SOC 174 Lecture Notes - Kinship Terminology, Classical Antiquity, Incest Taboo
Document Summary
Lineage, locality, marriage: conjugal/nuclear versus extended households. Variety & diversity of family forms: great variety of kinship systems, family, both throughout history and in present times, case in point: some societies do not even know marriage or fatherhood. The public family in history: the public family is as old as civilization, whereas the private family is a comparatively recent development (few hundred years) For most of history, families were primarily public families: organized around economic imperatives. Family also played greater role in child rearing, elder care. No/brief formal schooling, family-based apprentice system; no hospitals, no government safety net: the very notion of privacy is pretty recent. What about love: romantic love: a universal human emotion, but love"s role in the family has changed. Affectionate relationship between mothers & children is documented throughout history (contra aries). But marriages in u. s. and europe were not widely (and certainly not primarily) based on romantic love until the 18th-20th century!
