Kinship terminology
Encyclopedia
Kinship terminology refers to the various systems used in language
s to refer to the persons to whom an individual is related through kinship
. Different societies classify kinship relations differently and therefore use different systems of kinship terminology - for example some languages distinguish between affinal and consanguine uncles, whereas others
have only one word to refer to both a father and his brothers. Kinship terminologies include the terms of address used in different languages or communities for different relatives and the terms of reference used to identify the relationship of these relatives to ego or to each other.
(1818–1881) performed the first survey of kinship terminologies in use around the world. Though much of his work is now considered dated, he argued that kinship
terminologies reflect different sets of distinctions. For example, most kinship terminologies distinguish between sexes (the difference between a brother and a sister) and between generations (the difference between a child and a parent). Moreover, he argued, kinship terminologies distinguish between relatives by blood and marriage
(although recently some anthropologists have argued that many societies define kinship in terms other than blood).
However, Morgan also observed that different languages (and, by extension, societies) organize these distinctions differently. He proposed to describe kin terms and terminologies as either descriptive or classificatory
. When a descriptive term is used, it can only represent one type of relationship between two people, while a classificatory term represents one of many different types of relationships. For example, the word brother in English-speaking societies indicates a son of the same parent; thus, English-speaking societies use the word brother as a descriptive term. But a person's male first cousin could be the mother's brother's son, mother's sister's son, father's brother's son, father's sister's son, and so on; English-speaking societies therefore use the word cousin as a classificatory term.
Morgan discovered that a descriptive term in one society can become a classificatory term in another society. For example, in some societies, one would refer to many different people as "mother" (the woman who gave birth to oneself, as well as her sister and husband's sister, and also one's father's sister). Moreover, some societies do not group together relatives which the English-speaking societies classify together. For example, some languages have no one-word equivalent to cousin, because different terms refer to mother's sister's children and to father's sister's children.
Armed with these different terms, Morgan identified six basic patterns of kinship terminologies:
The basic principles of Crow and Omaha terminologies are symmetrical and opposite, with Crow systems having a matrilineal emphasis and Omaha systems a patrilineal emphasis.
, Tamil
, Sinhalese, Chinese
(see Chinese kinship
), Japanese
, Korean
, Hungarian
, Bulgarian
and Nepalese
add another dimension to some relations: relative age. Rather than one term for "brother", there exist, for example, different words for "older brother" and "younger brother". In Nepali, an older male sibling is referred to as daju or dai and a younger male sibling as bhai, whereas older and younger female siblings are called didi and bahini respectively.
, use the same terms of address for alternating generations. So a Chiricahua child (male or female) calls her paternal grandmother -ch’iné, and likewise this grandmother will call her son's child -ch’iné. Terms that recognize alternating generations and the prohibition of marriage within one's own set of alternate generation relatives (0, ±2, ±4, ±6, etc.) are common in Australian Aboriginal kinship
.
borrows the relative age system of the Chinese kinship
and follows the generation system of kinship. Philippine Kinship
distinguishes between generation, age and in some cases gender.
categories rather than based on biological descent. Kay (1967), Scheffler (1971), and Tjon Sie Fat (1981) gave variant criteria for Dravidian classificatory logic, but the basic idea is that of applying an even/odd distinction to relatives that takes into account the gender of every linking relative for ego’s kin relation to any given person. A MFBD(C), for example, is a mother’s father’s brother’s daughter’s child. If each female link (M,D) is assigned a 0 and each male (F,B) a 1, the number of 1s is either even or odd; in this case, even. In a Dravidian system with a patrilineal modulo
-2 counting system, marriage is prohibited with this relative, and a marriageable relative must be modulo-2 odd. There exists also a version of this logic with a matrilineal bias. Discoveries of systems that use modulo-2 logic, as in South Asia, Australia, and many other parts of the world, marked a major advance in the understanding of kinship terminologies that differ from kin relations and terminologies employed by Europeans.
children and one's mother's sister's children are NOT cousins but brothers and sisters
"one step removed." They are considered "consanguinous" ("pangali") and marriage
with them is strictly forbidden as it is "incestuous."
However, one's father's sister's children and one's mother's brother's children are
considered cousins and potential mates ("muraicherugu"). Marriages between such cousins are allowed and encouraged. There is a clear distinction between "cross" cousins who are one's true cousins and parallel cousin
s who are in fact "siblings". Like Iroquois people, Dravidians refer to their father's sister as "mother-in-law" and their mother's brother as "father-in-law."
Language
Language may refer either to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication...
s to refer to the persons to whom an individual is related through kinship
Kinship
Kinship is a relationship between any entities that share a genealogical origin, through either biological, cultural, or historical descent. And descent groups, lineages, etc. are treated in their own subsections....
. Different societies classify kinship relations differently and therefore use different systems of kinship terminology - for example some languages distinguish between affinal and consanguine uncles, whereas others
have only one word to refer to both a father and his brothers. Kinship terminologies include the terms of address used in different languages or communities for different relatives and the terms of reference used to identify the relationship of these relatives to ego or to each other.
Historical view
Anthropologist Lewis Henry MorganLewis H. Morgan
Lewis Henry Morgan was a pioneering American anthropologist and social theorist, a railroad lawyer and capitalist. He is best known for his work on kinship and social structure, his theories of social evolution, and his ethnography of the Iroquois...
(1818–1881) performed the first survey of kinship terminologies in use around the world. Though much of his work is now considered dated, he argued that kinship
Kinship
Kinship is a relationship between any entities that share a genealogical origin, through either biological, cultural, or historical descent. And descent groups, lineages, etc. are treated in their own subsections....
terminologies reflect different sets of distinctions. For example, most kinship terminologies distinguish between sexes (the difference between a brother and a sister) and between generations (the difference between a child and a parent). Moreover, he argued, kinship terminologies distinguish between relatives by blood and marriage
Marriage
Marriage is a social union or legal contract between people that creates kinship. It is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually intimate and sexual, are acknowledged in a variety of ways, depending on the culture or subculture in which it is found...
(although recently some anthropologists have argued that many societies define kinship in terms other than blood).
However, Morgan also observed that different languages (and, by extension, societies) organize these distinctions differently. He proposed to describe kin terms and terminologies as either descriptive or classificatory
Classificatory kinship
Classificatory kinship systems, as defined by Lewis Henry Morgan, put people into society-wide kinship classes on the basis of abstract relationship rules. These may have to do with genealogical relations locally but the classes bear no overall relation to genetic closeness...
. When a descriptive term is used, it can only represent one type of relationship between two people, while a classificatory term represents one of many different types of relationships. For example, the word brother in English-speaking societies indicates a son of the same parent; thus, English-speaking societies use the word brother as a descriptive term. But a person's male first cousin could be the mother's brother's son, mother's sister's son, father's brother's son, father's sister's son, and so on; English-speaking societies therefore use the word cousin as a classificatory term.
Morgan discovered that a descriptive term in one society can become a classificatory term in another society. For example, in some societies, one would refer to many different people as "mother" (the woman who gave birth to oneself, as well as her sister and husband's sister, and also one's father's sister). Moreover, some societies do not group together relatives which the English-speaking societies classify together. For example, some languages have no one-word equivalent to cousin, because different terms refer to mother's sister's children and to father's sister's children.
Armed with these different terms, Morgan identified six basic patterns of kinship terminologies:
- Hawaiian kinshipHawaiian kinshipHawaiian kinship is a kinship system used to define family. Identified by Louis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, the Hawaiian system is one of the six major kinship systems .-Kinship system:Within common typologies, the...
: the most classificatory; only distinguishes between sex and generation. Thus, siblings and cousins are not distinguished (the same terms are used for both types of relatives). - Sudanese kinshipSudanese kinshipSudanese kinship is a kinship system used to define family. Identified by Lewis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, the Sudanese system is one of the six major kinship systems .The Sudanese kinship system is the most complicated...
: the most descriptive; no two types of relatives share the same term. Siblings are distinguished from cousins, and different terms are used for each type of cousin (i.e. father's brother's children, father's sister's children, mother's sister's children and mother's brother's children).
- Eskimo kinshipEskimo kinshipEskimo kinship is a concept of kinship used to define family in anthropology. Identified by Lewis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, the Eskimo system was one of six major kinship systems .-Kinship system:The Eskimo system places no...
: has both classificatory and descriptive terms; in addition to sex and generation, it also distinguishes between lineal relatives (those related directly by a line of descent) and collateral relatives (those related by blood, but not directly in the line of descent). Lineal relatives have highly descriptive terms; collateral relatives have highly classificatory terms. Thus, siblings are distinguished from cousins, while all types of cousins are grouped together. The system of English-language kinship terms falls into the "Eskimo" type.
- Iroquois kinshipIroquois kinshipIroquois kinship is a kinship system used to define family. Identified by Lewis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, the Iroquois system is one of the six major kinship systems .-Kinship system:The system has both classificatory and...
: has both classificatory and descriptive terms; in addition to sex and generation, it also distinguishes between siblings of opposite sexes in the parental generation. A genealogical relationship traced through a pair of siblings of the same sex is classed as a blood relationship, but one traced though a pair of siblings of the opposite sex can be considered an in-law relationship. In other words, siblings are grouped together with parallel cousinParallel cousinIn discussing consanguineal kinship in anthropology, a parallel cousin is a cousin from a parent's same sex sibling, while a cross cousin is from a parent's opposite-sexed sibling...
s, while separate terms are used for cross-cousins. Also, one calls one's mother's sister "mother" and one's father's brother "father". However, one refers to one's mother's brother and one's father's sister by separate terms (often the terms for "father-in-law" and "mother-in-law", since cross-cousins can be preferential marriage partners).
- Crow kinshipCrow kinshipCrow kinship is a kinship system used to define family. Identified by Lewis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, the Crow system is one of the six major kinship systems .-Kinship system:The system is somewhat similar to the Iroquois system, but...
: like Iroquois, but further distinguishes between mother's side and father's side. Relatives on the mother's side of the family have more descriptive terms, and relatives on the father's side have more classificatory terms. Thus, Crow kinship is like Iroquois kinship, with the addition that a number of relatives belonging to one's father's matrilineage are grouped together, ignoring generational differences, so that the same term is used for both one's father's sister and one's father's sister's daughter, etc.
- Omaha kinshipOmaha kinshipOmaha kinship is the system of terms and relationships used to define family in Omaha tribal culture. Identified by Lewis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, the Omaha system is one of the six major kinship systems which he identified...
: like Iroquois, but further distinguishes between mother's side and father's side. Relatives on the mother's side of the family have more classificatory terms, and relatives on the father's side have more descriptive terms. Thus, Omaha kinship is like Iroquois, with the addition that a number of relatives belonging to one's mother's patrilineage are grouped together, ignoring generational differences, so that the same term is used for both one's mother's brother and one's mother's brother's son, etc.
The basic principles of Crow and Omaha terminologies are symmetrical and opposite, with Crow systems having a matrilineal emphasis and Omaha systems a patrilineal emphasis.
Relative age
Some languages, such as BengaliBengali language
Bengali or Bangla is an eastern Indo-Aryan language. It is native to the region of eastern South Asia known as Bengal, which comprises present day Bangladesh, the Indian state of West Bengal, and parts of the Indian states of Tripura and Assam. It is written with the Bengali script...
, Tamil
Tamil language
Tamil is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by Tamil people of the Indian subcontinent. It has official status in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and in the Indian union territory of Pondicherry. Tamil is also an official language of Sri Lanka and Singapore...
, Sinhalese, Chinese
Chinese language
The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
(see Chinese kinship
Chinese kinship
The Chinese kinship system is classified as a Sudanese kinship system used to define family. Identified by Lewis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, the Sudanese system is one of the six major kinship systems together with Eskimo, Hawaiian,...
), Japanese
Japanese language
is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...
, Korean
Korean language
Korean is the official language of the country Korea, in both South and North. It is also one of the two official languages in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in People's Republic of China. There are about 78 million Korean speakers worldwide. In the 15th century, a national writing...
, Hungarian
Hungarian language
Hungarian is a Uralic language, part of the Ugric group. With some 14 million speakers, it is one of the most widely spoken non-Indo-European languages in Europe....
, Bulgarian
Bulgarian language
Bulgarian is an Indo-European language, a member of the Slavic linguistic group.Bulgarian, along with the closely related Macedonian language, demonstrates several linguistic characteristics that set it apart from all other Slavic languages such as the elimination of case declension, the...
and Nepalese
Nepali language
Nepali or Nepalese is a language in the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European language family.It is the official language and de facto lingua franca of Nepal and is also spoken in Bhutan, parts of India and parts of Myanmar...
add another dimension to some relations: relative age. Rather than one term for "brother", there exist, for example, different words for "older brother" and "younger brother". In Nepali, an older male sibling is referred to as daju or dai and a younger male sibling as bhai, whereas older and younger female siblings are called didi and bahini respectively.
Identification of alternating generations
Other languages, such as ChiricahuaChiricahua language
Mescalero-Chiricahua is a Southern Athabaskan language spoken by the Mescalero and Chiricahua tribes in Oklahoma and New Mexico. It is related to Navajo and Western Apache. Mescalero-Chiricahua has been described in great detail by the anthropological linguist Harry Hoijer , especially in Hoijer &...
, use the same terms of address for alternating generations. So a Chiricahua child (male or female) calls her paternal grandmother -ch’iné, and likewise this grandmother will call her son's child -ch’iné. Terms that recognize alternating generations and the prohibition of marriage within one's own set of alternate generation relatives (0, ±2, ±4, ±6, etc.) are common in Australian Aboriginal kinship
Australian Aboriginal kinship
Australian Aboriginal kinship is the system of law governing social interaction, particularly marriage, in traditional Australian Aboriginal culture...
.
Relative age and identification of alternating generations
TagalogTagalog language
Tagalog is an Austronesian language spoken as a first language by a third of the population of the Philippines and as a second language by most of the rest. It is the first language of the Philippine region IV and of Metro Manila...
borrows the relative age system of the Chinese kinship
Chinese kinship
The Chinese kinship system is classified as a Sudanese kinship system used to define family. Identified by Lewis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, the Sudanese system is one of the six major kinship systems together with Eskimo, Hawaiian,...
and follows the generation system of kinship. Philippine Kinship
Philippine kinship
Philippine kinship uses the Generational system to define family. Within common typologies, the Philippine system is one of the most simple classificatory systems of kinship compared to the complex U.S. kinship system...
distinguishes between generation, age and in some cases gender.
Discovery of Dravidian kinship terminology
Floyd Lounsbury (1964) discovered a seventh, Dravidian type of terminological system that had been conflated with Iroquois in Morgan’s typology of kin-term systems because both systems distinguish relatives by marriage from relatives by descent, although both are classificatoryClassificatory kinship
Classificatory kinship systems, as defined by Lewis Henry Morgan, put people into society-wide kinship classes on the basis of abstract relationship rules. These may have to do with genealogical relations locally but the classes bear no overall relation to genetic closeness...
categories rather than based on biological descent. Kay (1967), Scheffler (1971), and Tjon Sie Fat (1981) gave variant criteria for Dravidian classificatory logic, but the basic idea is that of applying an even/odd distinction to relatives that takes into account the gender of every linking relative for ego’s kin relation to any given person. A MFBD(C), for example, is a mother’s father’s brother’s daughter’s child. If each female link (M,D) is assigned a 0 and each male (F,B) a 1, the number of 1s is either even or odd; in this case, even. In a Dravidian system with a patrilineal modulo
Modular arithmetic
In mathematics, modular arithmetic is a system of arithmetic for integers, where numbers "wrap around" after they reach a certain value—the modulus....
-2 counting system, marriage is prohibited with this relative, and a marriageable relative must be modulo-2 odd. There exists also a version of this logic with a matrilineal bias. Discoveries of systems that use modulo-2 logic, as in South Asia, Australia, and many other parts of the world, marked a major advance in the understanding of kinship terminologies that differ from kin relations and terminologies employed by Europeans.
On Dravidian kinship
The Dravidian kinship system involves selective "cousinhood." One's father's brother'schildren and one's mother's sister's children are NOT cousins but brothers and sisters
"one step removed." They are considered "consanguinous" ("pangali") and marriage
with them is strictly forbidden as it is "incestuous."
However, one's father's sister's children and one's mother's brother's children are
considered cousins and potential mates ("muraicherugu"). Marriages between such cousins are allowed and encouraged. There is a clear distinction between "cross" cousins who are one's true cousins and parallel cousin
Parallel cousin
In discussing consanguineal kinship in anthropology, a parallel cousin is a cousin from a parent's same sex sibling, while a cross cousin is from a parent's opposite-sexed sibling...
s who are in fact "siblings". Like Iroquois people, Dravidians refer to their father's sister as "mother-in-law" and their mother's brother as "father-in-law."
Abbreviations for genealogical relationships
The genealogical terminology used in many genealogical charts describes relatives of the subject in question. Using the abbreviations below, genealogical relationships may be distinguished by single or compound relationships, such as BC for a brother's children, MBD for a mother's brother's daughter, and so forth.- B = Brother
- C = Child(ren)
- D = Daughter
- F = Father
- GC = Grandchild(ren)
- GP = Grandparent(s)
- P = Parent
- S = Son
- Z = Sister
- W = Wife
- H = Husband
- SP = Spouse
- LA = In-law
- SI = Siblings
- M = Mother
- (m.s.) = male speaking
- (f.s.) = female speaking
See also
- CousinCousinIn kinship terminology, a cousin is a relative with whom one shares one or more common ancestors. The term is rarely used when referring to a relative in one's immediate family where there is a more specific term . The term "blood relative" can be used synonymously and establishes the existence of...
- Dyadic kinship termDyadic kinship termDyadic kinship terms are kinship terms in a few languages that express the relationship between individuals as they relate one to the other...
- FamilyFamilyIn human context, a family is a group of people affiliated by consanguinity, affinity, or co-residence. In most societies it is the principal institution for the socialization of children...
- Fictive kinshipFictive kinshipFictive kinship is a term used by anthropologists and ethnographers to distinguish between forms of kinship or social ties that are based on neither consanguinal nor affinal ties...
- Genealogical numbering systemsGenealogical numbering systemsSeveral genealogical numbering systems have been widely adopted for presenting family trees and pedigree charts in text format. Among the most popular numbering systems are: Ahnentafel , and the Register, NGSQ, Henry, d'Aboville, Meurgey de Tupigny, and de Villiers/Pama Systems...
- MarriageMarriageMarriage is a social union or legal contract between people that creates kinship. It is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually intimate and sexual, are acknowledged in a variety of ways, depending on the culture or subculture in which it is found...
- Multilingual list of Indian family relation names
- Cognatic kinship
External links
- Kin Naming Systems (part 1) and (part 2) - from Palomar College.