AN ANTHROPOLOGICAL

READER
E d i t e d by
R o b ert Parkin and
Linda Stone

fo
JS&a-W'
li& 'f a T 'L

Blackwell Anthologies in Social and Cultural Anthropology

Series Editor: Parker Shipton, Boston University
Series Advisory Editorial Board:
Fredrik Barth, University of Oslo and Boston University
Stephen Gudeman, University of Minnesota
Jane Guyer, Northwestern University
Caroline Humphrey, University of Cambridge
Tim Ingold, University of Aberdeen
Emily M artin, Princeton University
John Middleton, Yale Emeritus
Sally Falk Moore, Harvard Emerita
Marshall Sahlins, University of Chicago Emeritus
Joan Vincent, Columbia University and Barnard College Emerita
Drawing from some of the most significant scholarly work of the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries, the Blackwell Anthologies in Social and Cultural Anthropology
series offers a comprehensive and unique perspective on the ever-changing field of
anthropology. It represents both a collection of classic readers and an exciting
challenge to the norms that have shaped this discipline over the past century.
Each edited volume is devoted to a traditional subdiscipline of the field such as the
anthropology of religion, linguistic anthropology, or medical anthropology; and
provides a foundation in the canonical readings of the selected area. Aware that
such subdisciplinary definitions are still widely recogni2ed and useful - but increas
ingly problematic - these volumes are crafted to include a rare and invaluable
perspective on social and cultural anthropology at the onset of the twenty-first
century. Each text provides a selection of classic readings together with contempor
ary works that underscore the artificiality of subdisciplinary definitions and point
students, researchers, and general readers in the new directions in which anthropol
ogy is moving.
1 Linguistic Anthropology: A Reader
Edited by Alessandro Duranti
2 A Reader in the Anthropology o f Religion
Edited by Michael Lambek
3 The Anthropology o f Politics: A Reader in Ethnography, Theory, and Critique
Edited by Joan Vincent
4 Kinship and Family: An Anthropological Reader
Edited by Robert Parkin and Linda Stone

What Is Kinship All About?

David M. Schneider

We are here to celebrate the centenary of Mor

gans Systems, and the topic I have chosen for
this occasion is W hat Is Kinship All About.
Let us look at the one who began it all and ask
what he thought kinship was all about.1
I need not remind you that M organ was
concerned to discover the history and origin
of the Indians of N orth America. He believed
that he could reconstruct their history and
locate their origins by their manner of classify
ing kinsmen. He argued that it was not the
words or the language that could be taken as
reliable indices but rather the mode of classifi
cation regardless of the words or language
used.
, .' Morgans reasoning was that if the system of
relationship of consanguinity should be found
to be the same among all the Indians of AmerJca and should also be shown to be the same as
: those from India, then it would follow that the
- .Indians of America brought that system with
^ them from Asia. Why? Because it is a system
({Which is transmitted with the blood (1871:4).
{{By blood" Morgan meant precisely what we
V rown; genetics and biology. He says elsewhere
book: In the systems of relationship of
great families of mankind, some of the
memorials of human thought and exf c j^ n c e are deposited and preserved. They
^ p e been handed down as transmitted systems
;iriirough the channels of the blood, from the
lip lP ?31 ages of mans existence upon the
^Ut revea^nS certain definite and pro

gressive changes with the growth of mans ex

perience in the ages of barbarism (1871:vi).
W hat did the mode of classification show?
How did it come about? What did it reflect?
Morgans answer was: The actual biological
facts as these were known or knowable, given
the state o f knowledge o f the group on the one
hand and the state o f marriage and sexual rela
tionship on the other, at the time the classifica
tion first was established.
In M organs own words:
The family relationships are as ancient as the
family. They exist in virtue of the law of deriv
ation, which is expressed by the perpetuation
of the species through the marriage relation. A
system of consanguinity which is founded
upon a community of blood, is but the formal
expression and recognition of these relation
ships. Around every person there is a circle or
group of kindred of which such person is the
center; and the Ego, from whom the degree of
the relationship is reckoned and to whom the
relationship itself returns. Above him are his
father and mother and their ascendants, below
him are his children and their descendants;
while on either side are his brothers and sisters
and their descendants and the brothers and
sisters of his father and of his mother and
their descendants as well as a much greater
number of collateral relatives descended from
common ancestors still more remote. To him
they are nearer in degree than ocher individuals
of the nation at large. A formal arrangement of

253

DAVID M. SCHNEIDER

the more immediate blood kindred into lines

of descent, with the adoption of some m ethod
to distinguish one relative from another and to
express the value o f the relationship, would be
one of the earliest acts of human intelligence
[1871:10].
And so M o rg an called the descriptive system
a n atu ral system precisely because it is
founded upon a correct ap p reciation o f the dis
tinction betw een the lineal and several co llat
eral lines and o f the p erpetual divergence of th e
latter from the former. Each relationship is th u s
specialized and separated from every o th er in
such a m an n er as to decrease its nearness and
dim inish its value according to the degree o f
distance o f each person from the central E go
(187 1 :1 4 2 -1 4 3 ). Conversely, the classificatory
system , as it is used am ong A m erican Indians
and others, M organ said, is co n trary to the
natu re o f descents, confounding relationships
w hich are distinct, separating those w hich are
sim ila r and diverting the stream s of the blood
from the collateral channels into the lineal.
W here, for the descriptive system, know ledge
o f the lines of parentage is necessary to deter
m ine the classification, just the opposite is true
for the classificatory system; a know ledge o f
parentage is quite unnecessary. It is im possible
to explain its origin on the assum ption o f the
existence of the family founded upon m arriage
betw een single pairs; b u t it m ay be explained
w ith som e degree o f probability on the assum p
tion o f the antecedent existence of a series o f
custom s and institutions, one reform atory o f
the other, com m encing w ith prom iscuous inter
course and ending w ith the establishm ent o f
the family, as now constituted, resting on m ar
riage between single pairs (paraphrased from
1871:143):
It will prove useful for us to keep tw o parts
of M o rg an s paradigm distinct from each other.
O ne is the m ode of classification itself. The
other is the m anner in w hich the m ode o f clas
sification can be established, th a t is, by m eans
of the analysis o f the kinship term inology.
M o rg an s paradigm states th a t the m ode of
classification of kinsm en derives from the
know ledge of how people are actually genetic
ally or biologically related to each other. This
knowledge in turn depends on their form of
m arriage. Hence for M organ, as for others

-M

since, m arriage is the central insticiitioq

kinship. Im plicit in this p a rt of Morgan's
digm is the prem ise th a t marriage c o n s is t
sexual relationship betw een male and
It is th e processes of biological reprodu^
th a t m ake th e m arried pair the parenti^pf^th eir biological offspring and the offspring^f^
such a m ated p a ir are siblings. The links w jii^
are recognized o r m arked in the mode of
sification o f kinsm en are the biological or gen.'
etic links am ong these people as these m a f c p ||
know n, w hich in turn depend on the mo'ded ^
m arriage. T h u s, by taking one male and ongf't
fem ale in the a b stra ct and tracing their siblings^
their p arents, th eir offspring, and the p a r e n t ^
siblings, offspring, and spouse of each of th e * g |
it is possible to create a genealogical grid, as ipf.;.
is called today; the p a rticu la r c la ssifica tio n # ^
kin w hich a p articu lar people use can bit
m apped on this grid and com pared with other
classifications w hich o th e r people use by com
p aring the differently partitioned grids. The
classification, in tu rn , can be derived from
w hich positions on the genealogy are grouped
together and w hich p ositions are distinguished.
. . . [I]t seemed obvious to M organ that the _
m ode o f classification could be read directly
from the kinship term inology; th a t is, those
positions on the genealogical grid which were
grouped together under one kinship term could
be distinguished from those positions on the
genealogical grid grouped under a different
kinship term and so on. H ence kinship termin
ology w as th e key to the m ode of classification
and in fact, practically the only key, since the
kinship term s m eant (either only or primarily)
specific relationships o f blood or m arriage. The
taxonom y, then, w as derived from no other
source th an the kinship term inology.
W hat w as kinship all ab o u t for Morgan,
then? K inship w as ab o u t the w ay in which a
people grouped and classified themselves as
com pared w ith the real, tru e, biological facts
o f consanguinity and affinity. The facts of con
sanguinity m ean those persons w ho are related
by biological descent from the sam e ancestor
T he facts of affinity are the facts of marriage,
and m arriage m eans the sexual, reproductive
relationship betw een male an d female.
M cL ennan took issue w ith M organ on one
specific score, and his argum ent is easy to mis
understand if one does n o t observe it closely.

W H A T IS KINSHIP ALL A BO U T ?

T h e . . . m istake, or rath er I should say error,

was to have so lightly assum ed the system to be
a system o f blood-ties (1886:269).

259

arise o u t of the biological facts of hum an re

production; for M cLennan, rights and duties,
succession and estates followed blood-ties, not
kinship terms. For both M organ and M cLen
For the following reasons I think that assump
nan, m arriage m eant a sexual relationship be
tion was an error:-(l) it- is apparent, on the
tween
male and female; consanguinity m eant
slightest inspection of Mr. M organs tables,
descent from the same ancestor. These are the
that son and daughter, in the classificatory
only tw o com ponents that are necessary for the
system, do n ot mean son or daughter begotten
construction
of a genealogy, that is, for
by or bom to; that brother and sister are
the construction of the analytic apparatus
terms which do not imply connection by des
needed to describe any particular mode of clas
cent from the same m other or father; and that
sification or kinship system and to com pare it
mother does not mean the bearing mother.
From the analogies of the case, we must be
w ith any other system.2
lieve that father does mean the begetting
Ever since M organs Systems, anthropolo
father. . . . These facts surely ought to have
gists have followed this basic paradigm in its
strongly suggested that the classificatory
essential outline and have continued to argue
system cannot be a system of blood-ties at
a b o u t the m eaning of kinship terms as well. For
a l l ...[1886:270]. (2) T hat the classificatory
m any since then, like Durkheim and Rivers, the
system is a system of mutual salutations
n otions o f paternity and m aternity and blood
merely, appears from many of its peculiar fea
connection had to be taken in their social and
tures. For one thing, the names for relationship
n o t in their biological meanings; indeed, their
are framed for use in address. They w ant gen
social and their actual biological senses did not
erality [McLennan 1886:270, 273].
alw ays accord w ith each other too well. Some
This, then, is w h a t M cL ennan said K IN SH IP
tim es these biological relationships are either
TERMS w ere all ab o u t; they w ere courtesies
presum ptive, fictive, errors of fact based on
and modes o f address, o f m utual salutation.
ignorance, o r putative rather than empirically
But did M cL ennan differ w ith M organ on
dem onstrable. But this hardly alters the fact
what KINSHIP w as all about? N o t a bit!
th a t it is the system o f w hat are socially defined
as
the biological facts of reproduction th at kin
all, or almost all, the peoples using a form of
sh ip is all about. T h a t there are rights and
the classificatory system have, besides, some
duties, statuses and roles, and interpersonal re
well-defined system o f blood-ties the system
lationships o f different com plexions associated
which traces blood-ties through women only,
w ith the genealogically defined kinship rela
or some other. It is inconceivable that any
tionships has alw ays been agreed; but the tw o
> people should have at the same time two enhave been k ep t quite distinct and held to be
...i. tirely different systems of blood relationship.
And it may be confidently affirmed th at in
inherently distinguishable so th a t the defining
: i every case it is the system which is unquestionfeature, the definition o f a kinship relationship
^(-^ably a system of blood-ties, and not the classias ag ainst any o ther kind of relationship, has
v
(katory system, th at alone is of practical force
alw ays been the biological aspect, w hether
V{ '.'>V ilr which regulated succession, for instance, to
treated as p u re biology or as the social defin
;h nours or estates. . . . W hat duties o r rights
itio n o f w h a t biology is. Indeed, the prevailing
i- (^ .^e affacted by the relationships comprised of
view since M o rg an has been th a t the fictive o r
i
classificatory system? Absolutely none.
presum ptive o r undem onstrable biological re
are barren of consequences, except
lationship, the social aspect itself, is m odeled
'^Srmdeed as comprising a code o f courtesies and
after, or is a m etaphorical extension of, or is a
^^S^faonial addresses in social intercourse
social accretion to, the defining and fundam en
1886:270-273].
tal biological relationship. T hus for instance
^ M cL e n n a n as well as fo r M o rg a n , kina d o p tio n is n o t ruled outside the kinship
about m arriage, a b o u t the facts o f
system b u t is understandable as a kind of kin
?r?non and co n cep tio n , a b o u t blood-ties
sh ip relationship precisely in term s o f the fact
relationships as th ey cou ld be
th a t it is m odeled after the biological relation
IT were k n o w ab le, a b o u t the ties th a t
ship. W ith o u t th e biological relationship, in this

260

DA V ID M. SCHNEIDER

view, adoption makes absolutely no sense.

The position I have argued both n pi
Hence even if it is in its social aspects, and
rn person is that M organs paradigm ii-\
even if it is as a social relationship th at anthro and that no m atter how elegantly ^ !
pologists are concerned with it, the real, actual,
been revised, amended, altered, em belli^i^c
and true facts of biology as they concern hum an
or tightened up, it does not do what itpum ^I ;
reproduction remain the base and the defining
to do. I take it th at Lounsbury and GoiE&i
nough in the United States follow that
feature of kinship.3
A variant of this view, which is not funda digm, as well as Levi-Strauss in France,
mentally different from it is the position that and Needham in England, and many othen/lfl^
the genealogical grid itself, can be treated as do not mean this as an exhaustive list of j & 0 |l
the defining feature, regardless of how the spe lowers of M organs kinship work, but dnly-fo^
cific genealogical relationships themselves may suggest th at it holds a position of preeminence"??r$
be defined and even when they are not defined in the anthropological world today. Neitjief
in biological terms at all. Thus whatever the do I mean to suggest th at the work of G d a h f ^
theory of procreation may be for a given enough and Lounsbury or any of these men 11
people, it is the fact th at a system o f genea in any sense identical except that they'-a]j^|
follow M organs use of the genealogical grid
logical-like relations can be mapped out and
partitioned into categories, each systematically as the basic analytic tool and they all remain
wedded to M organs definition of what kin* f
related to the other which is the crucial and
defining feature of kinship. Yet however dif ship is all about.
M y criticism of M organs paradigm is 'M.;
ferent this position may seem to be at first
glance it boils down to the fact that a p a re n t- plainly contained in the alternative strategy I
child relationship - however that m ay be de have followed. I have tried here to show its ; -V
fined procreatively - obtains which implies a utility and productivity given my aims, object
sibling relationship which implies a sexual re ives, and analytic procedures.
lationship between parents, and so on, which
creates the genealogy. By definition, of course,
no genealogy is formed or can be formed from
the exchange of morning greetings o r saluta There is general agreement among all of us,
tions, nor can a genealogical grid be con followers of M organ as well as others, that a
structed from material other than some set classification of kinsmen does not exhaust the
of premises about the nature of human repro kinship system by any means. Where we differ
is in how we handle this fact. The position
duction.
The two sides of kinship, the biological which follows from M organs paradigm,
which Lounsbury, Goodenough, Levi-Strauss,
model (whether real or presumptive, putative
or fictive) and the social relationship (the Leach, Needham, and the many others whom I
should mention take, is th at the kin classifica
rights, duties, privileges, roles, and statuses)
tion can be treated as a distinct, separate, and
stand in a hierarchical relationship to each
others for the biological defines the system to
autonom ous p art of the kinship system, how
which the social is attached, and is thus logic ever it may be related to a larger system. Just as
some anthropologists believe that the phon
ally prior to the latter. If two relationships are
emic system can be analyzed apart from
precisely the same except for one single feature,
that one is the kinship relationship where gram m ar and syntax in language, so these an
some biological relationship prevails or is pre thropologists also feel that the kin classifica
sumed to prevail, and the other one, lacking tion can be analyzed apart from the rest of the
this feature, is not. It is possible to hold that the
kinship system. M y own position is that an
genealogical grid can be distinct from all other accurate account of the kin classification in a
aspects of kinship and that the boundaries of cultural sense (see below) cannot be given
the system are those defined by the grid. These w ithout taking the whole kinship system into
boundaries, for some but not for all, include account.
the putative or metaphoric extensions of the
The second m ajor part of the strategy I have
genealogical grid. [ . . . J
followed is to ask w hat, in each and every

W HAT IS KINSHIP ALL ABOUT?

instance, the definition of the domain of kin

ship may be for each and every culture I study.
I do not assume that this domain is defined a
priori by the bio-genetic premises of the genea
logically defined grid. In other words, where
the followers of M organ take it as. a matter of
definition that the invariant points of reference
provided by the facts of sexual intercourse,
conception, pregnancy, and parturition consti
tute the domain of kinship, I treat this as an
open, empirical question. O f w hat primitive
elements, I ask in each and every case, is the
cultural system composed? It is this question
which on the one hand enables me to ask w hat
kinship is all about, while on the other hand it
seems to deprive me of an externally based,
systematically usable comparative frame. I
shall return to this point below.
The second m ajor aspect of the strategy I
have used follows directly from, and is required
by, the third, which is the use of a different,
narrower; and I think sharper and more power
ful concept of culture than has been traditional
in anthropology. Briefly, I start with concrete,
observable patterns of behavior and abstract
from it a level o f material which has usually
' been called norm s. The normative system
; | consists in the rules and regulations which an
actor should follow if his behavior is to be
^ . accepted by his community or his society as
T,; proper. These are the how-to-do-it rules, as
;,Goodenough has recently put it (1970). They
rj^thbuld on no account be confused with the
[^patterns of behavior which people actually perNform. It is the rule thou shalt not steal that is
not the fact that many people do not
ttl> itis the rule that a middle-class father
l^iould earn the money to support his family,
$ the fact that m any actually do.
vTbenext step is to abstract from the normawhat, following Parsons, I have
tithe cultural system (Parsons 1966,
}**This consists in the system of symbols
^nteanings embedded in the normative
\but which is a quite distinct aspect of
J&n easily be abstracted from it. By symwdrineanings I mean the basic premises
^culture posits for life: w hat its units
jjPi how those units are defined and
how they form an integrated
[^classification, how the w orld is struci>>vhat parts it consists and on w hat

261

premises it is conceived to exist, the categories

and classifications of the various domains of
the world of man and how they relate one
with another, and the world that man sees
himself living in. Where the normative system,
the how-to-do-it rules and regulations, is Egocentered and particularly appropriate to deci
sion-making or interaction models of analysis,
culture is system-centered and appears to be
more static and given, and far less processual
(but only in contrast with the normative system
of course; culture has its own processes and its
own rules of change and movement). Culture
takes m ans position vis-a-vis the world rather
than a mans position on how to get along in
the world as it is given; it asks Of what does
this world consist? where the normative level
asks, Given the world to be made up in the
way it is, how does a man proceed to act in it?
Culture concerns the stage, the stage setting,
and the cast of characters; the normative
system consists in the stage directions for the
actors and how the actors should play their
parts on the stage that is so set.
This is not to say that the cultural and nor
mative level are unconnected. The cultural
level contains implications for the general dir
ections in which normative patterns of action
ought to take place, but it does not spell them
out in the detail which the normative patterns
themselves provide. The cultural premise that
"there are two kinds of relatives, relatives by
blood and relatives by marriage, does not tell
how a man should treat his relatives by mar
riage. Yet once it is known that there are these
two categories, how each is defined, and the
values attached to each, general directions of
action are laid out already even if they are not
sufficient to provide a precise template for
how-to-do-it. By the same token, the cultural
premises allow a wide range of possibilities and
alternatives in the normative rules.4
This conception of culture is far more
narrow and, I think, far more precise than
those generally in use in anthropology today.
Furthermore, it is explicitly tied into a wider
social theory rather than linked in a loose, ad
hoc w ay to a variety of eclectically given and
not always internally consistent theories. This
conception of culture and the social theory of
which it is a part yields a considerably smaller,
more concentrated, and homogeneous body of

262

DA VID

materials abstracted as culture than m any

from the cultural question. For in sta n c e ^
other definitions.
functional prerequisite to the maintenance
This leads to the final point in this introduc any society to regulate sexual behavioi; tSj,
tory section. W hat kinship is all about is con unregulated sexual behavior is a source of djf'*
sidered here only in its cultural aspects; it is ruption. We can then ask of each socio-culiuftjp
kinship at a cultural level as here defined. I system or society, H ow do they do it? ,^ am explicitly not speaking of kinship at a
boundaries of sex and of the different recu
psychological level. N o r am I speaking of it as tory mechanisms are defined in terms of
a system for the organization of social groups, relevance to the question and are related only
that is, not at the social system, social organiza loosely to the boundaries which the society
tional or social structural level, for these are, by itself embodies in its cultural constructs.'We
my definitions, not the same as the cultural
may ask, for whatever reason, how the pro,
system. The cultural level is focused on the
cesses o f hum an reproduction are ordered ^
fundamental system of symbols and meanings different societies, and a study of certain
which inform and give shape to the norm ative aspects of their kinship system will of course
level of action.
be included; but the particular cultural cofy
This theory, like every other theory, is easily structs which obtain within that society are
transformable into a series of questions which
cut off or are included a t points determined
are put to the data. It assumes that every con by the relevance of that material to the ques
crete act, or system of action, has a cultural
tion being posed and asked in a comparative
component, a social system component, a psy fram ework from outside the bounds of the par
chological component, and so on. Thus the
ticular culture.
question I am asking, which follows directly
A cultural question is by definition a question
from this theory, is: W hat are the underlying of from w hat units this particular socio-cultural
symbols and their meanings in this particular system is constructed, of how those units are
segment of concrete action and how do they defined and articulated, and of how those units
form a single, coherent, interrelated system of form a meaningful whole. It is not true that
symbols and meanings? If that question cannot such a question necessarily yields material
be answered satisfactorily, there must be some which is unique, distinctive, and cannot be
compared from one society to another. Quite
thing wrong with my theory. If I can answer the
question, it may at least show th a t the theory
the contrary. The systems of symbols and mean
can be applied, even if it is not enlightening. I ings of different cultures can be compared as
have followed this theory, however; not be easily as systems of hum an reproduction can be
cause it is merely applicable but because I compared from one society to another.
think that it is enlightening and th at we learn
I do not m ean to play semantic games here or
much from it.
to beg fundam ental questions; but if culture
consists in the system of symbols and meanings
M any other fruitful and useful questions can
be asked about the same segment of concrete
of a particular society, and if a social system
action using the same social theory. For instance, consists in the m anner in which social units are
one can ask about the motivations entailed in organized for various social purposes, then
that action. O r one may ask the history of that comparative operations of the former are
segment o f action. A relatively common ques cross-cultural comparisons while, by defin
tion in anthropology is sometimes called a com ition, comparative operations of the latter are
parative, functional question.5
not cross -cultural comparisons but rather
The crux of the issue, then, is w hat is being cross-social comparisons, that is, comparisons
compared. If we ask how any particular cul of social organization, social systems, or social
tural system is constructed, for instance, we ask structures. The key definitional difference lies
w hat units it contains, how they are defined in
between the concepts of society and culture,
that culture, how they are differentiated and
between modes of organization of action
articulated as symbols and meanings; but if we systems and systems of symbols and meanings.
pose a question taken from outside any par
I am concerned with questions of crossticular socio-cultural system, this is different cultural comparison and questions having to

W H A T IS KINSHIP ALL ABOUT?

do with the analysis of particular cultures, not

social systems.

263

w ithout the shared bio-genetic substance elem

ent the category of relatives-in-law or relatives
by m arriage is form ed; and, finally, w hen the
shared bio-genetic substance is present alone
II
the category of relatives in nature is form ed.
W hat happens if this analytic strategy is used
Hence at the pure kinship level the so-called
on a particular kinship system? Does it tell us
kinship term s do not play a classificatory
anything usefully new or different about that role.7
system or about the nature of kinship?
-If we consider the pure kinship system
I have tried to do this for the American
alone, we can see th at the distinctive features
kinship system. Since m uch of this m aterial
by w hich it is defined are parts of tw o m uch
already has been published (1968, 1969: 116 w ider and m ore general categories o f A m erican
125, 1970:88-90), I will merely touch on the
culture. T h at is easy to see w hen we rem em ber
th a t blood relatives are considered to be related
points which bear directly on the task at hand.
in n ature and th at they are parts of the n atural
W hat anthropologists have heretofore
regarded as T H E dom ain of kinship in Ameri order o f things as defined in A m erican culture.
T heir second distinctive feature, the code for
can culture turns out to be only one p a rt of a
conduct, is simply p art of th a t m uch w ider
larger dom ain, m ade up of two different parts.
The dom ain we have traditionally called kin category called the order o f law, defined in
opposition to the order o f nature. This is the
ship is Ego-centered, consisting of a netw ork
order im posed by m an on nature, the order
of related persons, such as m other, father;
brother, etc. It is n o t hard to see th at
defined in A m erican culture as consisting in
this domain is constructed o u t of m any differ rules, regulations, custom s, trad itio n s, and so
forth w hich m an, w ith the aid of hum an
ent kinds of com ponents from m any different
systems. Thus each unit in the system, such as
reason, creates. T he lim ited dom ain of law in
mother or father, is defined first by w h at m ight
the juridical sense is only one p a rt of this
be called a pure kinship com ponent, second by w ider dom ain; and w hen we u n d erstand how
an age or generation com ponent, th ird by a
m uch a p a rt of the sam e dom ain they are, we
sex-role com ponent, fourth by a class com pon
have explained in som e significant degree w hy
ent, and by oth er com ponents o f other kinds as
relatives by m arriage are also called relatives
well. Hence I have called this the conglom er in law .
ate* system o r the conglom erate level of the
A t the pure level, then, p a rt of w h a t a n th ro
pologists have traditionally been calling k in
system.
;-To understand the second p a rt we m ust go a
ship seems to be defined in A m erican culture as
- step further. We can, by using a level o f contrast
an indistinguishable p a rt o f these tw o m uch
which is not generally em ployed in k inship w id er an d m ore general cultural categories,
i analysis, abstract the kinship com ponent
the o rd e r of n atu re and the order o f law.
alone and in its pure form from the conglom er
If w e n o w consider the dom ains o f religion
and n a tio n ality 8 a n d analyze them as we have
a t e system. We do so by asking w h a t the dis
junctive features are w hich define the person as
analyzed k in sh ip , a ra th er interesting fact
yj.^'jdnsman as against a non-kinsm an.6 W hen
emerges. We again distinguish the p u re system
|7 ^ c d o this, it becomes a p p aren t a t the level of
from th e conglom erate system . T he conglom er
\.j ^ j^ p u re system th a t the distinctive features o r
ate system o f n atio n a lity consists in the entire
defining features (1968:22, 41 ff.) o r the
federal a n d state system s; the legislative, judi
cial, an d executive branches o f governm ent;
k ' |r ^ tive an^ irreducible elements are, first,
bio-genetic substance and, second, a
th e tw o H ouses o f C ongress; the different
states an d th eir o rg anization, an d so fo rth .
% i l r ^ 0r con^u c t^which I have characterized
enduring solidarity. T hese tw o elemB ut to a b stra c t the pure system w e sim ply ask,
^ f e n m b i n e to yield three m ajor categories o f
W h a t m akes a person a citizen? W h a t are
the distinctive features w hich define a p e rso n s
I l l l l $ k en kQtk elem ents occur together the
relative is form ed; w h en the
n ationality? H e is eith er b o rn an A m erican
conduct elem ent occurs alone and
o r he is - and the w o rd is o f course quite

264

DAVID M. SCHNEIDER

significant - naturalized. Once again we find

that the distinctive features are shared sub
stance (being born American) and a code for
conduct which enjoins diffuse, enduring soli
darity: being a loyal American, loving ones
country, and, in President Kennedys felicitous
phrase, Ask not what your country can do for
you. Ask rather what you can do for your
country. The same is true, as I have tried to
show elsewhere, for religion, where the con
glomerate level includes the organization of
the church and so forth; but what makes a
member of the church is, once again, shared
substance and a special code for conduct which
can be characterized as diffuse, enduring soli
darity (1969). [ . . . ]
If the conglomerate level consists in units
made up of elements from different pure systems,
then the question arises of how the different
components relate with each other in the con
glomerate unit. Are they simply added together?
Do they form some special configuration?
The answer to these questions seems to be
that at the level of the person, each pure com
ponent receives further specification of its con
tent, defined now with reference to how a
person should act, and this further specification
derives from the total context or the interaction
of all of the defining components.
Let me try to explain this by going back to
the so-called kinship component once more.
The kinship component says that persons are
related either by shared bio-genetic substance,
a shared code for conduct, or by both. But at
the level of the person something called dis
tance comes into play, so that the question is
no longer shared or not shared but of how
much is shared. If the shared elements are
now conceived in terms of magnitudes, then
class factors, personal factors, and a variety of
other considerations permit it to be cut off at
various points and at various times and under
various circumstances and for various purposes
at the option of the actor himself. Hence the
common observation in both America and
England that some people will actually trace
blood connections to people, whom they then
say they do not count among their relatives or
kinsmen. They simply say, Yes, they are my
blood relatives, I suppose, but I dont consider
them relatives; they are too far away or words
to that effect.

In sum, the difference between the?

system and the conglomerate system
^
their orientations. The conglomerate system ^oriented toward action, toward telling p S & ill
how to behave, toward telling people h o w ^ f^
do-it under ideal circumstances. It is thusin&^S
closer to the normative system. The
Pure"';
system, however, is oriented toward the stated
of-being, toward How Things Are. It is in thjv^
transition from How Things Are and How
Things Ought To Be to the domain of If Thai i;
Is So, How Then Should One Act that the pufl^v:
systems come together to form the conglomer
ate systems for action.
At this point the question of just what h '
kinship all about or how the domain of kin
ship is to be defined must be raised. If, on the
one hand, the broad categories of the order of
nature and the order of law contain as special
instances the two major components which are
distinctive features out of which the categories
of kin are formed, and if, on the other hand, at.
the level of the pure system, the kinship
system, the nationality system, and the reli
gious system cannot be distinguished from
one another in terms of their defining features,
what justification is there for calling this
system either a kinship or a religious or a
nationality system? They are, culturally
speaking or with respect to their distinctive
features, all exactly the same thing.
And if it is true that at the level of the con
glomerate system it is not possible to say that
the kinship component is dominant and
modifies the sex-role component, or the other
way around, but only that each retains its in
tegrity in the configuration, while a new, emer
gent level is formed, then it is equally
problematic as to what, for comparative ana
lytic purposes, any particular conglomerate
system should be called. That is, if it is a kin
ship plus sex-role plus age-role plus class,
system, why call it a kinship system? Oq for
that matteq why call it a sex-role system? Is
there one good reason why a particular bundle
of components should be characterized by
only one of its components rather than by an
other?
There is ONE good reason and that is when,
in the particular culture we are studying, it is
done that way. I can think of no other good
reason.

W H A T IS KINSHIP ALL ABOUT?

265

This turns out to be the case in American in which they are embedded in that system as
culture. As in m odern W estern European cul- well as the way in which they are articulated to
ture in general, there are clear-cut, form al div- the social system components at the normative
isions w hich are called in th a t culture itself level. The normative level thus includes more
institutions. These institutions refer precisely than those cultural elements in it. It follows
to the conglom erate level - the family is one, therefore that the conglomerate level and the
the church is another (it may also be called normative system are at the same level of abreligion), the state is a third, and so on.
straction, but that the notion of conglomerate
Hence if our term kinship is synonymous
is simply the identification of the cultural elemwith that institution as it is defined in American ents in their matrix of the normative system,
culture, sometimes called family, then kinTo move to the pure cultural level, then, is to
ship is indeed a valid cultural unit which is abstract distinct cultural domains apart from
actually found in American culture, and it is arid regardless of the normative matrix in
found so th at its defining features are at the which they are found. Thus one normative
cultural level to be identical w ith those of reli- m atrix containing certain cultural elements
gion and nationality while it is found to be very may be an institutionally distinct family system
clearly differentiated from those other units at in modern Western European society, but the
the conglom erate level and in its norm ative
pure cultural domain is quite different as I have
aspects. N o r should it be forgotten that, how- tried to show, and the same cultural elements
ever kinship, nationality, and religion are dif- can be found in a variety of other differentiated
ferentiated at the conglom erate, organizational normative systems as well (such as religion, the
level, the very same distinctive features which moral community, etc.). To distinguish the con define all three as cultural dom ains are them- glomerate level, then, is simply to locate the
selves an integral part of the orders o f nature cultural elements in their place in the normaand law. T h at is, we have simply not explored tive system and to be able to analyze them in
the entire universe of American culture and so relation to each other and to the normative
we cannot as yet say w hat other units should system which contains them,
fall into the same cultural category w ith kinLet me conclude this section by repeating
ship, nationality, and religion or, to put it in that as anthropologists we can study different
the other way, whatever other categories ex- cultures or we can study different social
haust the dom ains of the order of nature and systems. If we study different cultures we do
law. Thus there are grounds for accepting not do the same thing as when we study differParsons suggestion that education ought to be ent social systems. When we study different
considered along with kinship, religion, and cultures we study different conceptual schemes
the moral com m unity (nationality) as p art of for w hat life is and how it should be lived, we
a single cultural entity. M y purpose here, how- study different symbolic and meaningful
ever^ is not to introduce a new element but to systems. We do not study the different ways
1 remind the reader that we have approached
in which different theoretically defined func1 American culture rather as the blind men ap- tions are actually or ideally carried out. There
1 proached the elephant. Even if we have disis thus a major difference betweencultural
|
covered that a leg is linked to the body, we
anthropology and what has been called,
I have not gone m uch further and cannot claim
following British usage (and quite correctly,
1 to have examined American cultural categories
too) social anthropology or comparative soci\ exhaustively. This is a very im portant point to
ology. I take my task to be the study of culture
1 which I shall return.
and identify myself as a cultural anthropologist
1 vi.In introducing the terms pure and conglom(although I will be the first to admit that this
I pate I confine their meaning to the cultural
has not always been so).
i;|r. !*Vel and speak only of cultural components.
Given this definition of the task, we can
1 ;. ?! is clear that the pure level is confined to the proceed. Even if kinship is culturally segre: .cultural level alone. The conglomerate level gated as a domain at one level of American
; ^jould be understood as the cultural elements
culture - the conglomerate or normative level
" ( V.^nbedded in the normative system and the way - it is not culturally segregated as a distinct

266

DAVID M. SCHNEIDER

domain in most of the cultures we encounter

outside the Western European culture area.
Quite.the contrary. The vast majority of other
cultures we know do not have culturally differ
entiated domains of the sort which occur in
Western European or American culture.
But note clearly what I am trying to say. I do
not mean that we must cease to observe domes
tic arrangements in different societies; I do not
mean that we cannot ask how a people order
their relationships between men and women or
between a woman and the child she bears; I do
not mean that we cannot go out and ask for the
theories of procreation which a particular
people hold. We can do all of these things and
more and have learned much from such ques
tions. I mean only that such questions of or
ganization, or social organization, or social
structure should not be confused with or iden
tified with questions about the nature, the
structure, or the content of either particular
cultures or of culture in general. Because do
mestic arrangements can be an analytic
category which may not correspond to any
thing as it is defined as a cultural category in
a particular culture, the relationship between a
woman and the child she bears may be an
analytic category which we erect for various
reasons, but it may or it may not correspond
to any particular cultural category in a particu
lar culture; theories of procreation may be an
analytic or functional category which we
invent but which may or may not have one or
another cultural counterpan in a particular
culture, or be incorporated indistinguishably
into one or another cultural scheme in a par
ticular culture. It may indeed be true that some
culture does have, as a cultural category, do
mestic units, but that needs to be shown em
pirically, not assumed so simply on one
theoretical ground or another.
There is one final point. I have said that the
American kinship system has two distinctive
features, shared bio-genetic substance and dif
fuse, enduring solidarity. I have said elsewhere
that these derive from the master symbol of
coitus and that each is a facet of this act. The
last few pages of my book, American Kinship,
make the point that the biological elements
have symbolic significance. They constitute an
integrated set of symbols in the sense that they
are a model for how life, in certain of its

,;iS

aspects, is constituted and should bet|i

The symbols are biological in the se n se ^ ^
the culturally given definition of the
system is that it is derived from the
biology as a process of nature itself. But
fundamental to our understanding th a t^ W ?
preciate that these biological elements are'syjj|f|t
bols and that their symbolic referents are
biology as a natural process at all.9
Now one may well ask if in a somewlut'-^.fl
roundabout way I am not saying here what
Morgan and his followers have always said,' - II
for they too stressed genealogy as a biologically 0
defined network, and descent can easily be seen
as shared bio-genetic substance, the whole . '~l
being treated in its social rather than in
biological aspects. I think that I am saying . j
something quite different. First, although , i
what appear to be biological elements seemto '!
be present in both Morgans analysis and mine,
we treat those elements in very different ways.l jinsist that these biological elements have pri
marily symbolic significance and that their
meaning is not biology at all. Morgan and his
followers have insisted that it is the biological
elements of human reproduction as they are
scientifically demonstrable in nature which
are directly reflected in kinship and that it is
these facts which people have slowly, over
time, learned to recognize more or less accur
ately and then give further social value. For
M organ the matter stopped there; but for1
many of his followers, like Rivers, Malinowski,
and some of our contemporaries, the biological
elements need not rest on the scientifically de
termined or actual facts of nature but merely
on whatever the natives believe to be the facts
of human reproduction. Thus whatever their
theory of procreation, it is the fact that these
are believed to be true facts of nature and it is
therefore in terms of these biological, or hypo
thetical facts of nature, that kinship is
defined.
Whether it is the true facts of human repro
duction or only those which the natives happen
to believe to be true, human reproduction in its
biological aspects plays the fundamental role
for Morgan as well as for the functionalists
who follow him. For both, the socio-cultural
position of kinship is similar. For Morgan, it
was an achievement of great evolutionary sig
nificance when the classificatory system gave

267

W HAT IS KINSHIP ALL ABOUT?

way to the descriptive system, for it showed not

only that m an had achieved the most advanced
form of the family but had also achieved an
advanced level of knowledge, for the descrip
tive system was founded upon correct appre
ciation of the distinction between lineal and
several collateral lines of perpetual divergence
of the latter from the form er (1871:142). A
formal arrangement of the more immediate
blood kindred into lines of descent, w ith the
adoption of some method to distinguish one
relative from another and to express the value
of the relationship, would be one of the earliest
acts of human intelligence (1871:10).
For the functionalists of M alinowskis
school the situation was not much different
except that the evolutionary material was ex
cised with gusto. Kinship was the social rec
ognition of biological facts, and the presence
and function of a socio-cultural system of kin
ship was explicable and understandable pre
cisely on the ground th at these facts constitute
elements in the external environment with
which man must cope directly as well as indir
ectly and to which he m ust adapt. His way of
coping with them and adapting to them is, by
definition, the kinship system. The family,
a part of the kinship system, was seen by
Malinowski as, among other things, one way
of maintaining order in the sexual sphere, for it
provided rules and regulations governing
sexual relations and these, when obeyed, were
orderly and permitted man to proceed with his
life in an orderly fashion and w ithout disrup
tions and the chaos that would be attendant on
unregulated sexuality.
(
As I have already indicated, I too am a func
tionalist and I too have a functional explan
ation to offer, though it is somewhat different
from Malinowskis or his co-workers.
No one can disagree th at man must cope
t.
with the facts of life and the facts of nature,
f.
whether he knows w hat these facts are scientif
ic
ically or has only erroneous beliefs. It can be
demonstrated easily that the question of how
:V;' man copes with the facts o f human reproduc|c '' ; kQn is answered only in part, and in very small
'X. Part at that, by the kinship system. But that is
|X; not the main point here at all. The main point
i v ^ere is that that is a social system question, a
T Urological question. It is a question of how
coles are defined and articulated into a set of

patterns for action which adapt man to the

facts of his environment.
A different functional question centers on the
cultural rather than the social system level.
T hat question has to do with the system of
symbols and meanings which the so-called
kinship system embodies, with w hat the
boundaries of that sub-system of symbols and
meanings are and whether they stretch beyond
the kinship system or only fall within a por
tion of it. The functional question at the cul
tural level, then, is what that system of symbols
and meanings consists in and, once that is
answered, w hat part it plays in the total
socio-cultural system. ( . . . ]
III
In section I, I drew a distinction between cul
ture and social or normative system and said
that this distinction had an important place in a
wider social theory, essentially Parsonian in
conception.
The fundamental point of section II was that
at the cultural or symbolic level, kinship, reli
gion, nationality (pending a full clarification
and revision of this term), and possibly educa
tion as well are identical, although they are
quite different in their social system or social
organizational aspects.
In sections I and II, I emphasized that the
question asked of the data is different, depen
ding on whether it is a cultural question or a
social system or social organizational question.
The next problem, and the problem of this
section, is the old one of how comparison can
be conducted on a cultural level if it is assumed
that each and every culture may be uniquely
constituted. How can one compare wholly dif
ferent things?
In part, the answer to this question has been
given in the discussion of the differences be
tween culture and social system. The units of
any particular culture are defined distinctively
within that culture. By definition, they cannot
be imposed from outside. It follows, therefore,
from the definitions and the theory used here,
that there is and can be only one cultural ques
tion, the question of what its particular system
of symbols and meanings consist in.
We must start, of course, as adults who have
lived in our own society and been socialized in

268

D A V ID M. SCHNEIDER

our ow n culture before we even imagine any

others. T hus we start by asking th a t question
and answ ering it for our own culture, w hich
always serves as a base-line for cross-cultural
com parison. W ithout som e com prehension,
however botched, distorted, biased, and in
fused w ith value judgm ents and wishful th in k
ing, both good and bad, our ow n culture
always remains the base-line for all other ques
tions and com parisons. In part, this is because
the experience o f our ow n culture is the only
experience which is deep and subtle enough to
com prehend in cultural term s, for the cultural
aspects of action are particularly subtle, som e
times particularly difficult to com prehend
partly because they are symbols n o t treated
usually as symbols but as true facts. So it is
difficult at times to convince an A m erican
th a t blood as a fluid has nothing in it w hich
causes ties to be deep and strong. So, too, m any
aspects o f culture are unconscious and are n o t
p a rt of an explicit scheme o f things.
A m ore fundam ental reason for the fact th a t
o u r ow n culture is always implicitly or expli
citly, im m ediately o r remotely, the base-line for
com parison and com prehension is th at th a t is
w h a t anthropology is all about. It is an attem p t
to understand ourselves as hum an beings by
using anthropology as the m irro r for m an. By
seeing ourselves against the contrast of others
and by seeing others in contrast w ith ourselves,
we learn a b o u t ourselves and a b o u t m ankind.
It is unnecessary to raise the old problem o f
how it is possible for tw o things to be com
pared as w holes w hen each is w holly unique.
We are spared this burden by the fact th a t the
basis for com parison is given by o u r definition
of culture as a system of symbols and m ean
ings. Symbols and m eanings can be com pared
just as easily as m odes of family organization,
the roles of seniors to juniors, or the m ethods
of agriculture. The com parative base is given
therefore by the theoretical stipulation of w h at
it is we are trying to ab stract from each system
and from the fact th a t we can indeed system at
ically abstract the system of sym bols and m ean
ings for each society. H ence the key to the
com parative problem is in locating the sym
bolic elem ents from a careful analysis of the
units which the culture itself defines. We do n o t
say, Lets look a t the lineages, we ask instead
w h at units this culture postulates, and the

answ er m ay have nothing whatever to/'iU'

w ith lineages. We m ust then follow these
bolic elements throughout the particular cup
ture, w herever they m ay lead and in whatever^
form s they m ay be found. In short, fra m in g ^
question is the first step. It must then
answ ered for our ow n culture as an hypotheaijjjS
O ne then takes those cultural constructs ahii
asks if any other culture has anything like it 0}'%
n ot, how they differ, where and in what way; vi.
and w here they appear to be the same.
Let me conclude and sum m arize by returning p.'
to M organ and com pany. I think it is quite clear v
th a t this is n o t in fact w hat M organ and hi*_followers have actually done. Their cultural '
categories do n o t come from a previously ana- '/
lyzed culture at all, but are composed of ad hoc:elements w hich derive from social system ques-~
tions, functional questions, and from (in
M o rg an s case especially) evolutionary consid
erations, all of w hich are quite foreign to any
p articular culture. M organ did n ot use the cul
tural system of A m erican kinship as the model
for his com parative analysis because as I have
show n in A m erican Kittship, the genealogical
grid w hich M organ used is n ot part of that
system. M organ is quite clear th a t what he
took to be the com parative model as the many
quotes cited a t the outset of this paper show, is
the genealogically defined or biologically de
fined netw ork. By using the genealogically de
fined grid M organ and his followers have
protected themselves from finding out
w h at the true units of Am erican kinship in a
cultural sense are and w h at their distinctive
features actually are. In other w ords, they have
n o t dealt w ith Am erican kinship as a
cultural system b u t have simply assumed
th a t their m odel caught or contained some
p a rt of it.
I have affirmed repeatedly th at the genea
logically defined grid is n o t appropriately ap
plied to Am erican kinship for three reasons.
First, it does n o t in fact correspond to the
cultural units of w hich the Am erican kinship
system is actually m ade up, nor to the distinct
ive features in term s of w hich these cultural
units are defined, unless, of course, the results
o f the research presented in Am erican Kinship
are largely in error. Second, the genealogically
defined grid is tied to the false assum ption that
it is possible to discover the classification of

W H A T IS KIN SH IP ALL A BO U T ?

269

kinsm en w ith o u t taking into account the rest of

I have consciously misused the term kinship
the k insh ip system , particu larly the system o f
simply as a way of beginning the discussion.
roles and p a tte rn s fo r behavior as well as the
But it is no longer necessary to misuse the
w ider cultu ral co n tex t in w hich the k in sh ip w ords; now we can use them correctly.
system is situ ated . T h ird , as M cL ennan was
K inship is w h at M organs, G oodenoughs,
first to p o in t o u t an d as only a few since have
L ounsburys, Levi-Strauss, Leachs and N eed
h am s (among others) analytic schemes are all
m aintained, is the false assu m p tio n th a t the socalled kinship term s are eith er the sole avenue
abo ut, but they have no know n referent in any
through w h ich the classification o f kin can be
know n culture except at the conglom erate level
established o r con stitu te a m ajo r o r decisive
o f W estern European culture, as in America. To
speak precisely, the title of my book, Am erican
body o f evidence on th a t problem .
One m ig h t raise th e q uestion o f w hether, per K inship, is a misnomer. I really did not deal
extensively w ith kinship at the conglom erate
haps, the A m erican k in sh ip system is unique in
that it is the only one in the w o rld w here the
level n o r did I intend to; in the pure culture
level there is no such thing as kinship. Hence
genealogical grid is in ap p ro p ria te for cultural
comparison. I am sure th a t you will agree th a t
m y use o f the term pure kinship level is
w rong, too, which I have tried to suggest by
this does n o t seem to be so. I can assure the
the use of quotes around the w ord. T he level is
reader th a t from m y ow n w o rk on Yap, the
the pure culture level as defined by certain
Mescalero A pache, an d the Z u n i . . . the genea
sym bols.
logically defined grid does n o t fit these cultures
Let m e conclude this section on a simple
either. I w ould suggest th a t the N u e r ca n n o t be
note. For a while anthropologists used to
fitted to a genealogical grid, n o r m ost of the
w rite papers ab o u t Totemism as if it were a
Eskimo system s w e have ad eq u ate inform ation
concrete o r conceptual entity th at had an
on.
actual, existential counterpart in the cultures
The im p o rta n t p o in t is th a t the genealogic
o f the Australian" aborigines, am ong others.
ally defined g rid is th e o nly analytic device th a t
G oldenw eiser and others then demolished
has been applied to m o st o f the system s w hich
th a t notion and show ed th a t totem ism simply
anthropologists have studied. T here has been
did n ot exist as a useful analytic category pre
. almost no system atic a tte m p t to stu d y the quescisely because it had no corresponding referent
V^-tion without em ploying this device. To p u t it
in any of the cultures w ith w hich it w as alleged
simply, it is a b o u t tim e th a t w e tested some
to be associated. It became, then, a non
vVS; other hypotheses. [ . . . ]
subject. In due course Levi-Strauss w rote a
b ook a b o u t th a t non-subject, in w hich he first
IV
explained th a t it w as a non-subject and there
fore could n o t be the subject o f the book, for it
a f ^ a r e ready n o w to deal w ith the question
did n o t exist outside the m inds of those who
;; "'if *Which is the title o f this paper: W h a t Is K inship
invented it and believed it, and these w ere an
-pAbout?
thropologists, n o t the natives they w rote about.
MwThe answer is sim ple an d self-evident by now.
T he m atrilineal com plex suffered the same
% Kjnship is an analytic categ o ry w hich has been
fate in the hands of Lowie.
^Prevalent in an th ro p o lo g y since M o rg a n first
iented it. In th e w a y in w h ich M organ a n d
In m y view, kinship is like totem ism , m atri
archy, and the m atrilineal com plex. It is a
Mowers have u sed it, it does n o t corresnon-subject. It exists in the m inds of a n th ro
J o any cultural category k n o w n to m a n .
sclosest thing to it is the W estern E uropean
pologists b u t n o t in the cultures they study. If
jgory of family, b u t if I am c o rre c t in m y
you like to think th a t I have devoted a good
Mis even th a t is n o t close. F ro m the beginp a rt o f m y intellectual life to the industrious
|othis paper I have p u t the w o rd k in sh ip study o f a non-subject, you are m ore than wel
com e to do so. If you think th a t I have now
in order to affirm th a t it is a th eoretUon in the m ind o f th e a n th ro p o lo g ist
talk ed m yself o u t of a subject for study you are
i no discernible cu ltu ral referent in
q u ite right, roo. But th a t is n o t the w hole story.
I have talked m yself o u t o f studying kinship as

270

DAVID M. SCHNEIDER

if it were a distinct, discrete, isolable sub

system of every and any culture. W hat I have
learned and have tried to convey here is that in
the study of culture one must proceed in a very
different way.
When I started to study American kinship I
went to households to talk with the inhabitants
about how those who were living there were
related to each other and to others who were
not living there. I systematically collected ge
nealogies at the very outset. When I began to
discover that their concepts were somewhat
different from those which traditional kinship
studies led me to expect, I followed their
concepts and their definitions and the formula
tion of the cultural domains of their actions,
depending as well on my own experience over
the past years here in America, on Yap, and
among the Mescalero Apache. Once that was
done, and it was not easy for me to do it
systematically, I could see that there was no
such thing as kinship, except as it existed as
a set of a priori theoretical assumptions in the
mind of the anthropologist.
One must take the natives own categories,
the natives units, the natives organization, and
articulation of those categories and follow
their definitions, their symbolic and meaning
ful divisions wherever they may lead. When
they lead across the lines of kinship into pol
itics, economics, education, ritual, and reli
gion, one must follow them there and include
those areas within the domains which the par
ticular culture has laid out. One does not stop
at the anthropologists arbitrarily defined
domains of kinship, religion, ritual, and
age-sets, etc., but instead draws a picture of
the structure of a culture by means of the cat
egories and congeries of units which the culture
defines as its parts; one interrelates these in
terms which, in that particular culture are sym
bolically defined as identical, drawing distinc
tions among parts which that culture itself
defines as different by their different symbolic
definition and designation.
Proceeding this way, a somewhat different
analysis emerges than when one asks questions
about the social system or the social organiza
tion. Yet the two systems, as I have said all
along, articulate and are related to each other.
Ultimately the study of culture can no more be
isolated from all other sub-systems of a society

than the study of its social system, alth ^.

this is the way we have been proceeding
past, largely neglecting orr om
omitting
the stud
stuAr
itting the
culture or relegating the idea of culture to
kinds of hats the natives wear or, correspofj|i?i %
ingly, to the level of arts and crafts iti g M S
i
j
achieved.
[r . . . ]i
*- T S

:i l Ift
S B fi

I will try to briefly summarize this paper andf^l f'

what I take to be its major points, and add
point in conclusion.
'^ 1 1
Theory suggests that it may be useful
systematically and rigorously distinguish cut~.:
ture from social system, defining culture rathir w f 5
narrowly as a system of symbols and meanings. When this view of culture is applied tolfO
what have ordinarily been treated as kinship
systems, new material emerges because i
new question has been asked about it. Instead
of the classic question which is at the social y.'i
system level of How Does This Society Organ- ;ize to Accomplish Certain Tasks (establish
alliances, maintain control over territory, pro
vide for inheritance and succession, hold and
transmit property, etc.), a cultural question
is asked: namely, what are the units, how are
they defined in the native culture itself,
how does it postulate their interconnections,
their mode of differentiation, by what
symbolic devices do they define the units and
their relationship, and what meanings do these
have?
I tried to give an example, briefly condensed
from published literature, of what happens
when a particular kinship system is analyzed
in this way, using my own work on American
kinship, and I think I was able to show that
some rather new and different results emerged.
One of the lessons derived from this study of
American kinship was that the very same
symbols defined kinship, nationality, and reli
gion at the cultural level and that, if this were
so, then all of these - with the possible addition
of the educational system in American culture
could be included in one single cultural unit
or domain. Hence there need be - there could
be - no grounds for distinguishing the kinship
system from the religious system, from the
nationality system, from the educational
system at the cultural level.

W HAT IS KINSHIP ALL ABOUT?

271

Further, where the bio-genetic elements, the enough as examples of those who were without
elements of conception and parturition were question squarely in the tradition of Morgan.
And finally, embedded here and there in the
taken simply as defining elements or were
treated as states of affairs with which every paper is the plea to try, for a change, another
society must cope in one way or another; the approach to kinship, another set of hypotheses,
alternate strategy of study which I commended to ask another question and see what the pay
yielded the suggestion that these defining elem off might be. We have asked these functionally
ents of blood, of one flesh and blood, of bio- defined, social organizational questions of kin
genetic identity could be understood as sym ship exclusively since the 1870s. There is no
bols which stood for social relationships of need to stop asking those questions for they are
diffuse, enduring solidarity. That is, the bio good, productive, legitimate questions. I only
logical elements which previous theories took urge that we ask a different kind of question, a
as merely defining features, givens in the state cultural question, as well.
In conclusion, if the argument of this paper
of affairs, could be understood better as sym
bols for kinds of social relationships, and has any merit, it follows that it will no longer
probably these did not derive from, not stand be possible to study kinship or religion or
for; the biological material they purported to economics or politics, etc., as distinct cultural
order functionally. Indeed, at many points the systems, for in each case the definition of each
scientific facts sharply contradicted the cultural of these domains has been in social system or
facts about biology; but the fact that the scien sociological and not cultural terms. This has
tific facts had little or no discernible effect been the classic Weberian approach,10 where
on changing the cultural facts seemed good the basic frame of reference is the institution,
evidence for concluding that the bio-genetic socially or sociologically defined, and the two
elements in American kinship were primarily different questions, one organizational and the
symbolic of something else and hardly other cultural, are then put to the data.
relevant to biology as a natural or actual state (Indeed, one of the favorite Weberian questions
of recent times has been of the effect of reli
of affairs.
The next step in the argument was simply to gious organization and its cultural aspects on
generalize from that fact. Kinship, from the the development of the economic system.) The
dme of M organ, had been defined in terms of result of this Weberian approach is a fragmen
consanguinity and affinity, that is, by an a tation of the cultural material into artificial
priori set of criteria, and studied with respect segments which remain unlinked and unlinkto the organization of its elements for dischar able. It is not possible to relate the cultural
ging certain functions. If kinship is studied at aspects of the religious system to the
the cultural level, however, then it is apparent cultural aspects of the kinship, political, or
that kinship is an artifact of the anthropolo economic system w ithout extraordinary skill
gists analytic apparatus and has no concrete and good luck, if it is possible at all.
If the argument I have presented here is
counterpart in the cultures of any of the soci
followed out logically it will be necessary to
eties we studied.
Hence the conclusion that kinship, like to treat the whole culture as a single cultural
temism, the matrilineal complex, and m atri system, following out its different segments
archy, is a non-subject, since it does not exist and its different divisions and domains as
these are defined and differentiated by the sym
any culture know n to man.
bolic system itself.
I then tried briefly to show that even those
It follows from the irreducibility of the cul
| who seemed to have broken with the Morgan
tradition - Rivers, Leach, Needham , and Levi- tural to the social systems, or vice versa, that
this examination of the cultural system as a
Strauss - were still ensnared in that tradition
flther by their com m itm ent to genealogical cri- whole, apart from its social system aspects, is
na in the definition of kinship or by their necessarily undertaken independently of any
^romitment to the positing o f questions purely examination of the social system, at least in
the social system o r social organizational its initial phases. Ultimately, of course, as the
*^*1 or both. I used Lounsbury and Good- Parsonian theory of action makes so clear,

272

DAVID M. SCHNEIDER

these all come together and are mutually inter

Mr. James A. Boon was kind enough toSj'
the first draft of this paper when my hcattrdependent parts of any concrete system of
prevented me from doing so, for Me. Bhofc
action, but they are analytically distinct. As
many useful suggestions and criticism^?---'
no one system can be reduced to any other
well as those of Mr. Carlos Dabezies, andfc!
each system therefore has an integrity of its
the long and useful letters on the first draft jv
own which must be respected by the analytic
this manuscript written me by Mr. MicjjjJ
procedures used.
Silverstein, Dr. Paul Kay, Dr. Roy dAndrai
It is precisely this failure to distinguish the
Dr. Edmund Leach, Professor Claude Lhj.
social system aspects from the cultural aspects
Strauss, Dr. Ward H. Goodenough, an|
and the primary analytic emphasis on the social
Dr. Judith Shapiro. In addition, I would moj:
system to the neglect of the cultural that has led
tion again my seminar on Culture Theory of
us - the descendants and followers of M organ spring, 1971, the students in the Department
into such untenable conclusions as I have tried
of Anthropology who heard and discussed the
to deal with here - that because in some sense
first version of this paper; making many help
genealogy and procreation and conception are
ful suggestions, and the students at the Uni'
really out there as indisputable and unavoid
versity of Minnesota who also listened
able facts of life it is and it must be the material
patiently and made acute and perceptive dt
out of which kinship systems are made.
servations and suggestions which I have in
To my mind it will no longer be acceptable to
corporated without further, more specific
consider religion as a cultural system any
acknowledgment.
more than it would be acceptable to consider
I Unless, of course, one takes the position that
marriage is necessarily entailed in the notion
kinship as a cultural system or politics as a
of descent and therefore all that is needed is
cultural system. Each culture must be ap
one single component, parenthood,
proached apart from its institutional segments,
i One of the best contemporary statements of
its social organizational segments, or its social
this position is contained in two papers by
structural segments, and from a purely cultural
Ernest
Gellner, 1957 and 1960.
perspective. Once the cultural system as a
Parenthetically, I should note that the cultural
whole is outlined - at least in its more or less
system can be abstracted either from the nor
broad oudine, with its major symbolic features
mative system or directly from the level of
defined and the links between them roughly
observable behavior, for it is a distinct aspect
established then, and only then, can such
of each. Methodologically the situation may
questions be usefully raised as, for instance,
be such that it is easier to abstract the cultural
the role of the culture of a given society on its
material from the normative system, and 1
economic development, its religious organiza
think that this is often true. Furthermore, it
tion, or its political system. But I would stress
is a useful methodological device to treat the
the importance of undertaking cultural ana
normative system and the system of observed
lyses which are truly and clearly independent
behavior as relatively independent sources of
o f the sociological analyses and uncontam in
material - they cannot be completely inde
ated by them. This is not the place to elaborate
pendent, of course - so that the cultural ma
this last point but only to make clear that if the
terial abstracted from the normative system
analysis of this paper has any merit, then the
can be checked against the cultural material
abstracted from the patterns of concrete be
independent study of the culture of a society as
havior. If these two sources do not yield the
a whole culture must be undertaken apart from
same cultural material, the analyst is alerted
and uncontam inated by the study of its social
to the fact that he has a problem on his hands,
system.
for if every cultural premise is embedded in
the normative system, and the normative
NOTES
system plays a role, though by no means the
only or even the decisive role, in concrete
action, then the cultural aspect ought to
1 I would like to acknowledge with gratitude
appear in both and not only in one area.
the helpfulness and the many useful sugges
Finally, it should be noted that some parts of
tions of Dr. Priscilla Reining, the fact that

WHAT IS KINSHIP ALL ABOUT?

the cultural system are constructs o f the ob

server w h ich deal w ith im plicit, covert, or
unconscious categories w hile others can be
formulated directly from the natives ow n,
explicit m odel itself. For further discussion
of these points see m y Am erican K inship
(1968), especially Chapter O ne.
5 All questions are really functional. W hen the
question deals w ith the relations betw een the
parts under given conditions it is a structural
question. W hen it deals w ith the relations
between parts taken over a period o f time
and w ith reference to their change and inter
action, then the question is processual. H ence
the popular term structural-functional is a
fundamental m isunderstanding as w ell as a
misnomer. Since all questions are functional,
some structural, and som e processual, then all
questions are either functional-structural or
functional-processual, and it is a m istake to
call a kind o f theory structural-functional.
See Parsons (1 9 7 0 ) o n this point.
6 I cannot think o f a single w ork on kinship
which has system atically don e this. Instead,
the assum ption is m ade that consanguinity
and affinity define kin ship and, therefore, if
a bond of either sort can be sh o w n to obtain,
then by definition those are kinsm en. T his is a
good exam ple o f the difference betw een
asking a social from a cultural question. T he
externally given criterion, a definition o f k in
ship taken from outsid e the culture, is used
rather than a definition o f kin ship elicited
jy .i'</ivfrom inside the culture itself.
; 7,^.The fundamental reference here is Schneider
y;(1970); see also Schneider (1 9 6 5 ). N o te the
;t; discussion o f M cLennan above as w ell. T he
Vppinc is fundamental, since the assum p tion
been widespread if n o t universal since
'^ ^ ^ M o r g a n that the m ode o f classification o f
is embodied in the kinship term inology
f p ^ n d can be derived from n o other sou rce. A s
^ V ^ t h a v c suggested (Schneider 1 9 6 8 , ch. 2 , 5),
ttore are other, m ore reliable as w e ll as valid
of deriving the classification o f kin chan
use o f kinship terms. I am o b liged to
B $|sSphael Silverstein for poin tin g o u t to me
f c ^ d failed to m ake this p o in t clear in
-"l
drafts o f this paper.
^
f e rougMy sum m arizing Schneider (1 969)
is, however, a fundam ental error
f i g p t Paper w hich I w an t to ack n ow led ge
^ cannot correct fully since
f ^ ^ t w bardly space in w h ich to d o so . First,

273

let me acknow ledge that my seminar in Cul

ture Theory in che spring o f 1971 drove hom e
to me the fact chat there w as an error involved
in this formulation; second, that Talcott
Parsons also pointed out the error and that
the solution emerged in conversations w ith
him during that same period. The problem is
that birth in a country is not quite com parable
to birth by a m other in American culture. The
w ord birth is the same but tw o different
meanings seem to be implied. Second, nation
ality is really a modern invention and the
presum ption im plicit in m ost o f the w ork I
have don e on American kinship is that these
are fundam ental cultural categories o f long
standing and considerable stability. T h a t the
concept o f nationality seem s to fit so easily
does suggest I am not far o ff the target. The
solution seem s to be to treat the third elem ent
in the triad not as nationality but as som e
thing like D urkheim s moral com m unity, the
group sharing the sam e cultural system con
stituting one society. This may at certain
levels be a nation, at others but a region o f a
n ation or a sm aller unit, or at certain levels
supra-national w ith an ethnic or racial or re
ligious reference, as che Jew s and M oslem s
and the Buddhists or Christians at certain
levels constitute such a m oral com m unity.
T he second aspect o f the solution centers on
series o f sym b olic equations betw een birth,
b lood , and land or place or locality. It is the
analog in som e instances o f the W here Ya
From ? qu estion s w h ich strangers som etim es
ask o f each other; but I m ust forego spelling
o u t the w a y s in w h ich com m on blood and
com m on soil or land are treated as equivalent
under certain con d ition s in Am erica. I hop e to
be able to publish a correction o f this in che
near future but until then w ill leave things
stand here as originally presented.
9 It is even a m oot question as to w hether the
sym b ols derive from the facts o f nature
and the facts o f b iology as these can be
dem onstrated scientifically. W hat is indisput
able is that the sym b ols are form ed o f elem
ents w h ich in native culture are defined as
b iological,
particularly
as
aspects
of
the reproductive process. W hat is disputable
is w h eth er they in fact derive from , or
mirror, or are m odels form ed after the scien
tific facts o f biology. I d o n ot think that they
are, but this is a subject best left to another
tim e.

274

DAVID M. SCHNEIDER

10 Of which C .. Geertz (1966) is a clear

example. Schneider (1968) also starts from
such an institutional beginning but does not
attempt to relate the cultural and social
system aspects, only to isolate the cultural
aspects.
R e f e r e n c e s C ite d

Geertz, C. 1966 Religion as a Cultural System. In

Anthropological Approaches to the Study of
Religion. ASA Monographs 3:149.
Gellner^ E. 1957 Ideal Language and Kinship
Structure. Philosophy of Science 24:235-242.
1960 The Concept of Kinship. Philosophy of
Science 27:187-204.
Goodenough, W. H. 1970 Description and Com
parison in Cultural Anthropology. Chicago:
Aidine.
McLennan, J. F. 1886 Studies in Ancient History.
Comprising a Reprint of Primitive Marriage.
London and New York: Macmillan.
Morgan, L. H. 1871 Systems of Consanguinity
and Affinity of the Human Family. Washington:
Smithsonian Institution. Vol. 17 of the Smithso
nian Contributions to Knowledge. (First printed
1870.)
Parsons, T. 1966 Societies. Englewood Cliffs:
Prentice-Hall.
1970 Some Problems of General Theory
in Sociology. In Theoretical Sociology.

J. C. McKinney and E. A. Tiryakiam'Jp*

New York: Crofts.
1971 The System of Modem Sodetl^i>l
Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall.
InjjJfSfjs
Schneider, D. M. 1965a Kinship and Biology.
Aspects of the Analysis of Family Structure.
A. J. Coale et al., Eds. Princeton: Princeton *
University Press, pp. 83-101.
1965b American Kin Terms and Terms for ..
Kinsmen: A Critique of Goodenough*
Componential Analysis of Yankee Kinship Ter
minology. In Formal Semantic Analyst
E. A. Hammel, Ed. American Anthropologist
67(5, pt. 2):288-308.
1965c The Content of Kinship. Man 108i
122-123.
'j ' : 0
1965d Some Muddles in the Models: On
How the System Really Works. In The Rele
vance of Models for Social Anthropology.
London: Tavistock, pp. 25-85.
1968 American Kinship: A Cultural Ac
count. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall.
1969 Kinship, Nationality and Religion. I
Forms of Symbolic Action. V. Turner, Ed. Pro
ceedings of the 1969 Annual Spring Meeting
of the American Ethnological Society,
pp. 116-125.
1970 What Should Be Included in a Vocabu
lary of Kinship Terms? Proceedings of the VIII
International Congress of Anthropological and
Ethnological Sciences, Tokyo 2:88-90.