HIS109Y1 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Patrilocal Residence, Lewis H. Morgan, Eskimo Kinship
LECTURES/PROFESSOR NOTES
1. INTRO
• “Trobriand Cricket”
- Papua New Guinea
- Response to British colonialism
- Took British cricket (missionaries used it for conflict resolution) then turned it
cultural (substitute for warfare, ritualistic—uniform, magic, dance chant)
2. FIELDWORK
• Description THIN = what is happening, THICK = what/why is it happening
• FIELDWORK AS SCIENCE
- Inductive Method = start with what you see and then prove it
- Cross-Checking = understanding is provisional, but not just opinion (repeat
the research technique to make sure ideas are correct)
• Reflexivity positioning = being aware of how people see you physically, how you
are perceived, your own judgements)
• THEORY IN FIELDWORK shapes perception; you already have an idea when
you approach fieldwork, then interpret
3. CULTURE CONCEPT
• MYTH OF THE SAVAGE
- Binaries = if not like self, then “savage”, not “civilized”
- Projections, Inversions (invert then project), Evolutionary Stages (earlier
evolution of your own culture/society), State of Nature (how much you use
nature around you), no concept of property or inequality, what is valued in
life (materialism, nature, farming) determines how civilized you are, License
to Conquer (Terra Nullis=land is a blank slate—whoever makes best use of it
deserves it)
• Manifest Destiny “survival of the fittest”
• HERBERT SPENCER Social Darwinism, superior races can take what they need
and inferior races die out
• LEWIS HENRY MORGAN recognized that cultures were complex, diverse
systems of social organization
- Idea of a generic group (like “savage” was absurd)
• Everyone is a part of the whole
• Anthropology = science of the colonized
- Ethnocentrism
- Culturally appropriate development
• ISHI
- Genesis of Salvage Anthropology = saving everything you can before a
species dies out
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- Imperial Nostalgia = what would have happened if we hadn’t done what we
did
- Contaminated = observing lifestyle alone as a source of research can’t be
uncontaminated
• CULTURE CONCEPT
1) Kenny and Smillie (Burnett) = complex whole
2) Kenny and Smillie = system of meaning
3) Sahlins = arbitrary; unique to each person
- CRITIQUES ethnographies of the particular (Abu-Lughod), no culture or
people as wholes (Wolf), cultural invention is continuous
4. KINSHIP
• Kinship = organizes social structure (sex, reproduction, inheritance); a process
• Society = social structure = matrix of duties, rights, labour, norms, social control
• Marriage = forms alliances between groups, defines household and residence,
transfers rights (women and children)
• Alliance Incest = taboo, Exogamy = marry outside of the group, Endogamy =
marry within the group
• Household Formation
- Conjugal/Non-conjugal = live/don’t live together
- Patrilocal/Matrilocal/Neolocal = man/woman/own household
- Nuclear = monogamous, neolocal (mostly what we have today)
- Polygamous = multiple spouses Polygynous = one guy with many wives,
Polyandrous = one woman with many husbands
- Extended = vertically (grandparents, parents)
- Joint = extended horizontally (siblings and their spouses)
- Blended = mixed through marriage (“step”)
- By Choice = choosing to live (Ex. roommates)
• Affinal = marriage relation, Consanguineal = blood relation
• Parallel Cousin = children of same-sex siblings
• Cross-Cousin = children of opposite-sex siblings
• Levirate = marrying dead husband’s brother
• Biological Father = Genitor
• Social Father = Pater
• Social Mother = Mater
• Biological Mother = Genetrix
• Vir = Husband
• Uxor = Wife
• Lineal = line of descent through blood (children)
• Collateral = line of descent horizontally (siblings)
• Corporate Descent Groups = hold property together
• NEWLYWED COUPLES post-matrilineal residence
- Patrilocal = residence with a father
- Viri-Patrilocal = husband’s father, Viri-Matrilocal = husband’s mother
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- Natolocal = birth family
- Neolocal = setting up a new household together (most common in modern
American society)
• Segmentary Lineage Organization political functions; allows for alliances of kin
(living members of lineage segments may work together situationally for mutual
descent)
• Clan = Putative Descent
• Unilineal Descent = descent traced through one sex (Matrilineal/Uterine or
Patrilineal/Agnatic)
• Cognatic Descent = everyone in ancestry
• Proscriptive = prohibiting certain marriages, Prescriptive = counsel advises or
recommends who to marry
• ESKIMO KINSHIP us
*** TRIANGLE = men, CIRCLE = women
5. INDIVIDUAL & SOCIETY
• VIEWS psychological, biological, sociological
• Structure = institutions, ways of organizing social life, norms, roles
• Agency = individual’s abilities to reflect on society and culture and take independent
action
• MICHEL FOUCAULT we are all formed by and subject to power (it constrains,
enables, forms desires and capabilities/actions, etc.)
• Methodological Individualism social phenomenon must be explained by showing
how they result from individual actions
• Methodological Wholeness explanation of phenomena by means of structure of
social roles
6. WORLDVIEW, RELIGION, SYSTEM OF MEANING
• Worldview = picture of reality and relationship to society
• 19TH CENTURY EVOLUTIONARY IDEAS
- primitive vs. modern; there isn’t a binary
• LURHMANN how practices produce conformity and their effects
TEXTBOOK
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Document Summary
Took british cricket (missionaries used it for conflict resolution) then turned it cultural (substitute for warfare, ritualistic uniform, magic, dance chant: fieldwork, description thin = what is happening, thick = what/why is it happening, fieldwork as science. Inductive method = start with what you see and then prove it. Binaries = if not like self, then savage , not civilized . Idea of a generic group (like savage was absurd: everyone is a part of the whole, anthropology = science of the colonized. Genesis of salvage anthropology = saving everything you can before a species dies out. Imperial nostalgia = what would have happened if we hadn"t done what we did. Contaminated = observing lifestyle alone as a source of research can"t be uncontaminated: culture concept , kenny and smillie (burnett) = complex whole, kenny and smillie = system of meaning, sahlins = arbitrary; unique to each person. Nuclear = monogamous, neolocal (mostly what we have today)
