Kinship terminology
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What does the term 'kinship' mean?
The term "kinship" refers to the network of social connections between people in a culture who are related, or are considered to be related. Kinship systems define and regulate the reciprocal obligations of those considered kin.
The study of kinship terminology started with Lewis Henry Morgan, who distinguished classificatory and descriptive systems of kinship. In classificatory systems, some collateral kin are grouped with lineal kin. Descriptive terminology, however, maintains a separation between lineal and collateral kin.
Kinship is always bilateral, including relatives on the mother’s and father’s sides. Recognizing one line of descent while excluding the other creates a unilineal kinship system.
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What is kinship terminology used for?
Kinship terminology, a system of names for kin relationships, reflects how societies categorize relatives. It is used to convey important social information. The study of kinship terminology demonstrates how language shapes social categories and practices.
Historically, kinship terminology has been used to distinguish between classificatory and descriptive systems. In societies with unilineal descent, terms differentiate between siblings/parallel cousins and cross-cousins, highlighting lineage and marriage rules. Systems of kinship also play a role in inheritance laws, which rely on kinship to determine intestate succession.
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What are some common kinship terms in English?
Kinship terminology is a system of terms used to define and organize relationships between individuals and groups. These terms reflect cultural understanding of social and genetic relatedness.
Common English kinship terms:
* Lineal Kin: These relatives are in ego’s direct line of descent, such as mother, father, grandmother, grandfather, son, and daughter.
* Collateral Kin: These relatives are not in ego’s direct line, like cousins, aunts, uncles, nieces, and nephews.
* Affinal Kin: These relationships are based on marriage, including terms like mother-in-law, father-in-law, son-in-law, daughter-in-law, and brother- or sister-in-law.2 Britannica SourcesCreated from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles. -
How do kinship terms vary between different cultures?
Kinship terminologies differ significantly across cultures, reflecting how societies categorize relationships. Lewis Henry Morgan distinguished between classificatory and descriptive systems; in classificatory systems, some collateral kin are grouped with lineal kin, while descriptive terminology separates them.
The standard European-American system uses descriptive terminology but also groups men of the parental generation under the term "uncle". American cultural anthropologists explored how behavior is ordered by social categories. Kin terms embody social and genetic relatedness, and anthropologists use precise language to avoid bias when translating kinship terminology.
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What is the difference between lineal and collateral kinship?
Lineal kinship refers to direct ancestors and descendants, like grandparents and grandchildren, representing a direct line of descent. Collateral kinship includes relatives not in the direct line, such as cousins, uncles, and nephews, who belong to the same ancestral stock but are "off to the side" of the direct line. While genetics may equally relate great-grandparents/grandchildren and first cousins, kinship distinguishes social relationships. Some communities use the same term for both consanguineous (blood-related) and non-consanguineous kin.
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How does kinship terminology help anthropologists understand family structures?
Kinship terminology is a system of names applied to categories of kin, and its study helps anthropologists understand social organization based on family ties. It provides insights into how societies classify relatives and define social categories, revealing cultural meanings and social information.
By examining kinship terms, anthropologists can decipher the relationships between language, social structure, and cultural practices. Kinship terminology reflects the competing realms of social and genetic relatedness. It demonstrates how societies distinguish between lineal and collateral kin, and how they define rules for marriage and descent.
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Kinship terminology, in anthropology, the system of names applied to categories of kin standing in relationship to one another. The possibilities for such nomenclature would seem limitless, but anthropologists have identified a small number of basic systems that are found in all world societies. Six of these systems use the criterion of classification of kin in the same generation as “ego,” a given individual designated as the starting point in genealogical reckoning. Four terminological systems that focus on ego’s parental generation have also been identified.
Historically, the systematic study of kinship terminology began with the American ethnologist Lewis Henry Morgan, whose pioneering work, Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, was published in 1871. An important element in Morgan’s formulation was the distinction between classificatory and descriptive systems of kinship. In a classificatory system some collateral kin—relatives not in ego’s direct line of descent or ancestry—are placed in the same terminological grouping as lineal kin—relatives in ego’s direct line of descent. Classificatory systems such as that of the Iroquois designate the father and his brother, and conversely the mother and her sister, by the same term. In many societies with unilineal descent—that is, systems that emphasize either the mother’s or the father’s line, but not both—ego uses one set of terms to refer to brothers, sisters, and parallel cousins (those whose genealogical ties are traced through a related parent of the same sex, as in a father’s brother or a mother’s sister), while another set of terms is employed for cross-cousins (the offspring of a father’s sister or a mother’s brother). This arrangement emphasizes the fact that cross-cousins do not belong to the lineage with ego, ego’s siblings, and ego’s parallel cousins, thus designating marriage between cross-cousins as exogamous.
Descriptive terminology, in contrast to classificatory terminology, maintains a separation between lineal and collateral kin; for example, mother and mother’s sister, although of the same generation and sex, are distinguished. Descriptive systems are typically found wherever the nuclear family operates as a relatively autonomous unit economically and socially; as a result, they are relatively rare in ethnographic literature.
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The standard European-American system of kinship uses descriptive terminology, but it also demonstrates that the distinction between descriptive and classificatory kinship systems is not absolute. In contemporary U.S. social organization, for example, kinship terminology distinguishes lineal members of ego’s generation (siblings) from collateral members of ego’s generation (cousins) but, with the exception of father, groups the men of the previous generation together, so that mother’s brother, mother’s sister’s husband, father’s brother, and father’s sister’s husband are all referred to by the term uncle.
Kinship systems convey important social information, but the problem of the cultural meanings and correct translations of kinship terminology has proved to be intractable. To a great extent, this is because kinship terms represent the competing realms of social and genetic relatedness; thus, it cannot be assumed that two or more persons for whom ego uses a single term are socially indistinguishable. For example, although it is quite common for all men of ego’s parental generation to be called by a single term (e.g., to use the same kin term for father and uncles), nobody in such a community would confuse ego’s biological father with the other men in that generational cohort. One method used by anthropologists to avoid bias is the development of a precise descriptive language. For example, when a father and his brother are referred to by the same term within a kinship system, the anthropologist may express the position of father’s brother as “a male agnatic relative of the ascending generation.”