Kinship, history, and descent

Documenta Praehistorica, 2024

IZVLEÈEK-Antropologi e dolgo analizirajo in razpravljajo o sorodstvu in raznolikih spletih odnosov, ki jih ustvarijo ljudje v svojih drubenih praksah. Razprave segajo od nekdanje prevladujoèe teorije rodu do sedanjega bolj fluidnega poudarjanja sorodnosti. Arheologi so od èasov procesualizma sorodstvu posveèali veè pozornosti kot v zgodnjih letih razvoja discipline, vendar do nedavnega na precej omejen in splošen naèin. Z uspešnimi raziskavami stare DNK in nekaj spodbude iz posthumanistiène teorije pa se je za nimanje v zadnjem èasu poveèalo. Razpravljam o nekaterih nedoslednostih pojasnjevanja sorodstva pri antropologih in arheologih; predvsem poudarjanja raznovrstnosti, sorodnosti, monosti in posledicah bilateralnega potomstva ter negotovega razmerja med biologijo in sorodstvom pri prvih. Da bi zaèel raziskovati, kako bi vse to lahko delovalo v arheologiji, sem skiciral tri scenarije v zaporednih fazah neolitika v Britaniji in na Irskem, v èetrtem in tretjem tisoèletju pr. n. št.; pri tem posku šam obliko vati specifiène in ne posplošene modele ter nakazujem obrise mone trajektorije skozi èas. Vprašanja sorodstva: tri skice iz britanskega in irskega neolitika KEY WORDS-kinship; relatedness; diversity; trajectory; Neolithic; Britain and Ireland ABSTRACT-Kinship, diverse webs of relationship generated by people in their social practice, has long been analysed and debated by anthropologists, from an earlier dominance of lineage theory to the current, much more fluid emphasis on relatedness. Since the days of processualism, archaeologists have given more attention to kinship than in the early years of the discipline, but in rather limited and general ways until very recently. With the advent of successful aDNA investigations, and with some prompt from posthumanist theory, that interest has been renewed recently. I discuss some inconsistencies between the accounts of kinship by anthropologists and archaeologists, notably the emphasis by the former on diversity, relatedness, the possibilities and implications of bilateral descent, and the uncertain relationship between biology and kinship. To begin to investigate how this might all work out in archaeology, I sketch three scenarios from successive parts of the Neolithic in Britain and Ireland, across the fourth to third millennia cal BC, attempting specific rather than generalised models and indicating the outlines of a possible trajectory through time.

2017

Kinship is a most significant organizing principle of human grouping, the basic matter of social categories in archaeological and ethnographic societies, and an important concept universally. However, its significance has rarely been adequately incorporated within archaeology's theoretical and interpretative practice. This article aims to not only show the potential of bringing kinship into social archaeology, but also argue that archaeology can make important contributions to wider social research. Grounded on prehistoric data, spanning from the 8th to the 4th millennium bc, and drawing on cross-cultural discussions, it explores how understandings and practices of kinship might have been constructed and enacted in the first farming communities through architecture, time, material products, burials, and rituals. In doing so, the article addresses key issues of common interest in archaeology and anthropology, inviting interdisciplinary dialogue.

Why kinship still needs anthropologists in the 21st century, 2024

With the rise of ancient DNA studies in prehistoric archaeology, terms such as matriliny and patriliny are commonly used in scholarly literature. From a sociocultural anthropological perspective, however, the two terms are not as simple and unproblematic as is widely accepted among archaeogeneticists. Matriliny and patriliny are umbrella terms for societies with a wide range of political and kinship practices, with or without a state. Moreover, archaeogenetic literature has assumed specific associations with matrilineal and patrilineal descent that are not supported by sociocultural anthropology. To properly understand the diversity of human sociopolitical forms in both the deep and recent past, archaeology – in its broadest sense, including archaeogenetics – must avoid essentializing prehistoric communities without exploring the empirical nuances that are well documented ethnographically. Finally, the article calls for more engagement in debates on kinship and sociopolitical organization in prehistory from sociocultural anthropological perspectives.

2008

Did Neanderthals marry? Did they possess avoidance rules and did they recognize inter-personal relationships, both vertically (descent) and horizontally (generation), that form the axes for kinship? The questions are more interesting than just speculating about the time-depth of human institutions. They raise the issue of how recognition and possession of rules and relationships might have occurred when opinion is still divided about the antiquity both of spoken language and of the symbolic codes that organized social life and its cultural transmission. Currently it is much easier to argue that Neanderthals did not marry because we can then analyse them through links to wider systems of animal kinship. Here the language of the genes speaks volumes, at least in the mathematical demonstration of mate choice and sacrifice for close kin, but at the expense of socio-cultural phenomena such as symbolism. Anthropologists have generally resisted such approaches, arguing that kinship is culturally constructed and only in the blood because consanguinity is a cultural rather than biological concept. Kinship is about the setting up of categories of relatedness through mutually structured activities, both economic and 'symbolic', but, as James explains in the introduction above, 'crucially including a framework of approved and prohibited mating links into which newborn persons are accommodated' (p. 40). Incest taboos, for example, are less to do with preserving the integrity of the gene pool than starting at home with the principle of exogamy enunciated so clearly by Tylor, long before genetics was formalized, as 'marry out or die out'. Marriage is about social and economic relationships and kinship has to be reckoned accordingly. The importance of marriage lies less in the gaining of a wife than, as Mead (1935: 84) pointed out some seventy years ago, in the gaining of a brother-in-law. The recruitment of affines to alliances, both social and economic, is central to the process. My purpose in this chapter is to raise interdisciplinary issues rather than provide an origins account of marriage and kinship rules. My vehicle is the social brain hypothesis (Dunbar 1998, 2003), which suggests our social lives

Minding Nature

Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 2013

In this book Alan Barnard uses the techniques of social anthropology to examine not only the idea that 'to use symbolism is to be human', but also how the process of searching for the beginnings of that symbolism is possible. His previous book, Social anthropology and human origins (2011), covers our human ancestors living between approximately 7,400,000 years ago and about 200,000 years ago. His current book, Genesis of symbolic thought, starts where it left off -the beginning of symbolic culture. His depth and breadth of anthropological understanding stretch beyond current-day thinking to include ethnography and anthropological theory past and present. His breadth crosses disciplines, beyond his field of social anthropology, to include research and findings from archaeology, genetics, neuroscience, linguistics, art history, comparative anatomy, folklore, and religious studies. He brings to light debates within social anthropology softened with an assessment that recent discoveries in other scientific fields provide information for new ideas and theories. He presents debates using opposing thinkers along with debates between his ideas and generally accepted theorists. In fact, one might feel the book is a reaction to Claude Lévi-Strauss's acquiescence that the origin of symbolic thought is indeterminable. As a matter of fact, he takes on Lévi-Strauss, Sir James Frazer, and Émile Durkheim and in one sentence discounts all three, before arguing his point by enlisting philosophical, linguistic, and anthropological questions, using as background recent archaeological discoveries, the evolution of sociology, and examining ritual and religion with a social anthropological and archaeological lens. He goes on to use theories of the evolution of language and mythology, prehistory, and human evolution. When he takes on Lévi-Strauss, the father of modern anthropology, Barnard refutes his theory that dating of the genesis of symbolic thought is impossible. He provides evidence from his fellow social anthropologists and multiple disciplines, including genetics, linguistics, archaeology, art history, neuroscience, and comparative anatomy. Then he adds folklore and religious studies along with ethnographic and anthropological theories from past and present. This is a lot for any one writer to take on, and whereas at times Barnard can be informative and enlightening, at other times he overwhelms the reader. That is mainly because there is a lack of order and flow. This book raises itself beyond a mere transdisciplinary scientific inquiry by delving into the origin of symbolic thought while also championing the resurrection of social anthropology. From another point of view, his research can be thought of as a current-day self-help book, addressing how we can thrive in a world filled with ambiguity, complexity, and volatility using innate creativity and playfulness to become more fully human. Yes, Barnard concedes that hunters and gathers are fully human. His claim is based on a definition I found dispersed throughout his book, including the use of symbolism, kinship systems, and the expression of complex thinking though myth.

2016

The application of social identity theory to bioarchaeological research has proven relevant for accessing various dimensions of social organization and the lived experience of past peoples. Despite its recent visibility, most of this research focuses on large-scale collective identities including gender, ethnicity, and religion from the perspectives of individuals and larger social groups, while mid-scale collective identities remain largely under-investigated. Kinship is an essential mid-scale identity for which (bio)archaeology can provide deep-time perspectives, insights that are increasingly significant given the ever-changing definitions of relatedness emerging concomitantly with rapid cultural transformations and new reproductive technologies. This paper provides historical background on the practice of kinship studies in bioarchaeology, highlighting the recent resurgence of kin-focused ethnographic research. We present examples of bioarchaeological research designs that embra...

2021

World Cultures E Journal, 2008

In this paper we use the cross-cultural record to identify the behavioral rules of conduct, and the system supporting those rules, that are found in traditional societies, such as tribal societies. We then draw on the historical record to identify the behavioral rules of conduct, and the system supporting those rules that were found in the early state. The proposal tested here is that in traditional societies the behavioral rules of conduct and the systems that support them (e.g., processes for identifying guilt, punishing offenders, enacting legislation, preventing conflict) are aimed at promoting enduring, cooperative relationships among individuals who are identified as kin through common ancestry. The assumption underlying this proposal is that once human females increased their investment in offspring, cultural strategies to protect those offspring became more important. A moral system, which is the term we use to refer to the early system of behavioral codes, protected offspring by turning conspecific threats into the protectors, providers, and educators of children. It did this by creating a strong kinship system, the members of which were bound by common ancestry (actual or metaphorical), thus tying individuals into enduring, cooperative relationships by using culture to encourage them to honor ongoing duties to one another. This kinship-based moral system is significantly different from that found in societies in which the majority of interactions are with non-kin, interactions often center on the exchange of good and services, and traditions have largely been broken down. We refer to this second system as a system of law and argue that this distinction between moral and legal systems has implications for attempts to explain the evolutionary basis of human cooperation. In this paper we use the cross-cultural record to identify the behavioral rules of conduct, and the system supporting those rules, that are found in traditional societies, such as tribal societies. We then draw on the historical record to identify the behavioral rules of conduct, and the system supporting those rules that were found in the early state. The proposal tested here is that in traditional societies the behavioral rules of conduct and the systems that support them (e.g., processes for identifying guilt, punishing offenders, enacting legislation, preventing conflict) are aimed at promoting enduring, cooperative relationships among individuals who are identified as kin through common ancestry. The assumption underlying this proposal is that once human females increased their investment in offspring, cultural strategies to protect those offspring became more important. A moral system, which is the term we use to refer to the early system of behavioral codes, protected offspring by turning conspecific threats into the protectors, providers, and educators of children. It did this by creating a strong kinship system, the members of which were bound by common ancestry (actual or metaphorical), thus tying individuals into enduring, cooperative relationships by using culture to encourage them to honor ongoing duties to one another. This kinship-based moral system is significantly different from that found in societies in which the majority of interactions are with non-kin, interactions often center on the exchange of good and services, and traditions have largely been broken down. We refer to this second system as a system of law and argue that this distinction between moral and legal systems has implications for attempts to explain the evolutionary basis of human cooperation.