family kinship essay

Kinship of Family Essay

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Kinship refers to the link that exists among people who are related to each other either by marriage or blood. This link is important because it defines somebody’s history. Kinship is used in most communities to dictate how properties are distributed among one’s descendants. The volume of properties received is dependent on the beneficiary’s number in the family order.

Among communities that speak the same vernacular language, the language is used as the unifying factor because it is used to distinguish that community from other communities. Residing in a common geographical location was responsible for fostering strong bonds due to frequent interaction.

There are two ways through which kinship can be acquired and they include marriage and through blood. The strength of these links does not rely on their source. A link based on marriage can disintegrate after the marriage has collapsed. In contrary affiliation by blood is thought to have the strongest foundation and is said to end when death walks in.

In my typical family setup the affiliation that exists among family members is used to hold it together. For instance, if my father was to divorce my mother, my link with the two of them would remain intact unless I take sides. This is because the link between me and both of them is based on blood while theirs is based on love.

In the above mentioned scenario it is certain that links that are based on blood are stronger and cannot be compared to links based on the marriage because the partners in marriage are united by their strong feelings towards each other and when these feelings fade away the link between them is then broken.

In our culture, the first born male is accorded the same respect as his father and is responsible for the continuation of family name. Female children are not able to participate in family name continuation because traditions dictate that when a woman is married she becomes more attached to her new family.

The male first born is usually consulted before a decision is made because if the father of the family does not exist the first born male assumes his role. Mothers tend to favor the child who is more financially stable than the rest. Studies in the recent past have proved that this favor is natural among females.

In ancient days our community supported marriage strongly because they knew the family was the basic unit that determined the survival of a community. In today’s world these cultures have been eliminated by modernization. Descendants of a given family name were avoided by many because it was perceived that by marrying such people will bring bad blood into a family name.

Children who are not financially stable enjoy limited authority in decision making process in their families because they are only allowed to implement decisions that have been made by those considered to be more intelligent. Money commands power in our family regardless of whether the wealthy child is the last born in the family.

Experience cannot be bought over the counter and thus one would expect the first born of the family whether male or female to be given the first priority in giving counsel to his siblings. Favoring one child over the other fosters jealousy in the family against the child who is seen as the apple of parent’s eye.

Property inheritance should be done with evenness because all the children enjoy the same rights in their family. In most families within our community, property inheritance has led to many wrangles that are extended to their offsprings. Children who are more successful than their siblings tend to take advantage of their siblings.

Parents also are also known to dislike children who are named after the parents of their partner. This is most likely to happen if the bond between the in-laws and their brother’s wife is soar. It is worth noting that the character traits exhibited by one’s children reflect those of his/her parents. Favoritism makes those who are more preferred than others feel like they are superior to their siblings, and hence decisions in that family must safe guard their interests.

Sometimes parent ignite family wrangles by allocating more property to one child. Parents should distribute their property equally among their children unless their children recommend so. This evenness will promote unity in a family. Thus children in our society are encouraged to exercise respect to each other.

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Why is Family Important? Unearthing the Power of Kinship in Our Lives

There’s something profoundly special about family. It’s the cornerstone of our lives, the bedrock on which we build our identities. Family is that unwavering foundation that remains steadfast, even amidst life’s most tumultuous storms. From teaching us our first words to guiding us through life’s winding paths, it’s hard to overstate just how essential families are in shaping who we become.

Not surprisingly, much of what I am today can be traced back to my own family. They’ve instilled in me a sense of integrity and resilience that has served as my North Star throughout life’s journey. My family taught me the importance of respect, love, and kindness—values I strive to uphold every single day.

The significance of family extends far beyond these personal anecdotes though. Various studies have shown how vital strong familial ties are for mental health and well-being at all stages of life—from childhood right up until old age! So let’s delve into this topic further and discuss why family is so crucial.

The Core Values of Family

Family is more than just a word. It’s a world filled with love, trust, respect, and mutual understanding. Let me dive into some of the core values that make family so integral to our lives.

Love is what binds us all together in the tapestry of a family. It’s an unspoken language that transcends words and actions. No matter how big or small our achievements are, we know there’s always someone at home waiting to share our joy or wipe away tears during tough times.

Trust forms the backbone of any familial relationship. We confide in each other knowing that our secrets are safe within those four walls. When we stumble and fall, it’s this unwavering faith we have in our family members that gives us the strength to get back up again.

A healthy dose of mutual respect goes a long way in maintaining harmony within a family. Understanding individual boundaries and acknowledging each other’s feelings play pivotal roles here.

The ability to communicate effectively can’t be overlooked either. Clear communication prevents misunderstandings and resolves conflicts swiftly ensuring peace reigns supreme at home.

And let’s not forget about support – be it emotional or financial, families always have each other’s backs.

To sum it up:

• Love: Bonds us together.
• Trust: Gives us strength.
• Respect: Maintains harmony.
• Communication: Resolves conflicts.
• Support: Provides reassurance during tough times.

These core values don’t just strengthen familial ties but also shape us as individuals influencing every aspect of our life from personal growth to career choices .

Family: The First School for Children

I’ve always believed that families play a crucial role in the early education of their children. They’re more than just blood ties and shared DNA; they’re our first teachers, imparting essential life lessons before we even step foot into a formal school setting.

Think about it – who taught you to speak your first words or tie your shoelaces? Most likely, it was someone in your family. These seemingly small skills are the building blocks of our personal development, and they often come from home.

• _ Speaking : From babbling as babies to forming complete sentences, we learn to communicate effectively through constant interaction with our family members.
• _ Social Skills : Families teach us how to behave properly, respect others, express love and handle conflicts – all vital components in socializing.
• _ Values & Morals : Our sense of right and wrong is largely shaped by the values our families instill in us at an early age.

According to data from the U.S. Department of Education,

Clearly, most parents understand the importance of being actively involved in their child’s early learning process.

On top of these basic life skills and moral teachings, families also provide emotional support during tough times. Childhood can be fraught with challenges and uncertainties; having a supportive family helps kids navigate these obstacles confidently.

In essence, families aren’t just important – they’re irreplaceable educators. So next time you see mom or dad playing ‘teacher’, know that it’s not just fun and games – they’re molding future generations one lesson at a time!

How Family Influences Our Personal Development

The influence of family on our personal development can’t be overstated. I’d go so far as to say it’s the primary architect shaping our emotional, social, and cognitive constructs. It all begins in the nurturing environment a family ideally provides.

Our earliest interactions with family members teach us about relationships , emotions, and effective communication. We learn what’s acceptable and unacceptable behavior within a societal context. Families also foster feelings of security and self-worth that are essential for healthy personal growth.

There are several ways this happens:

• Cognitive Development : The conversations we have at home often stimulate curiosity and thought processes. A simple question about why the sky is blue can ignite interest in science or nature.
• Emotional Development : Emotional intelligence develops through interactions with family members — empathy, understanding emotions, managing feelings — all these come from observing and interacting within a familial setting.
• Social Skills : Learning to share toys with siblings or negotiating an extra half-hour before bedtime cultivates negotiation skills.

In essence, families provide us with a training ground where we learn critical life skills.

Let’s look at some numbers:

Remember though, every individual’s experience varies significantly based on their unique familial circumstances. For instance, individuals from larger families may develop advanced social skills sooner due to more opportunities for interaction.

Family also instills values that shape our worldview. What’s perceived as right or wrong is largely framed by early lessons learned within the confines of our homes.

Long story short: while other factors like peer groups and education play important roles in molding us into who we become, one mustn’t underestimate the profound impact of those family dinners or Sunday afternoon board games.

Economic Benefits of a Strong Family Unit

Let’s dive right into how a strong family unit can contribute significantly to the economic stability of individuals and society as a whole. One of the primary ways this happens is through resource sharing. Within a family, resources like housing, food, and transportation often get shared among members.

• Resource Sharing : When families live together, they pool their resources together for common expenses such as rent or mortgage, utilities, groceries and vehicle costs. This joint effort typically results in lower per-person living expenses compared to people living alone or with non-family roommates.

Next up on the benefits list is childcare support. Here’s where grandparents or other family members step in to help with child rearing – an arrangement that saves parents substantial money they’d have otherwise spent on daycare or babysitters.

• Childcare Support : According to Child Care Aware of America’s 2020 report, the average cost of center-based infant care can range from $6,787 to $20,728 per year depending on the state[^1^]. It’s clear then that relatives helping out with childcare can lead to massive savings!

But it’s not just about saving money; having a strong family unit also tends to promote better financial habits which has long term implications.

• Financial Education : Families are usually the first source of financial education for children. Positive financial behaviors learned early – like saving or budgeting – can set kids up for solid financial futures.

Lastly but definitely not least, there’s evidence suggesting that close-knit families may have higher earning power.

• Earning Power : A study published by economists at University College London revealed that men who grew up in stable families earned approximately 13% more by their late 30s compared to those who did not[^2^].

In all these ways and more – be it through resource sharing, childcare support, financial education or increased earning power – a strong family unit can greatly enhance economic stability.

[^1^]: “2020 Price of Care”, Child Care Aware of America. [^2^]: Paul Gregg, Claudia Vittori and Lindsey Macmillan, “Family income and education in the next generation: exploring income gradients in education for current cohorts of youth”, Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Volume 32, Issue 4, Winter 2016.

Importance of Family in Mental Health Support

I can’t overstate the vital role family plays in supporting mental health. It’s not just about love and companionship, although these are undeniably important. Families offer an essential support system that can help us navigate through life’s toughest challenges, including those related to mental health.

Let’s delve into the statistics for a moment. According to a report by the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), approximately 1 in 5 adults in the U.S.—43.8 million, or 18.5%—experiences mental illness in a given year. That’s quite a significant number.

In such scenarios, families often become the first line of support, providing emotional comfort and understanding while also helping with practical matters like medical appointments or therapy sessions.

One real-life example comes from my friend Sarah who struggled with severe depression during her college years. She told me how her family was instrumental in her recovery process; they were there throughout – listening without judgment, accompanying her to therapy sessions and simply being present during her darkest hours.

Moreover, our loved ones can often spot changes that we might not notice ourselves – subtle shifts in behavior or mood that could be warning signs of an emerging issue. They’re more likely to encourage us to seek help when we need it most because they care about our well-being.

However, it’s crucial not just for families to be supportive but also informed about mental illnesses so they can provide appropriate help without inadvertently causing harm through misunderstanding or stigma.

• Families form an integral part of an individual’s support network
• They are often first responders during times of crisis
• Loved ones can detect early signs of trouble
• Knowledge about mental health issues enables families to provide effective support

So the importance of family in mental health support can’t be understated. They’re our safety net, cheering squad, and counsel wrapped into one irreplaceable package. In a world that’s increasingly recognizing the vital importance of mental health, our families remain an invaluable asset in this journey towards better wellbeing.

Role of Family in Society: A Broader Perspective

I can’t stress enough the importance of family in our society. They’re not just a group of people related by blood or marriage, they’re the backbone that holds us together as individuals and communities.

So why does family hold such a pivotal role? Well, to start with, families are the first social units we encounter and they shape our understanding of relationships and interactions. From an early age, we learn from our parents or guardians about love, trust, sharing, compromise – all crucial elements for any successful relationship.

Besides shaping personal relations, families also play a vital role in molding our values and beliefs. These lessons aren’t limited to moral teachings alone; they often extend to societal norms and expectations too. For example:

• How should I treat others?
• What’s my responsibility towards my community?
• How do I handle conflicts?

The answers to these questions largely come from our experiences within our family circles.

Now let me throw some light on another aspect – economic support. Families work as economic units ensuring the survival and growth of its members. Parents provide for their children until they become self-sufficient adults who in turn support their aging parents later in life.

Families also contribute hugely towards mental health stability among its members. Studies have shown that having supportive family ties can help reduce stress levels significantly.

To drive home my point about the significance of families in society, here’s some data:

In essence, families shape us into who we are today – teaching us life skills, providing emotional and financial support, and setting the foundation for our future interactions. It’s clear that without family, society as we know it would be a whole different ballgame.

Why Is It Difficult to Define ‘Family’ Universally?

I’ve often pondered why defining ‘family’ universally is such a complex endeavor. The main reason, I believe, is the sheer diversity in family structures worldwide. Traditional nuclear families, single-parent households, extended families living under one roof – these are just a few examples of how varied family setups can be.

Taking cultural nuances into consideration further complicates things. In some cultures, close friends or mentors could be considered as part of the family unit. To indigenous communities like the Maori people of New Zealand, “whanau” (a term for family) can include several generations and relatives by marriage or adoption.

Let’s take a quick look at types of families across several continents:

Another hurdle in universally defining ‘family’ is changing societal norms and attitudes towards relationships and cohabitation. Cohabiting couples who choose not to marry but share their lives together are increasingly common today. Similarly, same-sex couples and parents add another dimension to our understanding of ‘family’.

Moreover, advancements in reproductive technologies have ushered in an era where biological connections aren’t necessary for forming a family unit anymore. Surrogacy and IVF treatments allow individuals or couples – regardless of gender or marital status – to become parents.

So you see, it’s no easy task trying to pin down one universal definition for ‘family’. And perhaps that’s okay because after all, isn’t the beauty of family found within its diversity?

Conclusion: The Integral Role of Family

To wrap it all up, family plays a pivotal role in our lives. It’s not just about sharing the same bloodline or last name. With family, we learn valuable life skills, experience unconditional love and support, and build strong emotional bonds that remain unbroken through thick and thin.

Let’s take a quick recap:

• Life skills: From my first steps to learning how to cook my favorite dish, it was all thanks to my family. They’ve been my initial educators, teaching me essential social skills and values.
• Unconditional love: There are days when I’m at my best but also times when I’m far from perfect. Yet, no matter what happens or how badly I mess up, there’s always this group of people who love me just the same.
• Emotional bond: And let’s not forget the deep emotional connection we share with our families. It’s an irreplaceable bond that offers comfort during tough times and multiplies joy during happy moments.

It’d be remiss of me not to mention that every family is unique. Some might be small while others could span multiple generations living under one roof. You may have single-parent households or those with two moms or dads; some families come together through adoption while others blend due to remarriage.

Yet despite these differences in structure and dynamics, it remains true that having a loving family environment contributes significantly to personal development and overall wellbeing.

In essence, a world without families would be unimaginably different – perhaps less compassionate and more disconnected than ever before. So here’s to celebrating the integral role of families – they’re indeed our treasure troves of happiness!

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11.1 What Is Kinship?

Learning outcomes.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Identify kinship and explain how it is a sociocultural construction.
• Identify the importance of kinship in anthropology.
• Restate the important early works in the anthropological study of kinship.
• Distinguish between terms of reference and terms of address.

Social scientists commonly refer to social norms and behaviors—for example, as explored in Chapter 1, the ways that individuals are assigned to racial categories and what these categories mean about an individual’s place within that society—as sociocultural constructions . Such norms and behaviors create categories and rules according to social criteria (not biological truths) and thus vary across cultures. Kinship is also a sociocultural construction, one that creates a network of social and biological relationships between individuals. Through kinship systems, humans create meaning by interpreting social and biological relationships. Although kinship, like gender and age, is a universal concept in human societies (meaning that all societies have some means of defining kinship), the specific “rules” about who is related, and how closely, vary widely. Depending on the way kinship is determined, two individuals who would call each other cousins in one cultural group may not even consider themselves to be related in another group.

The common assumptions that kinship is static and created by biological relationships reveal the strength of sociocultural constructs in our lives. It is culture—not biology—that defines for us whom our closest relatives are. Biology relies on genetics, but kinship is determined by culture. One interesting and very familiar example of the sociocultural dimension of kinship is the practice of adoption, through which those who have no necessary genetic relationship to one another are considered both legally and culturally to be family. Biological relatedness is determined at the genetic level. This form of knowledge is detected through specialized DNA testing and typically has little meaning in our day-to-day lives except within legal and economic contexts where paternity or maternity may be in question. Otherwise, across history and cultures, including within our own society today, family are those we live with, rely on, and love. These individuals, whether or not they have a specific genetic relationship to us, are those we refer to using family terms of reference—my mother, my son, my aunt.

The study of kinship is central to anthropology. It provides deep insights into human relationships and alliances, including those who can and cannot marry, mechanisms that are used to create families, and even the ways social and economic resources are dispersed within a group. One of the earliest studies of kinship was completed by Lewis Henry Morgan (1818–1881), an amateur American anthropologist, in the mid-nineteenth century. Intrigued by the cultural diversity of the Haudenosaunee living in upstate New York, Morgan began to document differences in kinship terminology between cultural groups, based on historical accounts and surveys from missionaries working in other geographic locations. In Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family (1871), he defined three of the primary kinship systems that we still recognize today, identifying each with either descriptive kinship terms, such as “mother’s sister’s son,” or classificatory terms, which group diverse relationships under a single term, such as “cousin.” Although Morgan used different names, today we know these three systems as lineal kinship, bifurcate merging kinship, and generational kinship. The publication of his book marked the beginning of kinship studies in anthropology.

After Morgan’s research, anthropologists began a more methodical examination of kinship. W.H.R. Rivers (1864–1922) introduced the genealogical method in fieldwork in a 1910 article, “The Genealogical Method in Anthropological Query.” Using a series of basic questions about parents, grandparents, and siblings, Rivers approached the study of kinship as a systematic inquiry into the social structure of societies, seeking to understand how different cultures define family and family roles. Although he focused on small-scale societies, he argued that investigating kinship was a good way of establishing rapport with people and opening them up to sharing more detailed information about their lives regardless of the size of the society. Today, ethnographers continue to use a form of the genealogical method, through either face-to-face interviews or surveys, especially when doing fieldwork in small-scale societies. In this way, the ethnographer seeks to understand the sociocultural relationships in society and the ways that family affects those relationships.

In the 1920s, British anthropologists Bronislaw Malinowski (1884–1942) and A.R. Radcliffe-Brown (1881–1955) expanded the understanding of kinship as a social institution by studying the ways that kinship intersected with other institutions in society, such as inheritance, education, politics, and subsistence. Malinowski did fieldwork in the Trobriand Islands of Papua New Guinea, a matrilineal society where descent and inheritance were traced solely through mothers and grandmothers. In his work Argonauts of the Western Pacific (1922), he examined the functional role of kinship in Trobriand society, exploring how it works with other social institutions to address basic needs. Expanding kinship exploration beyond its early beginnings as a study of linguistic terminology only, Malinowski (1930, 19-20) says, “Kinship terminologies . . . are the most active and the most effective expressions of human relationship, expressions which start in early childhood, which accompany human intercourse throughout life, which embody all the most personal, passionate, and intimate sentiments of a man or woman.” He saw kinship as a driving force connecting individuals to each other by means of enduring bonds. A. R. Radcliffe-Brown also focused on kinship as a social institution in his study The Andaman Islanders (1922), but instead of looking at the function of kinship, Radcliffe-Brown examined the roles and statuses created for an individual by the practice of kinship.

Through these early studies in kinship, anthropologists began to better understand the diverse ways that cultural groups think about things like family and community. Kinship relationships determine both rights and obligations to other people. These connections contribute to the way a society functions and resolve problems associated with everyday life. In small-scale societies with low population density, kinship identity plays a significant role in most of the life choices an individual will have, while in larger-scale societies, kinship plays a smaller and more limited role. In all societies, however, kinship provides guidelines on how to interact with certain other individuals and the expectations that are associated with these relationships.

Cultures call attention to kinship relationships through the way people speak to and refer to one another. Anthropologists sort this kinship terminology into two categories: terms of reference and terms of address . Terms of reference are the words that are used to describe the relationship between individuals, such as “mother,” “grandfather,” or “father’s brother.” Terms of address are the terms people use to speak directly to their kin, such as “Mom,” “Uncle,” and “Grandpa.” Sometimes the same word is used as reference and address: “This is my father” and “Hello, Father.” These terms are important because they designate relationships between individuals that carry responsibilities and privileges that structure human societies.

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Kinship in Sociology: Definition in the Study of Sociology

The Basic Underpinning of All Human Relationships

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Kinship is the most universal and basic of all human relationships and is based on ties of blood, marriage, or adoption.

There are two basic kinds of kinship ties in sociology:

• Those based on blood that trace descent
• Those based on marriage, adoption, or other connections

Some sociologists and anthropologists have argued that kinship goes beyond familial ties, and even involves social bonds.

Defininition of Kinship in Sociology

Kinship is a "system of social organization based on real or putative family ties," according to Encyclopaedia Britannica. But in sociology , kinship involves more than family ties, according to the Sociology Group :

"Kinship is one of the most important organizing components of society. ... This social institution ties individuals and groups together and establishes a relationship among them."

Kinship can involve a relationship between two people unrelated by lineage or marriage, according to David Murray Schneider, professor of anthropology at the University of Chicago who was well known in academic circles for his studies of kinship.

In an article titled "What Is Kinship All About?" published posthumously in 2004 in " Kinship and Family: An Anthropological Reader ," Schneider said kinship refers to:

"the degree of sharing likelihood among individuals from different communities. For instance, if two people have many similarities between them then both of them do have a bond of kinship."

At its most basic, kinship refers to "the bond (of) marriage and reproduction," says the Sociology Group. But kinship can also involve any number of groups or individuals based on their social relationships.

Types of Kinship in Sociology

Sociologists and anthropologists debate what types of kinship exist. Most social scientists agree that kinship in sociology is based on two broad areas: birth and marriage; others say a third category of kinship involves social ties. These three types of kinship are:

• Consanguineal : This kinship is based on blood—or birth: the relationship between parents and children as well as siblings, says the Sociology Group. This is the most basic and universal type of kinship. Also known as a primary kinship, it involves people who are directly related.
• Affinal : This kinship is based on marriage. The relationship between husband and wife is also considered a basic form of kinship in sociology.
• Social : Schneider argued that not all kinship derives from blood (consanguineal) or marriage (affinal). There are social kinships where individuals not connected by birth or marriage have a kinship bond, he said. By this definition, two people who live in different communities may share a bond of kinship through a religious affiliation or a social group, such as the Kiwanis or Rotary service club, or within a rural or tribal society marked by close ties among its members. A major difference between consanguineal or affinal and social kinship is that the latter involves "the ability to terminate absolutely the relationship" without any legal recourse, Schneider stated in his 1984 book, " A Critique of the Study of Kinship ."

Importance of Kinship in Sociology

Kinship is important to a person's and a community's well-being. Because different societies define kinship differently, they also set the rules governing kinship, which are sometimes legally defined and sometimes implied. At its most basic levels, according to the Sociology Group, kinship in sociology refers to:

Descent : the socially existing recognized biological relationships between people in the society. Every society considers that all offspring and children descend from their parents and that biological relationships exist between parents and children. Descent is used to trace an individual’s ancestry.

Lineage : the line from which descent is traced. This is also called ancestry.

Based on descent and lineage, kinship determines family-line relationships—and even sets rules on who can marry and with whom, says Puja Mondal in " Kinship: Brief Essay on Kinship ." Mondal adds that kinship sets guidelines for interactions between people and defines the proper, acceptable relationship between father and daughter, brother and sister, or husband and wife, for example.

But since kinship also covers social connections, it has a wider role in society, says the Sociology Group, noting that kinship:

• Maintains unity, harmony, and cooperation in relationships
• Sets guidelines for communication and interactions among people
• Defines the rights and obligations of the family and marriage as well as the system of political power in rural areas or tribal societies, including among members who are not related by blood or marriage
• Helps people better understand their relationships with each other
• Helps people better relate to each other in society

Kinship, then, involves the social fabric that ties families—and even societies—together. According to the anthropologist George Peter Murdock:

“Kinship is a structured system of relationships in which kins are bound to one another by complex inter­locking ties.”

The breadth of those "interlocking ties" depends on how you define kin and kinship.

If kinship involves only blood and marriage ties, then kinship defines how family relationships form and how family members interact with one another. But if, as Schneider argued, kinship involves any number of social ties, then kinship—and its rules and norms—regulates how people from specific groups or even entire communities relate to each other in every aspect of their lives.

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4 Kinship and Family

Sheena Nahm McKinlay

In the docuseries Babies (2020), the first episode “Love” features several interviews with families and scientists who discuss how bonds are forged between caregivers and children. One of the families includes Josh and Isaac and their son Eric who was born via surrogacy. Isaac shares how “AJ gave us the ultimate gift of being able to form a family. Now she’s part of our family.” Isaac goes on to describe how unique this gift was given the fact that commercial (i.e., paid) surrogacy is illegal where AJ resides. The process involved submitting a case and waiting for a surrogate to choose the family. AJ explains, “In Canada, it is illegal to get paid for surrogacy. But I think that, because of how intimate surrogacy is, money cannot be the reason to do this. And I wanted to help. I mean, I can’t do much, but this is something that I can do.” In this brief snapshot of how family is made through relationships and policies, love is described not only as the love between parent and child but also between the adults that helped to make the conditions of parenthood possible. This is just one example of how we see modern day policies and practices shaping kinship.

Across the history of the discipline, anthropologists have recorded a vast array of kinship types and related practices. For example, Anindita Majumdar writes about kinship and surrogacy in in her book, Transnational Commercial Surrogacy and the (Un)Making of Kin in India (2017) . In her interview on the accompanying podcast to this textbook, Majumdar describes how commercial surrogacy can be a way for women to stay empowered in the process of negotiating their role in kinship, declaring their own agency in the process of choosing to become a surrogate, and discovering the limitations of potential policy changes that move away from commercial surrogacy to altruistic surrogacy.

Surrogacy is just one of many ways in which the nuances of kinship can be explored in contemporary anthropology. Surrogacy itself is not a new phenomenon; however, in more recent decades, the convergence of new policies, transnational flows, and assisted reproductive technologies bring to the forefront examples that build upon classic models of kinship and destabilize oversimplified theories of kinship. Additionally, parent-child relationships are just one means of understanding how ‘kin’ is defined and constructed within broader social contexts.

The relationships that matter to our social lives and individual identities are a rich topic for exploration. Families of origin might refer to the families into which we are born, adopted, or raised. Meanwhile, chosen families refer to the kin we find and make as young adults to complement and/or compensate for any challenges or limitations we may have experienced with families of origin. This chapter provides an overview of the history of kinship studies in anthropology, including its original definitions and some of the ways in which those models have been critiqued and revised over time. We then turn to more recent studies to better understand how anthropological perspectives illuminate our understanding of kinship.

Defining and Describing Kinship

Marshall Sahlins once described kinship as the “mutuality of being” and added, “kinsmen are persons who belong to one another, who are members of one another, who are co-present in each other, whose lives are joined and interdependent” (Sahlins 2011, 11). This definition may seem straightforward at first glance, but in actuality, it opens us up to imagine an infinite number of ways that someone might become kin. Among other critiques of Sahlins’ theory and methods (Gillison 2013), one critique has been that this definition of the mutuality of being is “too vague to be meaningful” (Kronenfeld 2012, 678). Still, many anthropologists continue to ask what it means to have mutual relationships with other human beings.

In this chapter, we will examine the concepts and practices that come with kinship or kin relations. We will review how understandings of kinship have evolved within the discipline as well as define some basic models and ways of illustrating those models using diagrams. We will then explore beliefs and practices that come with kinship , ranging from adoption and marriage to traditions and taboos. Along the way, we will review a variety of examples that have pushed anthropologists to think about how kinship is continuously in flux depending on ever-changing local and global contexts.

Kinship is a specific way of describing the relationships between people, initially conceptualized to include blood kin as well as kin relations created through marriage or similar bonds. To begin understanding how family relationships are defined, we can begin with some common terms. Family can include ties that are consanguineal ( blood) as well as affinal (partnerships sometimes referred to as marriage ties). Over time, anthropologists have acknowledged the limitations of these terms and definitions in describing meaningful relationships such as friend communities, other kin communities, and the dynamics of developing and maintaining ties in a world where people are on the move and not always residing in close proximity to each other for their entire lives. Popular culture as well as scholarship have drawn attention to this broader notion of kinship. Books like Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close and television shows like Pose highlight the meaningful relationships that create bonds between kinfolk who “live each other’s lives and die each other’s deaths.” In understanding kinship in fuller terms, we can better understand the diverse, vital supports needed for human wellbeing and social connectedness.

Relationships matter for a variety of reasons, including their representation as a “system of meaning and power that cultures create to determine who is related to whom and to define their mutual expectations, rights, and responsibilities” (Guest 2016, 236). How relationships are configured and understood among individuals has implications in daily activities as well as in milestone responsibilities. This can include everything from expectations about who has primary and secondary childrearing responsibilities to who attends rites of passage such as communion, bar mitzvah, or weddings. We begin by reviewing some basic concepts around kinship including a variety of systems or models and how they might be drawn using diagrams. And perhaps more importantly, we dive into the meaning behind the relationships depicted in those diagrams as we look at the social expectations and acknowledgement that comes with different ways of belonging to a group. While models and diagrams can help us understand some of the basic components of kinship systems, it is important to remember that “most of our talk about families is clouded by unexplored notions of what families ‘really’ are like” (Collier, Rosaldo, and Yanagisako 1997).

Kin relations and a sense of belonging to a group are built on collective understanding. For example, a person might reflect, “”Who do I see as my mother and is that the same or different from who others see as my mother?” Such understandings go beyond naturalized, inherent notions that one is born simply knowing who to call what and who will provide a great sense of belonging and connectedness.

• How the Nuclear Family Broke Down (The Atlantic)
• Janet Carsten on the Kinship of Anthropology
• Babies in limbo: Surrogacy in the time of COVID
• My Six Wives And 29 Children
• All My Relations podcast: Episodes “ Beyond Blood Quantum ” and “ Love in the Time of Blood Quantum ” focus on issues of kinship

Recall our earlier discussions of Bronislaw Malinowski in earlier chapters. Malinowski also explored notions of family and kin relations during his time on the Trobriand Islands. Malinowski’s argument was that “family” was a universal human institution. His work was then challenged by other theorists who took the opposite stance.

Much of what we know about kinship in the history of American anthropology comes from the 19 th century. Lewis Henry Morgan drew his insights from conducting research among the Haudenosaunee (whom he refers to as the Iroquois in his writings). Morgan noticed that relationships between individuals looked different from those he had grown up with and defined as family. He then recorded these observations in League of the Iroquois (1851). Decades later, Morgan who was a lawyer by trade recounted the words that Haudenosaunee used to describe family members and explained how they relate to right and responsibilities, both legally and socially. Morgan went on to record kinship systems among Indigenous groups in other parts of the world.

While we will spend some time reviewing some classic definitions and models of kinship systems from around the world as they were described initially by anthropologists, readers should keep in mind that definitions of family and how people are related to one another are neither simple nor static. As societies, nation-states, and biocultural flows are always in transition, so too are ideologies and practices around family ties. In examining the evolution of kinship charts, it is also possible to revisit the history of anthropology, noting what was recorded and what was not. This allows us to look at archived knowledge while also noticing and critiquing its limitations as artifacts produced and curated within systems of power rather than as neutral facts that simply exist for learners to memorize.

Before we dive into kinship diagrams, a way of depicting different models of understanding family ties, let us take a few moments to describe some basic terms and definitions. Adding to consanguineal and affinal, we introduce two other terms: matrilineal and patrilineal. Matrilineal means that descent follows the mother’s line whereas patrilineal descent follows the father’s line.

In “Don’t Even Talk to Me if You’re Kinya’áanii [Towering House]”: Adopted Clans, Kinship and “Blood” in Navajo Country,” Kristina Jacobsen and Shirley Ann Bowman examine ideologies around k’é or the Diné kinship system which connects people through “an elaborate matrilineal descent network of systems of obligation and reciprocity, otherwise known as the clan system (dóone’é). As elsewhere, kinship in Diné contexts is culturally specific, cultivated through daily use, and not a given, natural fact” (2019, 43).

Jacobsen and Bowman attend to the ways in which clan systems have incorporated non-Navajos into Navajo Nation and how varying practices have been impacted by settler colonialism. They also reflect on the nuances of historical and contemporary kinship and how they are related to the politics of citizenship (44). There are over 80 active clans, organized into nine groups: this organization influences taboos around marriage and dating. “If a Diné person has four Navajo grandparents, then they will have four Diné clans—maternal, paternal, mother’s father, and father’s father, and typically presented in this order. The first or maternal clan is considered to be the most important in being identified (and identifying oneself) as Diné…Sharing kinship means that everywhere one travels where there are other Navajos, one gains not only a relative but also a sense of belonging” (47). In understanding kinship systems where there may be some common organizing beliefs and practices, it should be noted that variation exists as do multiple understandings and practices that resist homogenizing assumptions about the entirety of any group. For example, Diné is sometimes considered preferable to “Navajo” which is not a word that exists within the language. In 1993, Navajo Nation President Peterson Zah was quoted in the Los Angeles Timesas stating, “We were called Diné by the Great Spirit…By changing our name, we are simply exercising self-determination and tribal sovereignty” (Sahagun 1993). Despite this advocacy, Legislation No. 0395-16 did not receive enough support from the Navajo Nation Council to change the group’s name from Navajo Nation to Diné Nation. This is one example among many that shows how perspectives and preferences can vary within a group of people who share aspects of identity.

Members of a society may choose to adopt different beliefs such that they no longer follow or know about their clans over time. Additionally, as Jacobsen and Bowman emphasize, there is much more fluidity when adoptive practices exist than are depicted in rigid kinship charts. They write, “Outside groups merged with Diné society, retained their own clans, merged clans, left for long periods of time, and returned, and adoption was not an overnight process. So the boundaries of Diné society, while cohesive and coherent, were also porous” (50).

In matrilineal systems, a man who marries typically becomes a member of his wife’s clan and goes to live with his wife’s (his new) clan. This is an illustration of being both matrilineal and matrilocal. Where people live depending on family ties is defined as patrilocal (living with the father’s side of the family) or matrilocal (living with the mother’s side of the family). Though locality has historically followed lineal systems, residential conventions have morphed over time to be less rigidly followed.

Patrilineage or matrilineage does not mean that relatives are limited to that line but rather, that linkages across generations (e.g., through surnames) might follow one line over another as will certain responsibilities such as caring for elders or inheriting land. Depending on the context (e.g., locality and how far family villages or residences are from one another), one might grow up with deeper relationships with one’s lineal descent and hardly any with the other side. It is also possible that one might be equally familiar with both lines of descent in terms of daily or weekly interactions. In a patrilineal context, children may bear the name of the father’s line as well as distinguish names for describing relatives on the father’s side and the mother’s side. Aunts, uncles, and in-laws will denote whether they are relatives via the father or the mother. There are also descriptors that indicate age and birth order. For example, someone might call an older brother and younger brother by two different names that denote birth order rather than using a singular term like “brother.”

It is important to note that matrilineal or patrilineal is about descent and not necessarily about gendered power. For example, one can live in a patriarchal society where landownership and leadership (e.g., kings) are male but determined through the mother’s line. That is to say, one can find themselves in a patriarchal and matrilineal society. Both matrilineal and patrilineal descent are examples of unilineal (one line or one side) descent. By contrast, when kinship follows both sides of the family, it is defined as bilateral descent.

Kinship charts or genograms can account for spousal death as well as divorce using a slashed line on symbols, for example over the shape symbolizing the individual who passed or over the double bars between previously married individuals. Even while examining the diverse range of ways kinship can be depicted in the history of anthropology, we can also see limitations in how charts are written including practices such as divorce or adoption. The assumptions that are both evident in what is visible and invisible can help to stimulate further examination of what sociocultural norms are present and how people may be treated if they live outside of those norms.

To get acquainted with reading these diagrams, we begin with “ego” who is the lens or starting point from which a chart will define and depict relations. In early kinship diagrams, triangles were typically used to indicate males and circles for females. Two parallel bars or lines denotes marriage, single vertical lines birth or parent/child relationships and single horizontal lines marked sibling relationships. While these kinship systems are named by societies that are examples of each, there are other societies that follow similar conventions. Additionally, images include labels used in the original charts but are accompanied with critiques and relevant updates to names. (Note: images for kinship system diagrams have been made available under the Creative Commons, where authors have waived rights so that the work might be available in the public domain. These depictions of different systems are associated with particular groups but as with most examples, are not meant to assume homogeneity across diverse and nuanced practices of any group of people.) In contemporary kinship charts, we see a range of symbols on kinship charts including triangles for males, circles for females, and squares for gender nonbinary individuals.

In the Haudenosaunee (previously referred to as Iroquois in historical documents) kinship systems, your parents’ same-sex siblings would also be considered your father or mother. Originally, the Iroquois Confederacy was a term used to describe six related tribes (initially five tribes: the Kanienkehaka or Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca) who called themselves the Haudenosaunee or “the people of the longhouse.” Iroquois appears to have been generated from French adaptations of a variety of indigenous words. In this type of kinship system, your father’s brother would also be considered your “father” and your mother’s sister would also be considered your “mother.” Meanwhile, your parent’s opposite-sex siblings (e.g., your father’s sister and mother’s brother) would not be considered similar to your father or mother; they would, instead, be considered to be more like “aunts” and “uncles.”

In general, in kinship diagrams, cross-cousins are considered to be the children of your parents’ opposite sex siblings (e.g., father’s sister’s children and mother’s brother’s children) while parallel cousins are the children of your parents’ same sex siblings (e.g., father’s brother’s children and mother’s sister’s children). In this type of kinship system, cross-cousins would be called “cousins” while parallel cousins would be considered “brothers” and “sisters.”

In the Hawaiian kinship system, all members of the same generation are considered similar. This system is now sometimes referred to as a generational system. In this generational system, in addition to ego’s mother and father, all siblings of both parents who are female are “mother” and all siblings of both parents who are male are “father.” Cousins are not called cousins at all but rather, brothers for males and sisters for females.  The terms Kanaka Maoli and Kanaka ‘Ōiwi are the original terms that were later popularized into the term Native Hawaiian. Kanaka maoli is the “appropriate indigenous term for Native Hawaiian by advocates of Native Hawaiian sovereignty and independence” and the term ‘Ōiwi refers to the literal translation “of the ancestral bone” according to Davianna Pōmaika‘i McGregor and Melody Kapilialoha MacKenzie (2014).

The Haudenosaunee kinship system was originally labeled as the Iroquois system to describe a kinship system that distinguishes between same or cross-sex siblings of parents. In this chart, ego’s father’s brother is considered father and his children are considered brothers and sisters. Meanwhile, ego’s father’s sister is an aunt, and her children are considered cousins. Following this same naming convention, ego’s mother’s sister is considered mother and her children are brothers and sisters whereas ego’s mother’s brother is an uncle, and his children are cousins.

While some generational systems utilize fewer categories of distinguishing relations and their names, the kinship system historically referred to as the Sudanese system differs in that words for relations range based on distance from ego as well as gender and relationship. In this system, nearly every relationship has a different name.

In what was referred to as the Crow system, distinguishing differences exist depending on the same or cross-sex sibling relationship. For example, ego’s father’s brother is father, and his children are therefore brother and sister; ego’s mother’s sister is mother, and her children are brother and sister to ego. However, ego’s father’s sister is an aunt equivalent, and her children are cousins. Ego’s mother’s brother is mother’s brother or uncle equivalent, and his children are cousins.

Like the Haudenosaunee and Crow, the kinship system initially described as the Omaha system also distinguishes between same and cross sex sibling lines.

While each of these charts may be antiquated, they are summarized here as part of the record of disciplinary history. Limitations exist because of methods used at the time as well as in reflecting knowledge today. People and populations are constantly changing and as a result relationships and structures of relation also evolve. No person or people are stuck in time, nor can the be captured for all time in a static diagram. However outdated they may be today, they are presented here as an illustration of a method (how to quickly diagram how someone describes themselves in relation to others) and a visual depiction of anthropologists presenting multiple ways in which family and belonging might look beyond a singular worldview.

Kinship in Social Context

Practices sometimes play out in the affirmative—things you are expected to do or might have the responsibility of doing, such as making decisions about childrearing, naming, or providing for in economic terms. But practices can also play out in the negative—things you should avoid doing. These beliefs and behaviors are sometimes encompassed by recognizing taboos. One illustration of the importance of understanding who is related and in what ways is in Juǀʼhoansi kinship (referred to as the !Kung in some ethnographies). Anthropologists described the Juǀʼhoansi as having very strict rules regarding incest and marriage taboos such that it was important to note who was a first cousin or second cousin on either side of the family to avoid marriage taboos.

Kinship was described in three different ways: 1) bilateral ; 2) names (people who have the same name as a kin relation will also be treated as family); and 3) wi (where an older person may “wi” a younger person, somewhat similar to the concept of adoption). Marrying someone further away from their family as defined by internal/external to one’s band not only avoids taboos but also increases knowledge of resources.

Another way to think about “marrying further away” is exogamy, the practice of marrying outside of one’s group. Conversely, another culture may practice endogamy which would be the practice of marrying inside the group. While exogamy and endogamy refer to marriage practices external and internal to groups, poly- and mono- refer to the number of partners. In classic kinship terms, monogamy indicates the practice of having one partner at a time. Differentiations can be made between lifetime monogamy and monogamy in a given moment of time or season of life (e.g., serial monogamy ). Polygamy indicates the practice of having more than one partner at a time. This can indicate multiple variations from one husband with many wives ( polygyny ), one wife with many husbands ( polyandry ), or multiple wives and husbands. In today’s terms, more common or nuanced terms such as polyamory or ethical non-monogamy might be used to describe non-exclusive relationships without necessarily aligning with the context of marriage or long-term partnerships.

Families and cultures might practice arranged marriage for a wide variety of reasons, ranging from economic or financial reasons to social ties and religious norms that indicate where families have similar things in common. The degree of formality in the arrangement also varies. Two people might meet as the result of an arrangement through a mutual friend, family member or relative or through someone who is a matchmaker.

Whether through arrangement or not, additional practices may help to forge ties between two families. A dowry refers to a bride’s family giving gifts to either the bride or the groom’s family at the time of marriage. Bride service is different from a dowry in that the first few months of marriage include living with the bride’s family and the groom (now husband) provides for his wife’s family for a period of time.

As with all cultures and societies, adaptations and shifts occur over time sometimes as a result of internal dynamics and at other times, a result of external pressures that can range from environment and climate to government policies and global flows. Kinship and ownership practices related to kinship structures have long been an area of study in anthropology, with many case studies focusing on the Maasai of Kenya and Tanzania or the Nuer of Sudan. More recent anthropological contributions have shown, though, that it is important to be aware of how groups have changed their systems to meet the evolving needs of their group. Additionally, changes may come about because of popular and academic narratives that then impact how local and international interventions are constructed with regard to land allocation. In Once Intrepid Warriors: Gender, Ethnicity, and the Cultural Politics of Maasai Development , Dorothy Hodgson (2001) emphasizes the impact of transnational factors ranging from colonialism to international development interventions. The limitations and failures of various development interventions, argues Hodgson, can often be rooted in inaccurate and static understandings of Maasai culture as pastoralist and patriarchal when, in fact, the Maasai have changed a great deal over the course of the last 80 years. Hodgson opens her text with a critique of letters published in the New York Times during the late 1980s, reflecting on images floating in popular discourse linking Maasai ethnic identity to either a romanticized “once free and beautiful” narrative or to a highly gendered narrative of pastoralism being inherently a male activity and means of organizing society. Images and narratives of the Maasai have limited perspectives circulating in the world in such a way that nongovernmental organizations as well as other administrative agencies have developed interventions based on outdated information that are inaccurate or inadequate in informing how present-day issues are addressed.

Other research such as the work of Winnie Wairimu and Paul Hebinck (2017) emphasize that the Maasai should not viewed as passive receivers of land tenure policies passed by the Kenyan state. Instead, they are agents in devising a varied number or responses to how land is divided among groups and to individual families. One of the actions that emerged in response to land subdivision is the cultivation of crops by women while men chose to aggregate smaller pieces of land to continue pastoral lifestyles. Among the Maasai, both traditional practices such as pastoralism might continue while also creating space for other practices such as horticulture (both of which we will delve into in more detail in an upcoming chapter on economics but named here for the ways in which they intersect with practices that weave together kinship, gender, and economic strategies).

Kinship also continues to morph and challenge notions of fixed definitions of family. For example, Caroline Archambault’s ethnographic work with families that have gone through the process of adoption shows how parents and children create ties. In particular, she stresses the perspective that children are active participants in how kinship is made and unmade (2010). Archambault writes, “In the Kenyan primary school syllabus the biological, nuclear and monogamous family model is by far the most popular textbook representation of family life. For most Maasai children, such a family model does not correspond to their lived reality. Throughout the school, dozens of children will make their way back to non-natal homes” (230). Moving across families as adopted children/“children given” or fostered children/ “children borrowed” supports the idea that family itself is a dynamic form of organizing relationships and that children do not belong to single set of parents in contrast to more rigid nuclear models. Dynamic practices also underscore the idea that adoption is not limited to a singular event but part of a process wherein acceptance and attachment are created and recreated over a span of years.

In one example, survey results from residents of a community organized by units called an enkang or a patrilocal residential unit reported that 28.4% of wives were living with at least one non-natal child (232). In this context, children often   circulate within and across homesteads for a variety of reasons including the convenience of being closer to schools as well as through adoption or fostering. This is rooted in the belief that children are gifts “not made and ‘owned,’ but given into human care” (Lienhardt 1961, 22 as cited in Archambault 2010, 232). Archambault traces how this belief and practice of communal support for children is changing and leaning toward the increased nuclearization of families because of factors like land privatization policies introduced in the 1990s. These policies allocated parcels of land to individual male family heads (rather than via communal group allocations), influencing the emphasis on nuclear units. Additionally, exposure to Euro-American ideals of nuclear families and biological parenthood (which itself are not representative of European and American societies but often circulate through institutional discourse) also impacted the increased emphasis on nuclear units.

A classic example of kinship and social context comes from the work of E.E. Evans-Pritchard who wrote The Nuer: A Description of the Modes of Livelihood and Political Institutions of a Nilotic People (1940) and Kinship and Marriage Among the Nuer (1951). At the time, Evans-Pritchard’s contributions helped challenge the notion that parent-child relations as well as marriage followed definitions that assigned a single person to a single role (e.g., a romantic partner also being a legally and socially recognized partner). In his ethnography, Evans-Pritchard described how various roles might play out in Nuer society, including differentiated definitions such as the following:

• The genitor as the biological father
• The pater as the socially recognized father
• The legal marital partner as the person responsible for caring for a woman and her children
• Ghost marriages, described as a situation wherein a man dies without marrying so that one of his male relatives steps in to fulfill the duties of the ghost. This might be a brother or cousin of the deceased. The male relative or pro-husband then has a child with the widow and helps to raise the children. In this context, a woman states that her husband is the ghost (deceased person) and the children take the name of the ghost who is recognized as their father. Thus, the relative might be a genitor and legal marital partner but not the pater. The ghost of the deceased is considered to be the pater. The pro-husband and relative might have another wife with whom their children and kinship relations are socially recognized as pater among other roles such as genitor.
• A leviratic marriage is when a widow goes to live with a kinsman or close relative of her deceased husband. The kinsman becomes her pro-husband. If the widow is still young, the pro-husband will reproduce with her, but the children are considered to be the children of the dead husband. Because the widow establishes a relationship with her deceased husband who exchanged bridewealth, any of her children would always be his children and he would be the socially recognized father or pater. The biological father or genitor in this context is less important because the social relationship had already been recognized through the exchange of bridewealth.

In these examples, various marriage practices and beliefs around parent-child relationships ensured that lineages continued even in the event of death.

Decades later, Evans-Pritchard’s work was both upheld as classic contributions to kinship theory and deeply critiqued for its limitations. Aidan Southall (1986) writes about the “real paradox of Evans-Pritchard’s Nath [i.e., Nuer] analysis was that he stimulated some of the most productive work in social anthropology by formulating a brilliant theory that applied well to many other societies but not to the one in which it was conceived” (Southall 1986, 17 as cited in McKinnon 2000, 36). One way this played out was in his noting of differences that occurred depending on class status but its exclusion in his theoretical framework of societal structure (which was depicted as egalitarian). In this way, Evans-Pritchard serves as an example of many figures in the history of anthropology who simultaneously observed different ways of being outside of Western contexts and raised awareness of diverse configurations of social belonging while also falling into their own limited perspectives and constructs such as the separation (i.e., non-integration) between domestic and political domains (Collier and Yanagisako 1987).

As we look at different kinship systems and how gender roles play out in different societies, we quickly see that there are no universally standardized norms about who counts as family and how being related to each other influences beliefs and practices. Recall Malinowski’s focus on the Trobriand Islands in his ethnographic research. Malinowski described Trobrianders as a matrilineal society, tracing descent through mother’s side. However, most of Malinowski’s work focused on men. During the 1970s, 80s, and 90s, anthropologist Annette Weiner conducted research specifically on women’s roles in the Trobriand Islands. Weiner noted how women had a tremendous amount of political and social influence and were not limited to domestic roles such as childrearing. One practice that illustrated women’s power in political and socioeconomic spheres was the sagali. Sagali occurred about one year after a person dies. It was an important period of feasting and gift exchange, led and organized by women. In preparation for this event, goods were made by women and exchanged by women. Goods included banana leaf bundles and grass skirts. Both items required many hours of work and were indicators of social prestige. The person who gave away the most goods (rather than the person who accumulated the most) was therefore seen as more socially powerful. While men were involved, it was women who had the power to establish social status and power during sagali.

Weiner’s work shined a light on the labor provided by women in Trobriand society. The intersections of gendered roles, specifically labor, and the social contexts of kinship can be seen in societies around the world.  Women’s work has been recorded in both public and private spheres.   Micaela di Leonardo provides an overview of kin work across a variety of cultural contexts (1987). One area where women labor outside of the marketplace includes housework and caregiving for family members within the home. In her fieldwork among Italian-Americans, di Leonardo defines kin work as “the conception, maintenance, and ritual celebration of cross-household kin ties, including visits, letters, telephone calls, presents, and cards to kin; the organization of holiday gatherings; the creation and maintenance of quasi-kin relations; decision to neglect or to intensify particular ties; the mental work of reflection about all these activities, and the creation and communication of altering images of family and kin vis-à-vis the images of others, both folk and mass media” (442-443). While the specific details of duties like writing holiday cards takes place in a specific place and time, the concept that there is work associated with maintaining kinship ties and how that work is designated or assumed in gendered ways is applicable to diverse contexts. One thing to note here is that there is an assumption of who kin are, based on socio-cultural constructs (e.g., who even gets or expects a holiday card — is it who is recognized as a relative through birth or law? Is it kin based on friendship and other relational ties that are meaningful?). On top of understanding who your kin are, there is work done to maintain those ties. Some of that work might be expected and can upheld or transgressed and others are further strengthened and cemented through regular work and practice.

Kinship, Transnationalism and Technology

We have discussed some examples of kinship systems both in the US and in other countries and become familiar with some of the terms and how concepts like lineage are woven into the texture of everyday life and milestones like marriage and having children. We have discussed scenarios that include widowhood and connections between life and death, gender and family, and political and economic power. The late 20 th century and early 21 st century in particular have surfaced additional questions and insights about kinship as it intersects with transnational flows, immigration, and technology. These add additional factors to ever-changing landscapes that, to large degree, have long contended with transnational flows via colonialism and imperialism as well as the circulation of norms related to “family” and the ways in which it plays out both in domestic and political domains.

Kin relations converge with a wide range of other topics of interest such as economic and political power. One example of contemporary complexities in kinship is in Christine Ward Gailey’s Blue Ribbon Babies: Labors of Love : Race, Class, and Gender in US Adoption Practice . In her research on adoption, she notes how white couples pursuing adoption via independent or private agencies seek out “healthy white babies” or “blue ribbon” babies. They often seek out international adoption and avoid open adoption, denoting perceptions of the quality of the babies themselves as well as the severing of ties from biological parents and biological links to lineage. Meanwhile, single Black and white women as well as middle class Black couples and working class white married couples choose a different route, often pursuing foster adoption. What is highlighted in this book is both the differing preferences for types of adoption (e.g., international vs domestic and closed vs open) as well as how those preferences are inextricably tied to parents’ perception of children, their backgrounds and needs, and how that impacts integration into the life and lineage of the adoptive family.

PODCAST: Kathryn Mariner

Listen here to this podcast episode where we interview Kathryn and hear about her work. Read and explore additional publications from Kathryn which include:

• American Elegy: A Triptych
• White Parents, Black Care: Entanglements of Race and Kinship in American Transracial Adoption
• “Who you are in these pieces of paper”: Imagining Future Kinship through Auto/Biographical Adoption Documents in the United States

Transnational flows or international contexts introduce additional factors to how kinship is defined and how that plays out in terms of economic and social expectations. For example, a family that immigrates from one country to another may create and expand their kin relations to include “relatives” in their new country of residence, making and cementing ties where they might not have been included in the context of the country of origin. One simple way this plays out is when “aunties” and “uncles” are included as family, with the bonds of social support as well as the concrete supports that can come from roles such as assistance in childrearing or connections to employment opportunities, even without the requisite lineal ties that might have been part of the criteria for defining aunt and uncle relationships in a non-immigrant community contexts. Immigrant and migrant communities and the context of economic and political challenges reframe kinship ties, roles and responsibilities in new ways often adding additional pressures to provide economic support to family from one direction to the other. Sacrifice is defined on both sides of the lines crossed and blurred through the migration process.

Zooming in on the practice of transnational or international adoption, we see how kinship can become complex in the context of global flows and the sometimes productive, sometimes tenuous relationship between national identity and globalization. Eleana Kim is an anthropologist who has studied transnational adoption of babies from South Korea to the US and the implications of those babies returning to visit Korea as adults. In “Our Adoptee, Our Alien: Transnational Adoptees as Specters of Foreignness and Family in South Korea,” Kim recounts how adopted Koreans are welcomed back to their birth country under the legal designation of “overseas Koreans” under a state-sponsored globalization project (2007). She writes:

Designed to build economic and social networks between Korea and its seven million compatriots abroad, this policy projects an ethnonationalist and deterritorialized vision of Korea that depends upon a conflation of “blood” with “kinship” and “nation.” Adoptees present a particularly problematic subset of overseas Koreans: they have biological links to Korea, but their adoptions have complicated the sentimental and symbolic ties of “blood” upon which this familiarist and nationalist state policy depend. Because international adoption replaces biological with social parenthood and involves the transfer of citizenship, to incorporate adoptees as “overseas Koreans,” the state must honor the authority and role of adoptive parents who raised them, even as they invite adoptees to (re)claim their Koreanness (2007, 497).

In this example of transnational adoption, we see the complex relationship between birth and adoptive ties in the making of kin as it intersects with macro-level projects in nationhood and in global flows. Legal and social bonds converge and diverge with the complexities of racial identity. For example, Korean American adults who return to Korea to reunite with their birth families discovered that their rights to sponsor Korean relatives’ entry into the U.S. are nullified or forfeited. This is an example of how the severing of kin relationship from birth to and through adoption changes the definition of “relative” and the legal rights that can be attached to the sponsorship of relatives joining family through immigration.

In this scenario, adoptive parents are the only legally recognized genitors as well as socially recognized parents in the U.S. context. The reason for the shift in genitor (or birth parent) designation is because, historically, babies were designated as “orphans” before going through the adoption process. This plays out in the context of the major rise in adoption out of Korea in a post-war context. Decades after the war in a time when Korea’s economic and global status as a “developed” nation places new and emerging challenges on family definitions, choices, and population demographics. Kim documents how more and more adults are choosing to have fewer children or no children at all. In 2006, Korea had a birthrate of 1.08 which was the lowest among developed nations at that time, adding context to a history of overseas adoption that takes on new shape, building on post-war landscapes to a present-day population health discourse among national policymakers concerned with not having enough babies to sustain the nation.

The geopolitical context of adoption, immigration, and kin relations is indeed complex. Technology also introduces pathways for kin relations to be defined and redefined. For example, building on the writings of Marilyn Strathern (1992), Charis Thompson’s “Strategic Naturalizing: Kinship in an Infertility Clinic” (2001) reflects on her fieldwork in infertility clinics in California in the 1990s. Thompson reveals insights into contemporary notions of kinship. She points to the clinic as a site where notions of kin relationships are made and remade, and how that plays out in the context of reproductive technology clinics where biological definitions of being related and social definitions of parenthood sometimes collide, converge, and conflict. She writes, “In the process, the meaning of biological motherhood is somewhat transformed; in particular, biological motherhood is becoming something that can be partial. This work is thus about ‘doing’ kinship, as opposed to simply ‘being’ a particular and fixed kind of kin” (175). In particular, Thompson raises questions about the need to understand kinship in the context of donors and surrogates who are close friends or family members (vs. contracted individuals). Kinship is not just about who is defined and designated as a parent but also includes all of the implications that come from parental roles as well as the need to be explicit about relationships in order to avoid possibilities of incest. Through a range of case studies, Thompson suggests several ways of understanding kinship in the context of reproductive assistance. Stages in the establishment of pregnancy are determined to be “relational” when they implicate kin relations whereas the stage is called “custodial” if it enables relatedness but does not itself become part of kinship understandings. For example, in a custodial stage, a woman might be instrumental in the conception or bearing of the child (i.e., biologically involved) but not a part of the kinship network (i.e., not implicated as mother).

Technologies (both biomedical and legal) have influenced the making of kin. Examples range from birth control and in vitro fertilization to surrogacy and artificial insemination. Faye Ginsburg and Rayna Rapp have explored the impact of assisted reproductive technologies on kinship and society. For example, medical technologies have helped children with disabilities to survive in ways that they may not have in the past (Ginsburg and Rapp 2011). Ginsburg and Rapp argue that such “disruptions of reproduction” are inextricably tied to rises in learning disabilities and that the politics of reproduction therefore have an indelible mark on the contemporary context of developed nations. Learning disabilities doubled each decade after the 1970s, resulting in a 15% rate among US students. In addition to the development of new technologies, policy changes and disability rights legislation and portrayals of more nuanced or positive representations of children and adults with disabilities in the media have also increased in recent decades. They converge to transform the American context of children and parenthood to be more inclusive of people with disabilities and to bring together family relationships, technology, and social justice. Ginsburg and Rapp emphasize, “With nearly every interview, we heard stories about how families have had to reimagine everything from household budgets to school careers, to sibling relations, to models of humanity that take into account life with a difference. We argue that the stories our respondents told us about living with disability—from the moment of birth onward—collectively constitute a ‘new kinship imaginary’ with temporal and social implications” (2011, 3).

PROFILE: Tam Perry, Associate Professor, School of Social Work, Wayne State University

What prompted you to study social work and anthropology? How did one area of study start to lead to the other and then to thinking about them in conjunction with one another? Anthropology was a discipline that I was not directly exposed to until later in my academic career when I was entering my joint PhD program in social work and anthropology. I was interested in investigating the ways that anthropology and social work could merge. As social work is a helping profession, it is often utilized by its skilled professionals who “talk” in roles as advocates and brokers of services. My choice to specialize in linguistic anthropology allowed me to develop a framework for understanding how language acts both as a response to behaviors and also influences other behaviors. Recognizing linguistic patterns that are present within families and understanding linguistic practices could contribute to finding better ways for social workers to work with older persons and their families.

Alongside others committed to the intersection of social work and anthropology, I have become active in a group called Scholars Across Social Work and Anthropology (SASW). SASW aims to integrate social work and anthropology by (1) developing knowledge at the intersection of these fields; (2) fostering greater dialogue among social workers and anthropologists; (3) promoting collaboration on teaching and research; and (4) facilitating outreach and mentorship between scholars at all stages of their careers. SASW was founded in 2016 in a basement hallway at the annual conference of the Society for Social Work and Research (SSWR). Since that first “underground” meeting, membership has grown to approximately 50 active members. Thus far, members are primarily faculty and doctoral students in either social work or anthropology departments, though we welcome all who have an interest in the intersection of these two fields. The founding executive committee includes John Mathias (Florida State University), Matthew Chin (University of Virginia) and Lauren Gulbas (University of Texas at Austin). Please see our paper, “Interrogating Culture: Anthropology, Social Work, and the Concept Trade” (Mathias et al., 2020). As articulated by Dr. Gulbas, SASW is committed to the idea that systematic and rigorous qualitative research can be used to improve well-being and help meet human needs. Gulbas notes, “My engagement with social work has helped me to envision how to build on the vital intersections between medical anthropology and social work to confront important social problems and effect change. I have found there has been no better way to explore these synergies than through my collaborations with Scholars in Social Work and Anthropology.”

Much of your research has taken place in Detroit. Can you share a little bit about how you develop both short term and long-term relationships in field research and how anthropology as well as social work training informs how you approach connecting with people and places?  I have been active in Detroit since joining the faculty of Wayne State in 2012. Cultivating strong, trusting relationships with stakeholders in the Detroit community is a critical part of my work and personal ethos. I develop these relationships by consistently following through and following up with the people I meet. I regularly attend a variety of community events and am very committed to a local coalition, Senior Housing Preservation Detroit. In this coalition, I serve as research chair and help with the Strategic Planning process. Many of the projects we do in this coalition which aims to raise awareness about the concerns of those living in senior housing in the City’s core are possible because of long-standing relationships. I have always co-published and co-presented with members of this coalition (see Perry et al. 2015, 2017, 2020, in press).

Anthropology informs this work through the discipline’s emphasis on prolonged engagement and the level of detail needed to understand the lived experience from multiple angles (older adult, service providers) as well as the need to connect these details to macro policies and advocacy. Our multi-agency coalition often shares accounts of older adults facing displacement and other challenges recently as a result of COVID. My macro social work training on advocacy and the importance of understanding the individual and social determinants contributing to inequity are also always incorporated into my research and service approaches.

Your work focuses on housing transitions among older adults. Can you talk about the research and how it illustrates the importance of thinking about kin relations as changing over time? Kin relations have been part of most of my research projects with older adults in Detroit.  My dissertation work explored the processes of voluntary relocation, and my later projects involved older adults and their relationships to their homes and communities in times of involuntary displacement or environmental challenges. It is very clear that many of these decisions or the repercussions of challenges involve a host of kin. These kin structures constantly change as we examine resources, caregiving obligations and gentrification. I have written a paper with a section “kinship and lightbulbs” (Perry, 2014) illuminating (pun intended!) the intersection of kin relations with material possessions, in this case, collections of light bulbs. These lightbulb collections ensured that the patriarch of the household facilitated safe lighting and by inference, a safe physical environment. When he moved to senior living, this social role, as indexed by the selling of the lightbulb collection, was also transformed. My latest research project, Navigating Time and Space: Experiences of Aging with Hemophilia, also investigates aspects of kin relationships in this rare, genetically transmitted, bleeding disorder. The intersection of age with hemophilia in this population that has been gravely stricken by the HIV/AIDS pandemic highlights the “lack of a roadmap” in terms of older real and fictive kin in a population that never expected to age.

Your new project specifically examines how issues of housing and aging play out for urban Black American populations. Can you share a little about this project? More generally, how do you develop ideas for new projects and build on previous work while continuing to explore new ideas?  Working in Detroit, a predominantly Black American city, housing opportunities include reflections on historical homeownership opportunities, employment opportunities and system navigation. In general, projects tend to build upon themselves as insights are gained and research networks expand. For example, my interest in understanding housing challenges has expanded to working with urban planning researchers to understand how older adults are depicted in “development” materials, or in many cases, not featured, so depictions of “family” focuses on couples with small children (see Berglund et al. 2020). I’ve also been involved with larger work on building trust when it comes to engaging in research with communities of older adults in Detroit and Flint through the Michigan Center for Urban African American Aging Research. This includes examining best practices with Community Advisory Boards as a way to highlight historically marginalized voices (Mitchell et al. 2020). During initial waves of COVID-19, MCUAAAR engaged in a telephone outreach project to engage older adults to understand immediate concerns (Rorai & Perry, 2020).

Another example of kin-making in a contemporary context is the defining of hope and loss in both surrogacy and adoption. Christa Craven writes about kinship and “de-kinning” in LGBTQ communities in the context of reproductive loss. Reproductive loss can include failed adoption or miscarriage. After conducting interviews with LGBTQ parents in the US, Canada, Belgium, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, New Zealand and Scotland, Craven finds how reproductive loss can be de-kinning by marking the lack of family formation while new kinships can also be formed through practices such as creating physical memorials, having religious or spiritual services, or remembering kin-making experiences through tattoos and art.

Adoption, surrogacy, and assisted reproductive technologies underscore what many have called new kinship studies or the second coming of kinship studies. Motherhood disaggregates into categories such as genetic, birth, adoptive and surrogate, distinguishing between social and biological parenting (Strathern 1992, 27). For example, Janet Carsten discusses the evolution of anthropological thought on kinship from Levi-Strauss to today (Warburton and Edmonds 2016). Thinking about the topics of global flow alongside surrogacy and technology in the context of more recent events, we see how quickly kin relations are made, interrupted, and remade. News stories marked with headlines such as “Israeli Dads Welcome Surrogate Born Baby in Nepal on Earthquake Day” (Harris 2015) illustrate how policy, sexual orientation, circulation of people and things across borders, and natural disasters come together. In this particular story, two dads who are barred from adoption in their home country of Israel due to their sexual orientation fly to Nepal to meet their child, trying to find their surrogate in the middle of earthquake recovery. In this journey to make kin, the story begins with sperm in Israel that is frozen and flown to Thailand where a South African donor supplied her egg for fertilization. The embryo was then flow to Nepal where it was implanted in an Indian woman who had agreed to be the surrogate. W hether the egg donor and surrogate were paid and to what degree they were able to negotiate the terms of their labor are not details explicitly included in the news report.

Surrogate labor and its relationship to social power structures have led to discussions about women, particularly poor women, are relegated to “womb renting” for wealthy foreigners. Added reflection also comes from researchers who provide important critiques of commercial surrogacy based on these power differentials as well as calls to analyze limitations in these debates such as essentializing narratives of surrogates as agency-less individuals. Bronwyn Parry acknowledges that commercial surrogacy can indeed be exploitative but also cautions against fetishized, exceptionalist narratives that define it as inherently so when other forms of bodily labor are also spaces of potential and real exploitation. Parry writes:

One of the powerful implications of perpetuating racialized and gendered accounts of surrogacy that characterize the practitioners (the surrogates) as an oppressed and exploited minority is that they actively prohibit such women from occupying the role of benefactor of reproductive labour to the more privileged Indian or white Western women and men who avail themselves of their services. Keeping them in this role, whilst simultaneously denying the significance of their labour, works to strip them further of both power and self-respect (2018, 228).

Better regulation that encourages or mandates more information sharing and the building of structures for more equitable negotiation are distinguished from exceptionalist narratives that might require the entire act of commercial surrogacy to be banned because the entire practice is seen as inherently exploitative. Parry cautions against falling into narratives of agency-less women that might address some inequities while further perpetuating others.

In examples like these, we see how marginalization and power might play out in one locale (gay men in Israel who want to be fathers) but also position them to interact in other locales (such as in Thailand and Nepal) in ways that leverage the power and privilege that accompanies the financial means to pursue assisted reproductive technologies and international travel. In this way, the complexities of kinship are mediated, facilitated, and disrupted by law, social and economic power, as well as unforeseen events that connect many countries and people of different cultural backgrounds to one another in the making of this family.

Recall our opening chapter where the context of COVID-19 brings anthropological issues to the forefront. Within this context, we also see how surrogacy and transnational flows take shape in the midst of a global pandemic (Maynes 2020). BioTexCom operates a center in Ukraine and released footage of surrogate babies born and awaiting their meeting with their parents but facing delays due to travel restrictions put in place as result of COVID-19 response. The center has been criticized for some of its practices in the past, and as an example of the complications of the transnational reproductive “market” for surrogacy and for lack of regulations. For example, parents who are one of the more frequently represented customers of BioTexCom may rely on its presence in Ukraine because surrogacy is not legal in their country of residence. This is further complicated by socioeconomic and class divisions that allow only certain would-be parents to travel to far away locales where surrogacy is permitted. For example, not all people in Spain (where surrogacy is illegal) who want to be parents through surrogacy have the option or means to travel internationally to Ukraine. Local and state-specific laws thus collide with financial resources and class status when it comes to this modern-day configuration of parenthood.

These are just some of the ways in which technology, policy and transnational contexts impact the shifting definitions of kinship and family. Over the years, anthropologists have grappled with the ways in which human beings make meaning out of our mutual relations. From a world where simplified concepts of kinship helped to broaden narrow definitions of family to a more critical and reflexive discussion about how those early endeavors also had negative repercussions in the way they upheld static and homogenizing notions of kinship in non-Western societies, anthropology as a discipline continues to evolve in its study of kin relations. Lessons from the discipline now integrate key themes such as the role of technology and state policy and stratifications that exists due to persistent race, gender, and class-based barriers in access to resources (Inhorn 2020).

FOR FURTHER READING

• Digital Elder Care
• The Ends of Kinship: Connecting Himalayan Lives Between Nepal and New York
• The Circulation of Children: Kinship, Adoption, and Morality in Andean Peru

Kinship sits as a foundational principle in cultural anthropology, but it is a foundation that has shaped and shifted over time. How anthropologists think and write about kinship itself as universal or particular or as static versus in flux has itself evolved over time. Some historically understood notions of kin relations may remain cogent today but none remain “stuck” in the past or limited to definitions provided in a singular diagram. In a world where people, things, and ideas flow across group, clan, and nation-state borders, relationships between people have and will continue to shift.

By introducing some concepts and how they play out in different cultural contexts, we hope to underscore the fact that there is a wide range of diversity—and that there are no obvious givens when it comes to who relates to whom. Migration, transnational adoption, assisted reproductive technologies, and the converging spheres of legal, political, economic, and social contexts all challenge us to continuously interrogate how we think of our mutual relationships. Any changing roles, rights, and responsibilities must then be examined in all the ever-changing ways they impact kin relations in ways that underscore the diversity of ways human beings find belonging and community with one another.

CURRENT EVENTS & CRITICAL THINKING

• People Staff. “51-Year-Old Mother Serves as Her Daughter’s Surrogate After She Is Unable to Get Pregnant.” People , June 25, 2020. https://people.com/human-interest/mother-carries-daughters-baby/ .

The article features a story of a 51-year-old mother Julie Loving and a 29-year-old daughter Breanna Lockwood. The daughter had several miscarriages and was told that her uterus was unable to successfully carry a child. The Lockwoods looked for several surrogacy agencies, but the costs were very expensive. However, Lockwood’s fertility specialist Brian Kaplan suggested Lockwood to consider surrogacy, “specifically from a family member or friend instead of an agency to save the dental hygienist more than $100,000.” After series of careful medical examination and consultation, Loving volunteered to become a surrogate for her grandchild. This article provides an interesting example of kinship and pushes the boundaries of definition of motherhood. Although the baby was born through the 51-year-old mother’s uterus, genetically, the baby is 100% biologically related to the 29-year-old of daughter and her husband. The article is an example of modern medical technology re-defining the definition of traditional kinship.

• Strabuk, Alexa. “There Is No Way to Capture the Full Complexity of Transracial Adoption.” International Examiner , January 2, 2020. https://iexaminer.org/there-is-no-way-to-capture-the-full-complexity-of-transracial-adoption/ .

This opinion post covers complex layers of transracial adoption discourse and shares stories of adopted children growing up in a family of different race. Being Asian-American and a transracial adoptee herself, Strabuk shares brief history of transracial adoption in the US and modern international political background behind Asian kids’ adoption to the West. Questioning mass media’s generalized “happy endings” of adoptees and Strabuk writes, “A happy ending in the media erases the very real structural realities of the adoption industrial complex, one that orchestrates the exchange of babies for money. By watering down adoption, by overlooking the problems with white savior and colorblind parenting, the mainstream media uses transracial adoption to support its latest diversity campaign.”

Critical Thinking & Discussion Questions:

• Draw a kinship diagram of your family, however you define it. What are some places where it was easy to depict in a diagram? What are some places where it was challenging? What does relative ease or challenge say about the social and cultural norms you were raised in? Alternatively, you could do this exercise with a famous person, whether a celebrity in popular culture or a historic/political figure and ask the same questions.
• Define some key ways in which legal, biological, and socio-cultural definitions of kinship converge and diverge. How might this play out in the case of adoption or surrogacy?
• How have kinship concepts evolved over the course of the history of anthropology?

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

• Anthropology of Children and Youth Interest Group
• Scholars Across Anthropology & Social Work

Teaching Cultural Anthropology for 21st Century Learners Copyright © 2023 by Sheena Nahm McKinlay is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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The Sociology of Kinship: A Case for Looking Back to the Future

• First Online: 02 November 2021

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• Alexandra Maryanski 4  

Part of the book series: Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research ((HSSR))

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Kinship fired the imagination of scholars in sociology and anthropology for generations, although kinship per se is no longer regarded as a particularly useful concept for the study of family life in modern societies. Kinship theory rests on a global literature stockpiled over the last 150 years with clashing theories over whether kinship is a biological, sociological, or psychological phenomenon, how and why exogamy and the incest taboo originated, the role kinship plays in social integration, and even whether kinship and the nuclear family are a facet of human nature or an invented social construct. This essay reviews the compelling ideas of the leading kinship theorists in sociology and anthropology during the Axial Age of kinship. And, surprisingly, as this chapter will document, some early speculations on kinship and its related elements have now been corroborated in the light of primate data and the fossil, molecular, sociological, and archeological records, with findings that have the potential to revitalize sociological theory and practice. The near discarding of kinship theory in sociology is thus a rather foolish line of reasoning.

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The kinship literature is so enormous that only a representative sample of the leading kinship theorists and their contributions are possible in this essay.

Polygyny is the marriage of several women to one man at the same time; polyandry is the marriage of several men to one woman; bilateral descent lines are through both the mother’s and father’s relatives; unilineal descent lines are limited to either the mother’s or father’s relatives; patrilocal is a postmarital residence where the married couple live in or near the groom’s home; matrilocal is a postmarital residence where the couple live in or near the brides’ home; neolocal is a postmarital independent household; and avunculocal is a residence shift where a male leaves his patrilocal residence as an adult to reside with his mother’s brother before and after marriage. Two excellent (and easy to read) books on kinship for the interested are Fox ( 2003 ) and Schusky ( 1983 ).

The nuclear family is the starting point for creating larger kinship networks. The polygynous family is a compounded extension of the nuclear unit because each wife has her own offspring, usually her own residence, and they share a single husband. Exceptions are very rare. For example, the traditional Nayar, a group of castes living on the coast of India, once practiced a form of polyandry. The Nayar castes, however, comprised only a small slice of Indian society, and their very specialized occupations are said to account for their mating arrangement. About 1890, Nayar kinship patterns shifted to monogamy and a gradually emerging nuclear family (Gough 1961 ; Murdock 1949 , pp. 1–40)

J.D. Freeman ( 1961 ) noted that corporate kindred groups are rare but possible with bilateral descent, but they are never organized on the basis of a common ancestor (like a clan) and they are very small in size.

Six basic types of kinship terminology have been identified worldwide, although every society adds some variations. By tradition, they are called, Iroquois, Eskimo, Omaha, Hawaiian, Sudanese, and Crow. Sudanese is the most complex system because it assigns a distinctive kin term to each near relative, and it has eight different cousin terms. Interestingly, Old English and Latin kin terms conform to a Sudanese pattern. Crow (named after a native American tribe) is a mirror image of Omaha and is associated with a matrilineal kinship system.

Morgan’s division of kinship terminologies into descriptive and classificatory is a misnomer given that both classificatory and descriptive terminologies merge some relatives. Morgan knew this, but his intent was to distinguish between kinship terminologies that isolate out the nuclear family with special kin terms from those that lump them in nomenclature with other relatives. Critics have attacked Morgan over what they thought was a blunder on his part, but they were apparently ignorant of his reasoning when he made this distinction. The terms are still used in the kinship literature despite this obvious problem.

Spencer’s Descriptive Sociology or Groups of Sociological Facts (1873–1934) is a huge compilation of cross-cultural materials drawn from archeological, ethnological, historical, and other sources, classified and arranged by Spencer. Originally commissioned in the 1860s in preparation for writing Principles of Sociology , he later published them for future students, along with a trust fund to complete the series. In all, there are 15 fat volumes that include a series of tables and columns using the same categories for each type of society. For example, some columns have a heading that relates to some social, cultural, or institutional structure of society (e.g., religious, ceremonial, linguistic, artistic, and domestic relations). Other columns have headings for the sociological, organic, and inorganic environment (e.g., past history, contact with neighbors, climate, geography, and animal life).

Durkheim taught a lecture course at the Lycée de Sens in 1883–1884 where he refers to the family as “the primary and most natural grouping of individuals” and “the seed from which society as a whole is born” (see Gross and Jones 2004 , pp. 255–257).

As senior editor, Durkheim reviewed whatever caught his fancy, especially books and articles on social organization and religion. His articles on incest, totemism, and primitive classification were all published in L’Année sociologique as Mémoires originaux

Durkheim’s publications on kinship and the family (outside of his Journal reviews and in Suicide ) include the published introductory family lecture (discussed above), a fragment of the seventeenth lecture that he delivered in 1892 on the “Conjugal Family” (published posthumously in 1921) and in 1906 “Divorce by Mutual Consent.”

Durkheim essentially adopted Robertson Smith’s view on kinship in blood. As Smith put it: “The idea that kinship is not purely an affair of birth …has quite fallen out of our circle of ideas; but so, for that matter, has the primitive conception of kindred itself…To know that a man’s life was sacred to me …it was not necessary for me to count cousinship with him by reckoning up to our common ancestor; it was enough that we belonged to the same clan and bore the same clan-name” ( 1889 , p. 255).

Rivers did not entirely reject the notion of survivals, but he confined these so-called leftovers from the past to a few systematic features (Davis ([ 1936 ] 1980, p. 47).

Murdock was very critical of the way the Boasian school had “exorcised the bogey of evolutionism.” He considered Boas “extravagantly overrated by his disciples… [and]… the most unsystematic of theorists, his numerous kernels of genuine insight being scattered amongst much pedantic chaff” ( 1949 , p. xiv).

A.R. Radcliffe-Brown taught social anthropology in Chicago, Oxford, Alexandria, Sydney, London, Manchester, Johannesburg, and pretty much around the globe (Evans-Pritchard and Eggan 1952 ).

Following Davis, social distance has three manifestations: an individual’s private feelings toward certain individuals, open, overt behavior, or contact, and social norms that distinguish different classes of individuals ([1980] 1936 , p. 164).

Parsons notes that this characterization is for urban middle-class American society. For the upper-class elite, kinship solidarity usually persists as it is associated with status of ancestry, transfer of estates, etc. And this main kinship pattern also differs among the lower classes, although this has not been studied, he said, using a structural perspective.

A kinship system can be examined from two distinctive vantage points: An Ego-centered focus (the anchor for a kindred) or an ancestral focus (the anchor for a clan). A clan can exist in perpetuity, whereas a kindred comes in and out of existence with the birth and death of an Ego.

The great apes (our closest relatives) are all forest living. Orangutans are arboreal and nearly solitary, and the only stable group is a mother with dependent offspring. Gorillas are mostly terrestrial and live in regenerating and high-altitude forests and ravines. They are organized into loosely woven heterosexual groups or “bands” which average about 15 gorillas. While a gorilla band is made up of a shifting collection of individuals, it is organized around a leader male and includes a number of adult females with dependents and up to four adult males. Chimpanzees are tree-living and also hang out on the forest floor. The only stable group is a mother and her dependent young. Chimpanzees share nearly 99% of our DNA and as King and Wilson ( 1978 , p. 90) highlighted “the chimpanzee-human difference is far smaller than that between species within a genus of mice, frogs, or flies.” So, given that species usually build on the social structure that they inherit, it is a good bet that early hominins started out with an organizational arrangement much like the promiscuous and community living chimpanzees (see Maryanski 2018 and Turner and Maryanski 2008 )

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Maryanski, A. (2021). The Sociology of Kinship: A Case for Looking Back to the Future. In: Abrutyn, S., Lizardo, O. (eds) Handbook of Classical Sociological Theory. Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78205-4_12

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Kinship: brief essay on kinship (892 words).

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This essay provides information about the Kinship:

Man is a social animal. His social nature compels him to tie with others in some form of relationships. He always live with his fellow beings and is surrounded by different kinds of people. The people with which he lives in society are his friends, relatives, neighbors and strangers. Out of all these people man is bound up with some either through blood ties or marriage ties. This bond of blood or marriage which binds people together in a group is called kinship.

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This kinship system based on a biological fact of sexual intercourse between men and women. The desire for reproduction gives rise to a kind of binding relationship. Thus kinship is an interlocking system of families of orientation and procreation. But in a kinship system social recognition overrides biological facts.

That is why kinship system includes socially recognized relationships. These relationships are the product of social interaction. A kinship group may be a broad- range or narrow range.

Kinship refers solely to relationship based upon descent and marriage. An individual plays many roles in his social life such as – son, father, brother etc. Kinship is the idiom by which many people particularly in traditional societies comprehend these roles. Kinship is a construct, a cultural artifact created by almost all kinds of human society. As an artifact it primarily shapes people. Kinship relations are the most basic attachments a man has. Kinship is a social relationship based on real consanguinity.

(1) According to the Dictionary of Anthropology, “Kinship system includes socially recognized relationships based on supposed as well as actual genealogical ties.” Kinship is a cultural system. It varies from culture to culture, from society to society.

(2) According to Theodorson and Theodorson, “Kinship system is the customary system of statuses and roles that governs the behavior of people who are related to each other through marriage or descent from a common ancestor.”

(3) According to Murdock, “Kinship is a structured system of relationship in which kins are bound to one another by complex inter­locking ties.”

(4) According to Smelser, “Kinship is a cluster of social relations based on such factors as biological ties, marriage and legal rules regarding adoption, guardianship and the like.”

Thus, from the above it is concluded that the relationships created through marriage or blood ties are called kinship. When two or more persons are related to each other through descent or united through marriage kinship comes into existence. Murdock opines that each and every adult individual belongs to two nuclear families.

The family of orientation i.e. the family in which one is born and brought up and the family of procreation i.e. the family established through marriage. The relationships formed by both these types of family, ancestors, posterity and successors are called Kinship. Hence every kinship system has blood relations and close relatives based on intimacy.

Study of Kinship: Sociologists and anthropologists like Lowte, Murdock and Levistrauss have made a detailed study on Kinship. Famous anthropologist Radcliffe Brown and Robin Fox have also examined the kinship system. Mrs. Iravati Karve and K.M. Kapadia have analyzed the kinship relationships in Indian society. H.M. Johnson also studied kinship system.

The Important Types of Kinship:

Kinship mainly divided into two types such as:

(1) Consanguineous Kinship:

Those kins who are related to each other by blood is known as consanguineous kins. The relationship is based on blood ties. Son, daughter, sister etc. are example of consanguineous kinship.

(2) Affinal Kinship:

The kinship relationship established by marriage is known as affinal kinship. And the relatives so related are called affinal kins. Son-in-law, Father-in-law, Mother-in-law, Sister- in-law etc. are example of affinal kins.

Types of Kins or Degree of Kinship:

On the basis of nearness or distance kins may be classified into primary secondary and tertiary kins. These are:

(1) Primary Kins:

Those kins who are closely and directly related to one another are called primary kins. Normally there are eight types of primary kins which includes husband-wife, father-son, mother-son, father-daughter, mother-daughter, sister-brother, younger brother-elder brother, younger sister-elder sister. One’s father is one’s primary consanguineous kins whereas one’s wife is one’s primary affinal kins.

(2) Secondary Kins:

Secondary Kins are defined in relation to our primary kins. Primary kins of our primary kins are called secondary kins. Father’s brother, sister’s husband, brother’s wife are our secondary kins. An anthropologist opines that there are 33 types of secondary kins.

(3) Tertiary Kins:

The secondary kins of our primary kins is known as tertiary kins. Brother of sister’s husband, wife of brother- in-law are example of tertiary kins. An anthropologists opines that there are at about 151 types of tertiary kins. Besides the above types of kin there may be some other type of kins such as:

(1) Consanguineal Kin:

A consanguineal kin is a person who is related through blood ties such as father, brother, mother, son, daughter etc.

(2) Affinal Kin:

An affinal kin is a person who is related through marriage such as husband, wife, spouse’s parents etc.

(3) Lineal Kin:

A lineal kin is a person who is related by a direct line of descent such as father, father’s father, son and son’s son etc.

(4) Collateral Kin:

A collateral kin is a person who is related indirectly through the mediation of another relative such as father’s brother, mother’s sister etc.

Related Articles:

• Kinship: Main Organizing Principles of Human Society
• Kinship System: Essay on Kinship System (563 Words)

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• Introduction
• The evolution of family forms
• Personhood, cohesion, and the “matrilineal puzzle”

Critiques of descent theory

• Reciprocity, incest, and the transition from “nature” to “culture”
• Elementary structures
• Critiques of alliance theory
• Kinship terminology
• Historical materialism and instrumentality
• Households, residence rules, and house societies
• Culturalist accounts
• Feminist and gendered approaches to kinship
• Challenging the conceptual basis of kinship
• Reproductive technologies, social innovation, and the future of kinship studies

Descent theory

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• National Center for Biotechnology Information - PubMed Central - The foundation of kinship: Households
• University of Nebraska Pressbooks - An Introduction to Anthropology: the Biological and Cultural Evolution of Humans - Social Structures: Kinship and Marriage
• Social Science LibreTexts - Forming Family through Kinship
• Table Of Contents

Kinship was regarded as the theoretical and methodological core of social anthropology in the early and middle part of the 20th century. Although comparative studies gradually abandoned an explicit evolutionist agenda, there remained an implicit evolutionary cast to the way in which kinship studies were framed. Indeed, scholarly interest in the cross-cultural comparison of kinship institutions could be traced back to a set of questions deriving from the cultural evolutionists.

The central problem addressed by anthropologists of the early 20th century was directly related to the colonial enterprise and focused on understanding the mechanisms for maintaining political order in stateless societies. Given that such societies lacked centralized administrative and judicial institutions—the bureaucratic machinery of the state —how were rights, duties, status, and property transmitted from one generation to the next? Traditional societies accomplished this task by organizing around kinship relations rather than property. This distinction arose out of the models that had been developed by Maine and Morgan, in which cultural evolution was driven by the transition from status to contract forms of organization and from corporate to individual forms of property ownership.

Prominent British social anthropologists of this period, such as Malinowski , Radcliffe-Brown , Evans-Pritchard , and Fortes , generally advocated a functionalist approach to these questions. The major premises of functionalism were that every aspect of a culture , no matter how seemingly disparate (e.g., kinship terms, technology, food, mythology, artistic motifs), had a substantive purpose and that within a given culture these diverse structures worked together to maintain the group’s viability. For instance, these scholars saw the family as a universal social institution that functioned primarily to rear children. From their perspective this function was to a large degree self-evident and cross-culturally constant. The wider groupings recruited through kinship, which were the basis of political and economic organization, were much more culturally variable and hence of greater interest.

Fortes distinguished between the “private” or “domestic” domain of kinship and what he called the “politico-jural” domain. It was nevertheless true that Fortes in particular gave considerable explanatory weight to the emotional power of kinship. According to Fortes, what gave kinship its moral force was the “axiom of amity”—the idea that in the last analysis it is kin who can always be relied upon to help you out and who are the people you turn to when other help fails. Yet if this emotional content was the source of the power of kinship, it was also an area that lay beyond the province of anthropology. Fortes had been influenced by Freudian psychology, but his approach placed analyses of emotion and the unconscious mind in the domain of psychologists rather than anthropologists. Thus, British social anthropologists explored the ways in which kinship provided a basis for forming the kinds of groups—discrete, bounded, and linked to a particular territory—that were seen as necessary for a stable political order. Their explanations of these mechanisms became known as the descent theory of kinship.

Kinship is always “bilateral”; that is, it consists of relatives on both the mother’s and the father’s sides. Of course the relatives on both sides of any individual overlap with those of others, creating a web of interconnectedness rather than a discrete group. However, the recognition of one line of descent and the exclusion of the other provides the basis of a “ unilineal ” kinship system. In such systems descent defines bounded groups. The principle operates similarly whether the rule of descent is matrilineal (traced through the mother in the female line) or patrilineal (traced through the father in the male line).

Unilineal kinship systems were seen by British anthropologists of this period as providing a basis for the stable functioning of societies in the absence of state institutions. Generally, unilineal descent groups were exogamous. They also acted as corporations: their members held land in common, acted as a single unit with regard to substantive property, and behaved as one “person” in relation to other similarly constituted groups in legal and political matters such as warfare , feuds, and litigation. That is, the members of a lineage did not act as individuals in the politico-jural domain, instead conceiving themselves to a considerable extent as undifferentiated and continuous with each other. This corporateness was the basis of the stability and structure of a society formed out of unilineal descent groups.

The distinction between matrilineal and patrilineal systems did not have any obvious implications in terms of women’s political status, although it is sometimes assumed that a matrilineal kinship system must imply women’s greater political power. Anthropologists make a clear distinction between matriliny and matriarchy , however: the former denotes a method of reckoning kinship, while the latter denotes a system in which women have overall political control to the exclusion of men. Similarly, patriarchy denotes political control by men to the exclusion of women.

Although women may be more highly valued in matrilineal than patrilineal cultures , the anthropological data clearly indicate that hierarchical political systems (whether matrilineal or patrilineal) tend to be dominated by men and that no period of absolute matriarchy has ever existed. Despite plentiful evidence to the contrary, a notional era of “pure” matriarchy has been invoked as a theme in some very diverse contexts , including not only 19th-century cultural evolutionism but also the more recent discourses of environmentalism (especially ecofeminism), Neo-Paganism , and the so-called Goddess movement.

Personhood , cohesion, and the “matrilineal puzzle”

The differences between matrilineal and patrilineal systems nonetheless drew the nature of personhood to the attention of descent theorists. Studies of matrilineal systems suggested that a particular nexus of problems might arise regarding political continuity in a context where the holders of office (men) did not pass their status to their sons. If a man’s right to inherit an office was determined by who his mother was, then the political cohesion that seemed to be dependent on the father-son bond was potentially jeopardized. A number of solutions to what became known as the “matrilineal puzzle” were described, focusing variously on rules for marriage , residence , and succession . Perhaps the best-known of these is the avunculate , a custom in which men have an unusually close relationship with their sisters’ sons, often including coresidence.

The issues that underlay the so-called matrilineal puzzle were directly related to culturally specific notions about what constitutes a person. It was very clear that, in spite of wielding political authority , men in matrilineal systems occupied a marginal position as lineage members: they belonged by birth to the group of their mother, but on marriage they might be to some extent incorporated into their wife’s group in order to ensure the succession of her children. Because a man’s position as a member of a matrilineage was always to some degree compromised between affiliation to his mother’s group and to that of his wife, the extent to which he achieved full social personhood—that is, an identity altogether within either lineage—was limited. Fortes’s own work among the Tallensi of West Africa demonstrated very clearly that exactly the same argument could be made about women in a patrilineal system: women were always caught between being members of their father’s lineage and that of their husband. Not fully members of either group, they were not considered full social persons. However, the significance of men’s liminality vis-à-vis lineage membership seemed far greater and occupied more analytical space than that of women in mid-century studies, a view that reflected the androcentrism of the era’s researchers.

Although descent theory dominated early to mid-20th-century British kinship studies, a number of problems soon emerged. It became apparent that the depiction of societies as neatly ordered by unilineal descent into clearly bounded, nested units of different scale was quite far from everyday political reality. Personal experiences of kinship could vary considerably from the normative models described by some anthropologists; Evans-Pritchard, for instance, demonstrated that individuals could not always unequivocally identify the lineage to which they belonged. Furthermore, as scholars from Britain, France, and the United States increasingly undertook fieldwork outside Africa—for example, in Polynesia, Southeast Asia , or New Guinea—it became clear that kinship was not always organized through unilineal descent. Despite Radcliffe-Brown’s assertions to the contrary, bilateral (sometimes called “cognatic”) kinship as well as bilateral descent groups (reckoned in both the mother’s and the father’s lines) were found to be statistically common, even though they did not provide the same kind of clearly demarcated groupings as unilineal versions of kinship.

A further issue of contention was the extent to which descent theory minimized the importance of marriage in the structuring of kinship. Both Evans-Pritchard and Fortes asserted the importance of various links between descent groups. Such links assured the wider integration of kinship groups over a particular territory and could include links formed through marital connections as well as the recognition of kinship ties in the line that was complementary to the principal line of descent (i.e., matrilateral ties in a patrilineal kinship system or patrilateral ones in a matrilineal system). In their opinion, however, the principle of descent remained paramount in assuring the stable functioning of societies without states. Many prominent British anthropologists of this era were soon locked in forceful debate with their colleagues elsewhere over the significance of descent relative to that of marriage.

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Exploring kinship in a changing world

The study of kinship has long been central to the discipline of Anthropology. Indeed, for well over a century, kinship has been regarded as the glue that holds social relations together.

UTSC Anthropology Chair Professor Sandra Bamford has been researching and writing about kinship for years, and recently edited a volume of essays on the subject.

“For most people who have grown up in the West, the first thing you think about in relation to kinship is a biological connection. But when you start looking at peoples the world over, family relationships can be based on all kinds of things that have almost nothing to do with biological reproduction,” explains Prof. Bamford.

Prof. Bamford highlights an example from her own fieldwork in Papua New Guinea. Amongst the Kamea (the group of people with whom she worked), an older man will gift a certain variety of tree to a younger man who may or may not have any kind of previous relation to him. This tree is understood to produce a special type of sap which, when consumed in sufficient quantities, creates a pool of semen in the younger man’s body which can later be used for reproductive purposes. It follows, that over time ‘kin’ links can be formed between persons not previously related, based on having consumed sap from the same tree. “Sometimes kinship is based on eating the same food, cooking on the same hearth, or gardening long-term on the same plot of land,” she explains.

Then there are the Trobriand Islands – also part of Papua New Guinea – where according to Bronislaw Malinowski (long regarded as one of the ‘founders’ of modern anthropology) a woman becomes pregnant after a reincarnated spirit (known as a baloma ) enters her body while she swims in the sea.  Bamford also mentions the practice of ‘ghost marriages’ among the Nuer people of South Sudan.  Paternity, here, is established not on the basis of biological reproduction, but rather through the circulation of wealth – generally in the form of cattle – which entitles a man to lay claim to the offspring a woman bears. This opens the possibility of a dead man being recognized as a legal father. “If a man dies without having a child, a male kinsman may give cattle in his name to the family of a woman – any children this woman bears in the future will be regarded as belonging to the dead man because it was in his name that the cattle was circulated.” This last practice reminds Prof. Bamford of modern in vitro techniques which allow men to father children posthumously.

“Kinship and the way anthropologists think about kinship runs through almost every one of our classes,” explains Prof. Bamford. She developed a course, ANTC09H3 - Sex, Love, and Intimacy: Anthropological Approaches to Kinship and Marriage   that explores these different ways of looking at kinship, and which also examines the ways in which new advances in reproductive medicine (such as in vitro fertilization, embryo adoption, and surrogacy) are transforming how kinship is conceptualized across the globe.

“There's all kinds of new stuff that's happening that is really reinvigorating the study of kinship and making it one of the most interesting, exciting, and mind-blowing topics within the discipline,” says Prof. Bamford. “Since 1978, and the birth of Louise Brown in the U.K. (the first so-called ‘test-tube’ baby), we have been forced to rethink what it means to be ‘related.’ Consider surrogacy, for example. Is one’s ‘mother’ the person who gave birth to you? The person who donated an egg? Or the person who raised you?  Nowadays, this can involve three different people. Think also about the phenomenon of embryo adoption. Today, it is common for couples undergoing fertility treatments to ‘donate’ any unused frozen embryos to another couple who is hoping to establish a family of their own. This means that ‘siblings’ created in the lab at the same time can be scattered from one end of the country to the other, and/or separated by decades with respect to their date of birth. Imagine that you discover you have a fraternal twin who was born several decades before you!” 

There are interesting ethical implications associated with these practices, notes Prof. Bamford. “In the U.K., it is common for a man to donate sperm to his infertile son – some find this practice eminently sensible as you will be keeping DNA within the family, while for others it represents a morass of confusion. Doesn’t this mean that one’s ‘father’ is also one’s ‘brother’? And that one’s grandfather is also simultaneously one’s father? There are also cases of daughters donating eggs to their mothers, perhaps during the course of a second marriage when the older woman no longer produces viable ova.  The legal system and society more generally are grappling with how to make sense of these new kinship ties. This is an amazingly interesting time to be reflecting upon kinship!”

Prof. Bamford, alongside Prof. Kathryn Goldfarb from the University of Colorado Boulder, recently edited a recent volume entitled Difficult Attachments: Anxieties of Kinship and Care , which is due to appear in October of this year.  Prof. Bamford contributed an essay to the collection, which also includes work by UTSC Associate Professor Katie Kilroy-Marac and Professor Emeritus Michael Lambek . The book challenges the taken-for-granted assumption that kinship is always about positive sociality.

“Scholars have long understood that kin ties can mean many different things to many different people,” points out Prof. Bamford. “But until recently there has been an implicit assumption that whatever else kinship is, it's about positive connections, relationships based on support and nurture, love, intimacy, and attachment. These relationships are also supposed to stand the test of time. I think slowly anthropologists are beginning to recognize that kin ties aren't always just about positive things. Sometimes kin ties can have negative connotations.”

Marriage can be grounded in domestic violence, for instance, notes Prof. Bamford. Institutions like foster care exist because sometimes children need to be protected from their parents. Her most recent fieldwork project deals with foster care and child welfare in Canada and the US, examining how kinship ties are formed within the context of foster care, and what happens when the fabric of family life unravels.

Prof. Bamford’s own paper in the book deals with the phenomenon of ‘rehoming’, where parents will adopt a child from overseas, often with special needs, and will then put the child up for adoption privately on places like Craigslist and Kijiji when raising the child proves too much for them. “So, these kids are getting passed off to virtual strangers by putting them up on the Internet,” Prof. Bamford explains. “Some of these children end up in very dangerous places and eventually become completely lost in the system.”

Other papers in this volume deal with elderly people being abandoned in nursing homes, families who were torn apart during the period of dictatorship in Argentina, the burden of caring for a chronically ill family member, the removal of children from Indigenous families during what has come to be known as the ‘sixties scoop,’ and the degree to which loneliness is now being recognized as a public health threat in many countries across the globe.

“The volume is intended to call into question the idea that kinship and family ties are always loving, warm, and supportive. Kin ties can also cause harm and are often grounded in a lot of ambivalent emotions.”

Difficult Attachments: Anxieties of Kinship and Care is available now from Rutgers University Press.

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The State and Ideology of Kinship

With transition to the state kinship ceases the role of the central organizing principle of society. However, the very social nature of kinship provides the opportunities for manipulating it as ideology in societies of all types. It was typical for early states to represent the state and the sovereign by analogy with the family and its head. Not infrequently the same connotations are exploited for the sake of power’s legitimation in modern states either. However, the ideology of kinship’s exploitation in states should not be confused with the cases of completely another sort. In some societies of the overall complexity level not lower than that of early states (in “alternatives to the state”), one can observe the whole socio-political construction’s encompassment not from above (as it must be in states) but from below – from the local community level, while the community itself is underpinned by kin ties. Here kinship is not only ideology but also the real socio-political background. So, there is no direct conformity between the socio-political (transition to the state) and ideological (departure from the ideology of kinship) processes and this seemingly clear fact should be acknowledged and given due attention by researchers.

Related Papers

Dmitri Bondarenko

Within the framework of the overwhelming majority of modern theories, the state is considered as a specialized and centralized institution for governing a society, to what its right to exercise coercive authority – legitimized violence is often added as the state’s critical characteristic feature. Contrari-wise, my approach stems from the presumption that the state should be perceived not as a specific set of political institutions only but, first and foremost, as a type of society to which this set of insti-tutions is adequate. Following this approach leads to the necessity of paying special attention to coming to the fore of the non-kin, territorial relations in state society – the point often evicted from many contemporary definitions of the state due to the wide-spread vision of it as merely a specific form of political organization. I also argue that political centralization cannot be regarded as a fea-ture specific for the state, as it is applicable to many non-state forms of societies. In the meantime, the feature typical for the state only, is specialization resulting in administrators’ professionalization, that is, in the formation of bureaucracy, related directly to the non-kin social ties coming into promi-nence. As for the right to coerce, it should not be made the central point of the state concept because it is a dependent variable itself: the specificity of monopoly of the legitimate violence in state society is precisely that it is exercised through and by bureaucrats who operate within bureaucratic institu-tions.

"Until recently, cultural evolution has commonly been regarded as a permanent teleological move to a greater level of hierarchy, crowned with state formation. However, recent research based upon the principle of heterarchy – ‘... the relation of elements to one another when they are unranked or when they possess the potential for being ranked in a number of different ways’ (Crumley 1995: 3) changes the usual picture dramatically. The opposite of heterarchy, then, would be a condition in a society in which relationships in most contexts are ordered mainly according to one principal hierarchical relationship. This organizational principle may be called ‘homoarchy’. Homoarchy and heterarchy represent the most universal ‘ideal’ principles and basic trajectories of socio-cultural (including political) organization and its transformations. There are no universal evolutionary stages – band, tribe, chiefdom, state or otherwise – inasmuch as cultures so characterized could be heterarchical or homoarchical: they could be organized differently, while having an equal level of overall social complexity. However, alternativity exists not only between heterarchic and homoarchic cultures but also within each of the respective types. In particular, the present article attempts at demonstrating that the Benin Kingdom of the 13th – 19th centuries, being an explicitly homoarchic culture not inferior to early states in the level of complexity, nevertheless was not a state as it lacked administrative specialization and pronounced priority of the supra-kin ties. The Benin form of socio-political organization can be called ‘megacommunity’, and its structure can be depicted as four concentric circles forming an upset cone: the extended family, community, chiefdom, and megacommunity (kingdom). Thus, the homoarchic megacommunity turns out an alternative to the homoarchic by definition (Claessen and Skalník 1978: 640) early state."

The article treats the typology of the early state (“inchoate” – “typical” – “transitional”) from the viewpoint of the state beginnings. The author argues that in general typologies the state should be approached as a form of society, not as a kind of political system only. From this perspective he emphasizes the complex dynamics of the interrelations between the key principles of socio-political organization – the kin and territorial ties, in the process of cultural (socio-political) evolution. The conclusion is that the “full”, or “completed”, state should be characterized by the combination of primarily territorial (suprakin) social organization and specialized, professionalized and bureaucratized administration. This combination is observable only in “transitional early states”. As transformation processes usually develop in the administrative sphere faster than in the sphere of social organization, the “typical early state” can be called “incomplete”, or “limited”, state in which the political institutions are already approaching the level sufficient for state society but the territorial ties still do not outstrip kin ties, however counterbalancing them effectively. The “inchoate early state” cannot be designated as state in any sense, in its basic features (including the overall kinship nature) overlapping with those commonly attributed to the (complex) chiefdom. Finally, the ideology of kinship as a cloak for non-kin relations in states and as a reflection of socio-political reality in some supercomplex non-state societies (“alternatives to the state”) is discussed.

The paper provides an anthropological analysis of the socio-political system of the Kingdom of Benin during the longest and most important period of her history: from coming to power of the ruling up to now Second (Oba) dynasty presumably in the 13th century till the British colonial conquest in 1897. The course of this system formation and its basic characteristic features are outlined. It is argued that the Benin Kingdom of the 13th – 19th centuries was a supercomplex society which yet was not a state, as it was lack of the latter’s fundamental parameters. Particularly, the Benin society was not based on suprakin (territorial) social ties and there was no professional (bureaucratic) administration in it. The kin-based extended family community always remained this society’s focus, and the supracommunal institutions were built up by its matrix, what is impossible in a state. So, notwithstanding its overall socio-cultural supercomplexity, Benin was not a state but rather a specific alternative to it, labeled “megacommunity”. Its structure can be depicted as four concentric circles forming an upset cone: the extended family, the community, the chiefdom, and finally the kingdom. A number of other African and non-African examples of this underconceptualized and understudied by now type of socio-political organization are offered.

Dmitri Bondarenko , Leonid Grinin , Andrey Korotayev

It has always been peculiar to evolutionists to compare social and biological evolution, the latter as visualized by Charles Darwin1. But it also seems possible and correct to draw an analogy with another great discovery in the field of evolutionary biology, with the homologous series of Nikolay Vavilov (1921, 1927, 1967). However, there is no complete identity be-tween cultural parallelism and biological homologous series. Vavilov stud-ied the morphological homology, whereas our focus within the realm of social evolution is the functional one. No doubt, the morphological homo-morphism also happens in the process of social evolution (e. g., in the Hawaii Islands where a type of the sociocultural organization surprisingly similar with the ones of other highly developed parts of Polynesia had independently formed by the end of the 18th century [Sahlins 1972/1958; Goldman 1970; Earle 1978]). But this topic is beyond the present paper's problématique.

Leonid Grinin , Dmitri Bondarenko , Andrey Korotayev

What is important for us here is that there are reasons to suppose that an equal level of sociopolitical (and cultural) complexity (which makes it possible to solve equally difficult problems faced by societies) can be achieved not only in various forms but on essentially different evolutionary pathways, too. Thus, it is possible to achieve the same level of system complexity through differing pathways of evolution which appeared simultaneously (and even prior to the formation of Homo Sapiens Sapiens) and increased in quantity alongside so­ciocultural advancement. Diversity could be regarded as one of the most important preconditions of the evolutionary process. This implies that the transition to any qualitatively new forms is normally not possible without a sufficient level of variability of sociocultural forms (among both the given culture’ s predecessors and contemporaries).

Leonid Grinin , Dmitri Bondarenko , Andrey Korotayev , Fred Spier

The authors of this article depart from the idea that certain alternatives of development can be distinguished for every level of social evolution complexity. Different social and political forms have co-existed, competed with each other for a long time, and for some specific ecological and social niches non-general (in the retrospect) lines, models and variants could turn out more competitive and adequate than those that became dominant later. Hence as a rule, the argument about any inevitable outcome of evolution is true only in the most general respect (and only if certain conditions are observed): as an outcome of long-lasting competition between different forms, their disappearance, transformations, social selection, adaptation to various ecological conditions and so forth, while such an outcome could be not inevitable for each and every society in particular.

Zeitschrift für Ethnologie. 2014. Vol. 139, № 2. P. 215-232.

The state is usually considered to be a centralized and specialized coercive institution for governing a society. Contrariwise, our approach stems from the presumption that the state should be studied as a type of society for which this institution is adequate. This leads to the necessity of paying special attention to the coming to the fore of the non-kin relations in state society. Political centralization cannot be regarded as a feature specific to the state, as it is applicable to many non-state forms of societies. In the meantime, the feature typical only for the state is specialization resulting in administrators’ professionalization, that is, in the formation of bureaucracy which is related directly to the non-kin social ties coming into prominence. As for the right to coerce, it is a dependent variable: the legitimate violence in states is exercised through and by bureaucrats who operate within bureaucratic institutions.

Social Evolution and History. 2015. Vol. 14, № 2. P. 46-76.

The article provides an anthropological analysis of the socio-political system of the Benin Kingdom from coming to power of the Oba dynasty presumably in the 13th century till the British conquest in 1897. The course of this system formation and its basic characteristic features are outlined. It is argued that the Benin Kingdom of the 13th – 19th centuries was a supercomplex society which yet was not a state, as it was lack of the latter’s fundamental parameters. Particularly, the Benin society was not based on suprakin (territorial) social ties and there was no professional (bureaucratic) administration in it. The kin-based extended family community always remained this society’s focus, and the supracommunal institu-tions were built up by its matrix, what is impossible in a state. So, notwithstanding its over-all socio-cultural supercomplexity, Benin was not a state but rather a specific alternative to it, labeled “megacommunity”. Its structure can be depicted as four concentric circles form-ing an upset cone: the extended family, the community, the chiefdom, and finally the king-dom. A number of other African and non-African examples of this underconceptualized and understudied by now type of socio-political organization are offered.

Andrey Korotayev , Dmitri Bondarenko

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Engaging and Supporting Kinship Caregivers

Part four of family ties: analysis from a state-by-state survey of kinship care policies.

Survey Overview

The Annie E. Casey Foundation enlisted Child Trends to survey state child welfare administrators as a follow up to a comprehensive survey conducted in 2007. Agencies in the 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico received the 2022 survey and 46 locations completed it. This publication shares the 2022 survey results, which can help to advance the field’s understanding of what states are doing to find, inform and partner with kin when a child enters foster care. It is the fourth installment of a five-part series called Family Ties, released in 2024.

Survey Findings

Generally speaking, the survey results reveal increasing efforts by states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico to promote kinship care and support for kinship caregivers. For instance:

Family members — when called upon to become caregivers — need and deserve timely information and productive relationships with caseworkers and child welfare agencies. About half of states reported using notification materials that included information about how to become a licensed caregiver or explained the implications of not responding. An equivalent share of states confirmed that they collected data on outreach efforts with relatives. Fewer than 10 states provided notices that outlined the process for visiting or writing to the child involved or included the date of the next court hearing or family team meeting.

Child welfare agencies use family team meetings to bring families and professionals together to make decisions in a child welfare case. Relatives and close family friends often have a deeper understanding of a family's strengths and challenges. An encouraging number of states reported requiring some type of family team meeting, according to the survey findings. In addition, results indicate that, while most states have a kinship navigator program, many of these programs are not available statewide or inclusive of all kinship caregivers.

Data Tables

The report's data tables share a more detailed look at each participating state's responses to the 2022 survey. These tables provide information on a state's required search methods, the points at which family team meetings are required, which states administer kinship navigator programs and more.

Findings & Stats

Where states stand on notifying kin.

Federal law requires child welfare agencies to notify adult relatives within 30 days of a child entering foster care. Twelve states required relatives be notified more quickly than the 30-day requirement, including six states that required relatives to be notified immediately or as soon as possible.

Efforts to Find Kin Have Expanded

States have expanded their efforts to find relatives. For example: 44 of the 45 states that reported on this issue said that they require search activities after a child is removed from their parents' care. All states who responded to the survey (46) confirmed conducting search activities across state lines. Caseworkers reported using digital search engines in 36 states and social media in 27 states to help find potential kin caregivers.

Nearly All States Require Family Team Meetings

Most states (42 of the 46 responding states), reported requiring family team meetings at some point during child welfare involvement. These meetings — which include caseworkers, relatives and close family friends — help create plans to support families and keep children safe. Sixteen states reported using the Team Decision Making™ (TDM) model, which the Casey Foundation developed.

Statements & Quotations

Child welfare agencies increasingly rely on relatives and kin when a child cannot stay with a parent: Nationally, placements with kin for children in child welfare custody have risen 10% over the past 15 years.

As states strive to increase placements with kinship caregivers, engaging with kin in meaningful ways is an important step in improving the chances of making and maintaining connections for children in care.

Kinship Navigator Programs

The 2022 survey results indicate that many states have kinship navigator programs, which are associated with higher rates of stability, permanent care arrangements and increased safety for children. There is still room for improvement, however. While most states (40) confirmed having a kinship navigator program, only 28 states reported programming that served their entire state.

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Kentucky kids should stay with family when a crisis hits, but kinship care needs help

There are things we do well in kentucky around kinship care and there are things that need improvement. for the past five years, we’ve needed improvement regarding the initial placement process..

At the second gubernatorial debate in October 2023 , Governor Andy Beshear acknowledged the plight of kinship. Later he said, “We must do everything we can to ensure their needs are met." 

Kinship care is when a child is living with relatives or close family friends other than their parents. These children may be victims of abuse and neglect and/or formally in the child welfare system; while many for a myriad of reasons are informally left with relatives or friends.

Kinship care placement process needs improvements

There are things we do well in Kentucky around kinship care and there are things that need improvement. For the past five years, we’ve needed improvement regarding the initial placement process. This is when a caregiver is given paperwork from the Department for Community Based Services which captures specific custody details around placement with them.  

When placement is offered, it’s an emotional time for a caregiver.  They are in shock as they hear details about the circumstances of the child’s removal from their home such as abuse, neglect and sometimes even dealing with the child’s required hospitalization. 

At the initial placement conversation, there’s a multitude of things to consider such as researching many services; learning about the family court system and DCBS requirements; determining the emotional and physical needs of the child. A caregiver might not be thinking clearly and there are many unknowns. The initial wrong decision can affect longer-term services for the child.

I am a foster kid with a college degree. That shouldn't be rare, but it is. Here's why.

Kinship care needs funding

This year, we found an answer to improving the initial placement process. It is Senate Bill 151 .  Though it should have been simple and was unanimously approved and signed into law. It has a history to sort out in regards to implementation. At the center of the issues, there’s a Feb 8 th estimate created by the Cabinet for Health and Family Services that reflects the need for $20 million in additional general funds to implement. There’s also a referenced Kentucky Supreme Court ruling that basically states that if there isn’t funding, there doesn’t have to be implementation. 

The bill was amended with stricter parameters and was presented on Feb 29 to the House Families and Children’s committee. There were no objections or concerns raised at the meeting and the bill unanimously moved forward until signed by the Governor on April 5.  

The amended bill reduces costs (from the Feb 8 CHFS estimate) by limiting placement time option to 120 days and through other potential administrative regulation changes. It’s even better cost wise, if we get federal funding. 

At the July 30, IJC Children and Families meeting, the CHFS secretary shared that they would be happy to ask for federal funding. The $20 million estimate that holds SB-151 hostage from implementation did not include federal funds.  Kentucky gets approximately 72 cents of every dollar of applicable federal funds.

As legislators continue to pursue the issues, we wait until the next committee meeting in late-August.  As a kinship advocate who understands the seriousness of needed changes like SB-151 for vulnerable families; it feels like a series of games of “Whack-A-Mole”, where each event leads to another meeting with something new, but without tangible results. I’m most concerned about families becoming ineligible for longer term services because we are waiting for resolution. I also feel we can do more around better communication of the services in the interim.

Agree or disagree? Submit your letter to the editor here.

We need a private working meeting with CHFS, some legislators, key experts/stakeholders, where we’d assess potential funding sources; review the amended bill and revise regulation changes all focused on one goal - creating a definitive plan to do the work expeditiously. We shouldn’t leave the room until we have an agreed upon plan. I’d volunteer my time and gather state and national child welfare experts who would give their time. 

The Governor was right when he said we should be doing everything we can to ensure that their kinship needs are met.  We need his intervention to keep the promise to kinship families. 

We can’t change the past, but we can change today and the future. Let’s get to work on SB-151.

Norma Hatfield is a grandmother raising two grandchildren in Hardin County and long time kinship advocate; she is President of the Kinship Families Coalition of Kentucky

I moved with my kids to a hotel room. It's cheaper than renting an apartment and has many amenities.

• I was on a month-to-month lease at our previous place when the owner gave me 30 days' notice.
• I looked for other places to rent, but the rent was beyond what I could pay.
• I found a hotel room for $2,200 a month, which is cheaper than other places and has amenities.

"I am not sure what I am asking for exactly, but I need some sense of ease." I prayed the words as I walked into my bedroom and confronted the piles of clothes on the floor.

It wasn't just the clothes that had me feeling overwhelmed — it was everything. The bills, the upkeep of the house I had been living in for six years, the laundry, and the load of doing it all as a single mom of three. My plate was full, and I was so damn close to giving up —whatever that meant.

I loved my house. It had a charm of its own and was within walking distance to both my ex's house and the kids' schools, and my landlord never increased the rent.

I was, however, on a month-to-month lease , and with that came a sense of unease. In other ways, too, the house contributed to my sense of unease. The yard required an infinite amount of work, the oil tank and furnace were constantly malfunctioning, and don't even get me started on the mice issue.

I was drowning and needed to find a way out, though I didn't know what that was, so I prayed.

The house was put up for sale, and we had to move

Imagine my surprise when I read the email from my landlord that said, "We are putting the house up for sale and need you out by March 1." That was only 30 days away. Where would we go? How would I afford it? I didn't have savings to rely on ; hell, I didn't even have a credit card.

Related stories

I had prayed for a solution, for a sense of ease. This couldn't be my answer. This was more stress.

So, I hit Zillow. Two bedrooms, 1,000 square feet, $2,700 a month. Three bedrooms, 1,200 square feet, $3,000 a month. The prices were outrageous and well beyond my budget. When I finally found a place that left me feeling positive, my application was denied because my credit was subpar.

I was defeated. My plate was not just full. It was breaking and leaving a mess all around me. My mom generously offered that we could stay with her until I found something. I was grateful, but at 46 years old I was desperate for a solution that would honor my need for independence, privacy, and affordability. It was time to get creative.

I found a hotel room that rents for long-term stays

I frantically searched Airbnb and Vrbo, but the few long-term options were already booked. As a last-ditch effort, I reached out to local hotels and inquired about rates for long-term stays. That's when I received surprise email No. 2. Only this one was from Avon Old Farms Hotel , and, with it, I felt as if I had won the lottery.

"We have a two-bedroom apartment on-site that we rent out for longer stays. It's $2200 a month and includes all utilities and hotel amenities," the email said.

Sure, this was only a temporary solution — the apartment was on the small side, and the location was not perfect. But it was a place my kids and I could call our own, even if only for a few months.

After taking a look at the apartment, I signed on the dotted line. Quickly after moving in, I was told the cleaning team would be coming every Tuesday to do a deep clean, change the bedding, and swap out our used towels with clean ones. The gift of having towels laundered and stocked on top of the weekly cleaning was going to be the greatest gift in the world for me.

I still had to tell my kids, though, whom I assumed would be less than thrilled with a small temporary arrangement further from their father. But they found the adventure in our setup right away as they explored the beautiful hotel grounds. Their eyes lit up when I showed them the pool, the game room, the sauna, and the gym. They quickly discovered that the hotel restaurant hosted trivia every Thursday night, and it has since become our favorite weekly activity. We swim on hot days, cook s'mores at the firepits on the weekends, and enjoy continental breakfast in the mornings.

This is not an apartment I would've ever looked for, and I would not have known to look at a hotel for my housing needs. On paper, it is not a great fit for me and my kids. But the amenities are the answer to my prayers. They have offered me the gift of ease, and that, after all, is exactly what I prayed for.

Watch: Was Italy's $1 home scheme worth it?

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Details emerge after doctor raped and murdered in India as thousands protest

August 15, 2024 / 6:32 AM EDT / CBS/AFP

Thousands took to the streets of Kolkata early Thursday to condemn the rape and murder of a local doctor , demanding justice for the victim and an end to the chronic issue of violence against women in Indian society.

The discovery of the 31-year-old's brutalized body last week at a state-run hospital has sparked nationwide protests, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi demanding swift punishment for those who commit "monstrous" deeds against women.

Large crowds marched through the streets of Kolkata in West Bengal to condemn the killing, with a candlelight rally at midnight coinciding with the start of India's independence day celebrations on Thursday.

The protesters in Kolkata, who marched under the slogan "reclaim the night", called for a wider tackling of violence against women and held up handwritten signs demanding action.

"We want justice," read one sign at the rally. "Hang the rapist, save the women," read another.

"The atrocities against women do not stop," midnight marcher Monalisa Guha told Kolkata's The Telegraph newspaper.

"We face harassment almost on a daily basis," another marcher, Sangeeta Halder, told the daily. "But not stepping out because of fear is not the solution."

"Monstrous behavior against women"

Modi, speaking in New Delhi on Thursday morning at independence day celebrations, did not specifically reference the Kolkata murder, but expressed his "pain" at violence against women.

"There is anger for atrocities committed against our mothers and sisters, there is anger in the nation about that," he said.

"Crimes against women should be quickly investigated; monstrous behavior against women should be severely and quickly punished," he added. "That is essential for creating deterrence and confidence in the society."

Doctors are also demanding swift justice and better workplace security in the wake of the killing, with those in government hospitals across several states on Monday halting elective services "indefinitely" in protest.

Protests have since occurred in several other hospitals across the country, including in the capital.

"Doctors nationwide are questioning what is so difficult about enacting a law for our security," Dhruv Chauhan, from the Indian Medical Association's Junior Doctors' Network, told the Press Trust of India news agency. "The strike will continue until all demands are formally met."

The Telegraph on Thursday praised the "spirited public protests" across India.

"Hearteningly, doctors and medical organizations are not the only ones involved," it said in an editorial. "The ranks of the protesters have been swelled by people from all walks of life."

Police accused of mishandling case

Indian media have reported the murdered doctor was found in the teaching hospital's seminar hall, suggesting she had gone there for a brief rest during a long shift.

An autopsy has confirmed sexual assault, and in a petition to the court, the victim's parents have said that they suspected their daughter was gang-raped, according to Indian broadcaster NDTV.  

Though police have detained a man who worked at the hospital helping people navigate busy queues, officers have been accused of mishandling the case.

Kolkata's High Court on Tuesday transferred the case to the elite Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to "inspire public confidence."

In the early hours of Thursday, a mob of some 40 people angry at authorities' handling of the case stormed the grounds of the R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital, the site of the murder.

The men smashed property and hurled stones at police, who fired tear gas in response, authorities said.

West Bengal lawmaker Abhishek Banerjee, from the Trinamool Congress party, condemned the "hooliganism and vandalism," but said "the demands of the protesting doctors are fair and justified."

History of sexual violence in India

Sexual violence against women is a widespread problem in India. An average of nearly 90 rapes a day were reported in India in 2022, according to  data  from the National Crime Records Bureau.

That year, police  arrested 11 people  after the alleged brutal gang rape and torture of a young woman that included her being paraded through the streets of Dehli. Also in 2022, a police officer in India was arrested after being  accused of raping  a 13-year-old girl who went to his station to report she had been gang-raped.

In March 2024, multiple Indian men were arrested after the  gang rape of a Spanish tourist  on a motorbike trip with her husband.

For many, the gruesome nature of the attack has invoked comparisons with the horrific 2012 gang rape and murder  of a young woman on a Delhi bus.

The woman became a symbol of the socially conservative country's failure to tackle sexual violence against women.

Her death sparked huge, and at times violent, demonstrations in Delhi and elsewhere.

Under pressure, the government introduced harsher penalties for rapists, and the death penalty for repeat offenders.

Several new sexual offences were also introduced, including stalking and jail sentences for officials who failed to register rape complaints.

• Sexual Violence

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Breaking news, killer nyc granny carried out murder-suicide to give son full custody of child: heartbreaking suit.

The woman who killed the mother of her granddaughter before committing suicide did so as part of a sick, elaborate plot to get her Upper East Side son full custody of the 4-year-old, new court papers allege.

The disturbing Manhattan filing also reveals heartbreaking details about what life has been like for victim Marisa Galloway’s parents after the slay-suicide horror that robbed them of their daughter.

Terminally ill ex-Chicago probation officer Kathleen Leigh, 65, fatally shot Galloway — a 45-year-old special education teacher who shared a child with Leigh’s son, Zachariah Reed — last month on a leafy Manhattan street before killing herself .

Now Galloway’s parents, Nancy and John Galloway, have filed an emergency court petition claiming Reed has run off to his Chicago “multimillion-dollar home” with their beloved grandchild Lili under the pretext of “mourning” Leigh’s death and barred the Galloways from any contact — including even a video call — with the child.

“Clearly, [Reed’s] mother had a deliberate plan to kill Marisa in order to provide custody for her son,” the court papers charge. “Unfortunately, [Reed] has demonstrated an absolute intention to further those same goals of his mother as he has refused to provide us with any access to Lili at all in almost 3 weeks.”

The grandparents — who live in Cape May, NJ — are asking a Manhattan Supreme Court judge to pass on Marisa’s parenting time, hashed out in a 2022 custody agreement with Reed, to them, according to legal papers filed Friday.

They are also asking that Reed be forced to live in the Big Apple until Lili is 18 so that she can keep a close relationship with her grandparents and with her half-sister, Mariel, the 1-year-old daughter Marisa had with a sperm donor, the filing shows.

The Galloways currently have custody of Mariel, police sources have told The Post.

Nancy, in a heartbreaking affidavit, laid out the adoring and “hands on” relationship she and her husband had with Lili when they saw her two to three times a month, often for multiple nights at a time, when Marisa would often bring the kids to their Garden State home or when they visited Marisa and the girls in the city.

“When we did not see [Lili], we would Facetime almost every day,” Nancy wrote in an affidavit.

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Nancy and John were actively involved in raising the girl, even changing her diapers and feeding her as a baby, and as she’s grown, the grandparents each have special activities they love to do with her, the filing says.

John and Lili love gardening together, and they water the flowers and pick cherry tomatoes from his garden — which he is waiting to tend to until the girl is with him, Nancy’s affidavit says.

And Nancy loves to teach French to Lili and bake cakes with the child, whose “favorite part was cracking the eggs,” Nancy says in the papers.

When Nancy and Lili finished a 150-piece puzzle of the United States in just over an hour, the little girl was “so proud,” the filing says.

“While Marisa was always the best mother, we would love to be involved with all aspects of taking care of an infant, toddler, and ultimately the little girl that Lili currently is,” Nancy wrote.

Nancy said she is “extremely uncomfortable” being forced to file the petition but worried Lili would become estranged from her mom’s side of the family if they didn’t intervene.

The grandmother laid out the history of Marisa and Reed’s “tumultuous relationship” since the pair split and their “contentious” custody battle .

She claimed the pair dated before Marisa became pregnant but said their relationship ended — “driven by the interference of [Reed’s] mother.”

Marisa and Reed had lived together until she “was forced to move out … by [Reed] on July 25, 2021 because Marisa feared for her safety,” the affidavit explains.

The pair eventually hashed out a custody agreement over Lili on Nov. 4, 2022, in which the mom had her for nine out of every 14 nights, and the other nights were Reed’s time with the girl, the court papers say.

The estranged couple also agreed they would both live within the five boroughs of New York City until Lili was out of high school unless they otherwise both agreed or were ordered by a court, the filing claims.

Their custody agreement had a provision that specified that the custody terms were “binding” on Marisa and Reed’s estates and executors if something were to happen to them, the suit says.

Nancy explained in the filing that Marisa “was always very concerned with Lili having a sibling,” so she decided “to take on the herculean task of having a second child with an anonymous sperm donor in order to provide Lili with either a brother or a sister.”

Lili has been so “proud” to be Mariel’s older sister, and “from the second that Mariel was born, her and Lili had a very special relationship,” Nancy says in the document.

Lili sings Mariel songs, plays with her baby sister with their “stuffies” and draws her pictures, including of their family, Nancy says in the affidavit.

When Mariel would wake up from a nap, Lili would feed her Cheerios or bananas and would do funny dances and sing for her, the filing says.

“On July 26, 2024, all of our lives were changed forever,” a heartbroken Nancy wrote.

That day, Marisa — a former volunteer track coach at Fordham University and a board member of the Central Park Track Club — had packed her bags and put Mariel into her Honda Civic to go spend five nights with her parents in New Jersey. She was going to pick up Lili from her father before heading out of town, the court papers say.

But Leigh approached Marisa as she was loading something into the trunk and shot her once in the back of the head and again in the back before turning the gun on herself.

Leigh had been terminally ill with cancer and had been living with Reed at his East 79th Street apartment, where Lili would also stay during Reed’s visitation time.

Before her heinous crime, Leigh scrawled a seven-page letter “For Police” describing how she felt Marisa was trying to alienate Lili from Reed and saying she suspected Marisa of abusing Lili — despite child services clearing Marisa in two probes launched by Reed and the accounts of friends and family that Marisa was nothing but a doting mother.

“She took away the child’s mother in order to make her son happy … it’s shocking,” a law enforcement source had told The Post of Leigh right after the murder-suicide. “I’ve seen a lot of s–t, but this is biblical s–t.”

Nancy says in court papers that she and her husband have asked Reed “numerous” times since the horror to speak with Lili, as they are concerned with how she is doing after losing her mother and over concerns that the young sisters need to comfort each other — but Reed hasn’t even let them see her on video calls.

“We have no idea how [Lili] is doing, or what [Reed] has even told Lili about her mother,” the court papers say. “This is beyond unacceptable and must be rectified immediately.”

The grandparents say they are so committed that they will remain at Marisa’s apartment on East 86th Street during weekday visitations with Lily. They are also demanding Lili have daily video calls with Mariel.

The Galloways’ lawyer and the lawyer who represented Reed in his initial custody case with Marisa both did not immediately return Post requests for comment. A working number for Reed could not immediately be found.

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Ella Emhoff is the stepdaughter that stepmoms like me have been waiting for

When I became a stepmom in 2017 to a precocious 6-year-old, I had no idea where to look for role models. I searched high and low, but I was disheartened by what I found. Stepmothers still struggle to outrun the negative stigma of being “the other,” a perception reinforced by fairy tales and, more recently, Republican politicians. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, of Georgia, for one, has publicly delegitimized stepmoms , as has Donald Trump’s 2024 running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio.

Vance has called Vice President Kamala Harris “anti-child” and a “childless cat lady.” But that’s news to her stepdaughter, Ella Emhoff, the daughter of Harris’ husband, Doug. (Doug was married to film producer Kerstin Emhoff before the couple divorced in 2008.) Together with her brother, Cole, the 25-year-old recently defended Harris on social media, posting, “I love my three parents.”

Imagine the stepchildren and stepparents today who can point to a photo of Kamala and Ella embracing each other (a photo I sent to my stepdaughter) and use it as a touchstone, a guiding force and a powerful example of a nonnuclear family. Imagine watching this blended family on stage at the DNC this week, as Americans fight to elect a presidential candidate who is not only a woman of color, but also a stepmom.

I wish I could have had that example a few years ago. Instead, I struggled for guidance. It could feel like the blind leading the blind as I began reading Reddit forums about stepparenting and following niche stepmom influencers. I purchased memoirs written by stepmoms, and the book “ The Birth of a Foster, Adoptive or Stepmother: Beyond Biological Mothering Attachments .” I read a few essays online — and wrote a few more . I felt an urgent need to publicly defend stepmothering and fill the cultural gaps I was still experiencing in real time. 

Because for years Disney movies (and non-Disney movies) have told us that biological mothers and stepmothers are inherently enemies. We are pitted against one another, with stepmoms assumed to be the evil interlopers. And even if we weren’t “evil” per se, we definitely weren’t “real” parents.

As my stepdaughter grew into a teenager, this was a topic we spoke about frequently, wondering aloud why stepmoms were treated so poorly. We made sure to nurture our relationship by celebrating Stepmom’s Day every year. 

We all know kids need to see themselves represented in the world around them, especially as they come of age. Ella Emhoff is the perfect example of what it means to challenge nuclear family stereotypes. The so-called First Daughter of Bushwick has armpit hair, crochets, supports trans rights and gender-affirming care and clearly has no patience for anyone trying to denigrate her familial relationships. This isn’t “Cinderella.” It’s much, much better.

It is also obvious that both Ella and her brother respect and admire their stepmom. They don't resent his second wife; they are happy that their dad is happy. And this respect is mirrored by Doug’s first wife, Kerstin. Indeed, when Vance’s attacks on Harris started to get picked up by the press, Kerstin, too, came to the aid of her parenting partner. “For over 10 years, since Cole and Ella were teenagers, Kamala has been a co-parent with Doug and I,” she said in a statement . “She is loving, nurturing, fiercely protective, and always present. I love our blended family and am grateful to have her in it.”

And while Republicans may not want to admit it, blended families like these are not only normal — they are common . "It’s a cool dynamic we all have," Ella told The New York Times in 2021. "And I think it is a good model to show that you can have this and this isn’t weird. Like it’s not weird to be friends or have a good relationship with your ex. It’s actually very healthy."

In his 2020 Atlantic article “ The Nuclear Family Was a Mistake,” David Brooks writes that today, nuclear families with two-biological-parent households are in the minority. But, he adds, that’s not cause for panic. “The good news is that human beings adapt, even if politics are slow to do so. When one family form stops working, people cast about for something new—sometimes finding it in something very old,” he noted. And one of those “old” ideas is the concept of kinship. "We think of kin as those biologically related to us," Brooks writes. "But throughout most of human history, kinship was something you could create.” 

While Republicans may not want to admit it, blended families like these are not only normal — they are common.

My closest circle of friends are all in unique and thriving family structures: My best friends are a family of three: an adoptive dad and stepdad and their 13-year-old daughter. They co-parent with the other adoptive dad from the previous marriage. Another friend lives in a polyamorous polycule with their partner of 10 years, their partner’s partner and their partner’s partner’s two kids. They argue this structure only makes their family stronger . One of my close friends in her 40s lives unmarried with her boyfriend and his 6-year-old son, who goes back and forth between homes. 

Are these families not “real”? If you live with the child, are you a “real” parent? What about if you drive your stepchild to school for years? What if they sleep next to you when they have nightmares? How can you pass an impossible test? 

Stepmom alienation and discrimination is a specific kind of disenfranchised grief . Indeed, it takes a strong person to be a stepparent — this journey is not for the faint of the heart. I’ve even been called a “childless stepmom” over the years; truly the most absurd oxymoron you could come up with. 

Believe me: When you hold your stepdaughter’s hair while she throws up, drive her to and from school, fly with her to Europe for the first time, take her to urgent care, argue with her about cleaning her room, help pay for her private school, leave Post-its all over the apartment that say, “Brush your teeth,” help her pick out a dress for her first dance, teach her how to wash her face — and wear deodorant and hula hoop and pump gas — you aren’t “childless,” you’re child- plus . 

This is something the first daughter of Bushwick, and potentially the first female president of the United States, both understand. Kamala Harris isn’t some lesser, “other” mom. She’s just Momala . 

Chloé Caldwell is the author of the national bestseller " Women ." Her memoir, "Trying," will be published by Graywolf in 2025. She lives in Hudson, New York.