Solving the Problem of Cooperation

Marriage and Family

Marriage and Family

Marriage

…one variable in the formation of kinship groups (affinal relatives). The other is descent (consanguineal relatives).

Marriage

“…a relationship between one or more men (male or female) and one or more women (male or female) recognized by the society as having a continuing claim to the right of sexual access to one another” (Haviland 2003:514).

“The notion of marriage as a sacrament and not just a contract can be traced St. Paul who compared the relationship of a husband and wife to that of Christ and his church.” (http://marriage.about.com/cs/generalhistory/a/marriagehistory.htm)

In a 2005 book, Marriage, a History: From Obedience to Intimacy, or How Love Conquered Marriage, Coontz writes:

“Almost every marital and sexual arrangement we have seen in recent years, however startling it may appear, has been tried somewhere before.” (p. 2)

Marriage and Family

Conjugal bond – bond between married individuals

Affines - relatives by marriage

Consanguineal kin - relatives by birth

Incest taboo - very strong prohibition against mating within particular group.

Monogamy

Polygamy

Polygyny

Polyandry

One spouse

Multiple husbands

Multiple spouses

Multiple wives

Rules of Marriage

Exogamy

Endogamy Marry inside group

Marry outside group

Incest tabooStrong prohibition against marriage inside group

Group marriageChildren are offspring of the group

Serial marriage Multiple spouses, one at a time

Among the Buddhist people of the mountainous Ladakh District of Jammu and Kashmir, who have cultural ties to Tibet, fraternal polyandry is practiced, and a household may include a set of brothers with their common wife or wives. This family type, in which brothers also share land, is almost certainly linked to the extreme scarcity of cultivable land in the Himalayan region, because it discourages fragmentation of holdings.

Marriage and Family

Levirate - “brother marriage”

Sororate - “sister marriage”

…Either of the above may be “anticipatory”

Fictive marriage

Marriage and FamilyParallel-cousin (= Cousin) Marriage

ego's father's brother's children or mother's sister's children.

Cross-cousin (X-Cousin) Marriage

ego's father's sister's children or mother's brother's children.

Marriage and FamilyCross-cousin (X Cousin) Marriage

ego's father's sister's children or mother's brother's children.

Marriage and Family

X Cousin Marriage in Matrilineal Societies

Sometimes prescriptive (should)

Sometimes proscriptive (must)

adoption fictive

Marriage and Family

Family “…in anthropological terms, it is a group composed of a woman, her dependent children, and at least one adult man joined through marriage or blood relationship” (Haviland 2003: 537).

Note on co-operation:

Human beings, indeed all social animals, are innately co-operative.

So far……

The “family” continues to be the most universal form of human social organization.

Kathleen Gough specialized in cross cultural studies of the family and attempted this universal definition of family (a definition that applies to all societies): “A married couple or other group of adult kinsfolk who cooperate economically and in the upbringing of children, and all or most of whom share a common dwelling.”

Stephanie Coontz, author of The Way We Really Are: Coming to Terms with America's Changing Families and The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap, wrote:

“Many people hold an image of how American families ‘used to be’ at some particular point in time, and they propose that we return to that ideal. In fact, however, there have been a wide variety of family forms and

values in American history, and there is no period in which some ideal family predominated.”The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap (1992)

Families are composed of people related to one another by

consanguinity and descent.

Nuclear families Characterized by independence training…kids are taught to take care of themselves

Extended families Characterized by dependence training…kids are taught to depend on other family members

Marriage and Family

Marriage and Family

Traditional functions of families

Emotional nurturance

Economic Co-operationSex control

Enculturation

Physical nurturance

Women in Civilian Labor Force:

In 1900…20.6% of total …43.5% single women and 5.6% of married women.

In 2002…69.6% of total…67.4% single women and 61.0% of married women.U.S. Census Bureau - Marital Status of Women in the Civilian Labor Force: 1900-2002.

• Related to technology

Trends in Marriage and Family

…i.e. modern genetics

“Brave New World” of ‘Designer Children’Genetic implications:

Choosing or avoiding physical ability or disability

Choosing or avoiding behavioral ability or disabilityRavitsky, Ethics and Education: The Ethics of Shaping Human Identity

http://www.mssm.edu/msjournal/69/v69_5_page312_316.pdf