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| Why do anthropologists focus so much energy on studying kinship? Ans: Although the study of kinship may seem somewhat trivial to some Americans, if you are interested in studying the culture of people all over the world it is an important first step to recognize that everyone is necessarily related to someone. How people of different cultures choose to classify the people they are related to has a great deal of influence on the interactions that shape a person’s life and can be very informative to the anthropologist. In addition, in nonindustrial societies, much of the human interaction between people occurs between people who consider themselves to be related, so kinship takes on a more important role. How "normal" is the nuclear family that most Americans are familiar with? Ans: Nuclear family organization is widespread, but it is not universal. In certain societies, the nuclear family is rare or nonexistent and in other cultures the nuclear family has no special role in social life. In these societies other social groups such as descent groups and extended families assume the functions associated with the nuclear family. Interestingly, groups that rely on the organization of the nuclear family tend to be highly mobile. This includes modern industrial societies and forager societies. Increasingly, the nuclear family household, which might traditionally include two parents and children, is rare in the United States. In 1998, nonnuclear family arrangements outnumbered the "traditional" American household three to one. Can television help me understand the material in this chapter? Ans: Yes it can! The American family has changed a great deal in the last four or five decades, and this change is reflected on television. In the sitcoms of the 1950s and 1960s, the families were idealized middle-class and upper-middle-class examples of perfect nuclear families with an all-knowing dad. This began to change in the 1970s: think of the blended family of The Brady Bunch. Now sitcoms regularly show co-resident friends, roommates, unmarried couples, single parents, unrelated retirees, nannies, housekeepers, and working mothers. In addition, the father (think of Homer Simpson of The Simpsons) is almost never depicted as being as omniscient as his 1950s sitcom counterpart. Why do anthropologists distinguish between a person's pater and genitor? Ans: This distinction is made because in many societies a person's biological father (genitor) is the person who performs the duties of a father. For example, in many matrilineal societies the mother's brother serves as the pater because he belongs to the same descent group as the mother and the child. Since descent group affiliation is determined through the female line, the genitor is not considered kin to the child. An example from Western society involves children who have been adopted. Many adopted children grow up with a pater without ever knowing their genitor. Isn't the purpose of marriage to have children? Ans: Cross-culturally, people get married for a variety of reasons. Having children is just one of these reasons. In addition to granting spouses exclusive access to each other and establishing the legal parents of children, marriage serves many roles not directly related to sex. Marriages also serve an important economic role as spouses pool their labor, resources, and property, which reduces risk and increases productivity. In general, single people are at an economic disadvantage compared to people who are married. The textbook discusses the global trend of the feminization of poverty in which more and more of the world's poor live in households headed by single women. Anthropologists argue that plural marriages exist in part due to the economic advantages of having additional spouses. Since marriages create relationships between groups as well as between spouses, they also play an important role in creating and maintaining social and political relationships. Bridewealth and dowry exchanges help cement ties between the descent groups of the spouses. In polygynous societies, does every male have multiple wives? Ans: Not necessarily. In polygynous societies, most men are monogamous and only a fraction of the marriages are polygynous. This is due in part to the fact that in most human societies there are roughly as many women as men, which makes it impossible for every man to have multiple wives. In many polygynous societies, the number of wives is an indicator of a man's household productivity, prestige, and social position. More wives means more productivity which leads to greater wealth. This wealth can be used to marry more women, which in turn adds more productivity. In other instances, men are polygynous because they have inherited a widow from a brother. |