illegal in contemporary North America, but North Americans but North Americans are allowed to practice serial monogamy (remarrying after divorce).
PolygynyEven in cultures that encourage polygyny, monogamy still tends to be the norm, largely because most populations have roughly equal sex ratios.
The custom of men marrying later than women (so that there are more widows than widowers) promotes polygyny.
The context and function of polygyny vary from society to society and even within the same society.
Some men are polygynous because they have inherited a widow from a brother, while others have multiple wives because they seek prestige or want to increase household productivity.
PolyandryPolyandry is quite rare, being practiced almost exclusively in South Asia (Tibet, Nepal, India, and Sri Lanka).
Polyandry seems to be a cultural adaptation to mobility associated with customary male travel for trade, commerce, and military operations.
Polyandry ensures there will be at least one man at home to accomplish male activities.
Fraternal polyandry is also an effective strategy when resources are scarce. Brothers with limited resources can pool their resources in expanded (polyandrous) households.
Because polyandry restricts the number of wives and heirs, land can be transmitted with minimal fragmentation.
Anthropology Today: Five Wives and 55 ChildrenMany societies, including Turkey, that once permitted plural marriages have outlawed it. This news story reports on polygyny, the form of polygamy in which a man has more than one wife.
Polygamy, although formally outlawed, has survived in Turkey since the Ottoman period, when having several wives was viewed as a symbol of power, wealth, and sexual prowess.
Unlike the past, when the practice was customary, polygamy can put contemporary women at risk.
Since their marriages have no official status, secondary wives who are abused or mistreated have no legal recourse.
Like all institutions studied by anthropologists, customs involving plural marriage are changing in the contemporary world and in the context of nation-states and globalization.
