[Xmca-l] Re: kinship

[Martin Packer]

Hi Greg,

The question I initially posted was really very simple: is there a language that does not have a cognate to the English word ‘family’? (I think ‘cognate’ is the correct term; what I mean is a word that would generally be translated as ‘family.’)

Now I’ve learned that Chinese (Mandarin?) has a word that might be best translated as ‘household.’ I find that interesting.

The underlying interest? Yes, I’m trying to make sense of the anthropological literature on kinship, and also the psychological literature on ‘contexts of children’s development.’ In both disciplines there seems to be a tendency to assume a definition of family along the lines of child plus biological parents. That’s what I take Malinowski to have been proposing. There are psychologists today who still assume such a definition.

But of course it doesn’t work! There are families where the kids are adopted. There are married couples where the man, for example, has a secret illegitimate child, so they do not form a family. There are single parent families. There are families in which a same-sex couple has a child who is not biologically related to them. There are families who had a surrogate mother. There are now families where the child has 3 biological parents (one provided mitochondrial dna). Note that in several of these kinds of family, there is no ‘blood’ (or genes) shared among the members.

So I started to wonder if there are societies that have nothing that they call family! 

But I am also trying to figure out where anthropology is today. For example, is a distinction still drawn between family, clan, and tribe? If so, how are these defined? Sahlins moves between family and clan, for instance. I understand that his proposal is that kinship is at root mutual relations of being, the way people participate in each other’s existence. In that sense, you and I are kin, based on our relationship through xmca. But I don’t think that we are family. So what distinguishes the mutual relations of being that constitute a family?

These are the things I’m confused about. I am rapidly coming once again to the conclusion that understanding nothing of the matter.  :)

Martin

"I may say that whenever I meet Mrs. Seligman or Dr. Lowie or discuss matters with Radcliffe-Brown or Kroeber, I become at once aware that my partner does not understand anything in the matter, and I end usually with the feeling that this also applies to myself” (Malinowski, 1930)



> On Jan 7, 2018, at 9:55 PM, Greg Thompson <greg.a.thompson@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Martin,
> 
> Yes, I agree that Sahlins didn't offer much in the way of cross-cultural
> cognates of "family". But I'm still a little at a loss for why you are so
> interested in this English word (e.g., why not "kin"? why not the preferred
> word in some other culture that extends to a different set of
> relationships). Without a good working definition of what you mean by
> "family". Do the other examples that people have given "count" as "family",
> e.g., sports teams, brothers-in-arms? Or are you taking the approach that
> family=father(biological?)+mother(again, biological, and what about a
> second father? or a second mother?)+child(biological? and today, would a
> dog do in place of a child - e.g., a couple at the park with their dog who
> refer to their grouping as a "family"?).
> 
> I guess I'm not sure where you are going with this interest in "family"
> (and what has it got to do with the kinship relations of this here family?).
> 
> -greg
> 
> On Sun, Jan 7, 2018 at 5:33 PM, Martin Packer <mpacker@cantab.net> wrote:
> 
>> Yes, I’ve been reading Sahlins. Very interesting take on kinship, along
>> the lines of the ‘ontological turn’ in cultural anthropology. Greg can
>> explain that..  :)
>> 
>> But does Sahlins define family?  (No!)
>> 
>> Martin
>> 
>> "I may say that whenever I meet Mrs. Seligman or Dr. Lowie or discuss
>> matters with Radcliffe-Brown or Kroeber, I become at once aware that my
>> partner does not understand anything in the matter, and I end usually with
>> the feeling that this also applies to myself” (Malinowski, 1930)
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> On Jan 7, 2018, at 7:07 PM, Greg Thompson <greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> <image.png><Sahlins, Marshall - What is Kinship.pdf>
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
> Assistant Professor
> Department of Anthropology
> 880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
> Brigham Young University
> Provo, UT 84602
> WEBSITE: greg.a.thompson.byu.edu
> http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson