University of Edinburgh
School of Social & Political Science
Social Anthropology
2014-2015
Kinship: Structure & Process
(SCAN10021)
Key Information
Course Organisers
Professor Alan Barnard
Email: A.Barnard@ed.ac.uk
Room 5.20
Chrystal Macmillan Building, George Square
Professor Anthony Good
Email: A.Good@ed.ac.uk
Room B.07
Chrystal Macmillan Building, George Square
Location
Semester 2
Wednesdays, 11.10 – 13.00
Lecture Theatre 3, 7 Bristo Square
Course Secretary
Ewen Miller
Email: Ewen.Miller@ed.ac.uk
Undergraduate Teaching Office,
Macmillan Building
Assessment
deadlines
Ground
Floor,
Chrystal
 Short Essay: 12 noon Thursday 26 February 2015
 Exam – date and time to be confirmed
Aims and Objectives
This course examines some of the ways in which people in different societies
conceptualise and live out relatedness. It shows how notions about relatedness are
linked to notions about gender, theories of procreation (which are themselves changing
under the impact of new reproductive technologies), and ideas about bodily substance,
as well as having emotional, economic, and political salience. Kinship has long been
regarded as the core of the anthropological discipline, although the extent to which this
is still the case is questionable. The course will consider some of the history of kinship
studies, looking at some central debates in the subject and assessing their implications
for anthropological theory.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course, students should have an overview of the ways in which
anthropologists have approached kinship in both some classic non-Western cases,
and more recently, in Western cultures. They will have an understanding of the
economic and political salience of kinship, the history of kinship within anthropology,
and of the significance of key debates about what kinship is, and how it might be
studied.
Teaching Methods
The course involves one two-hour session a week for the whole class, together with
small group support teaching in separate one-hour sessions. In the main session, most
weeks will involve a mixture of a lecture and some discussion and group work. You will
be allocated to a group for the term in the first session, and each group will have a
specific short reading to work on for each week, with the group reporting back to the
whole class.
The ‘small group’ support teaching will normally be concerned with one or more
readings that illustrate, underpin or extend issues raised in the main sessions.
Students should note that participation in the small group support teaching
sessions is compulsory and attendance will be recorded. Please refer to the
‘Tutorial Participation’ information on the next page.
ASSESSMENT
All students will be assessed by:
1.
2.
3.
Assessed course work in the form of a short essay (1500 words), due on
Thursday 26 February 2015. This carries a weighting of 20% towards the final
overall mark for the course
An examination at the end of the Semester. Exam times will be announced by
Registry later in the Semester. The exam carries a weighting of 70% towards
the final overall mark for the course
Tutorial participation, which carries a weighting of 10% of your final mark for the
course
Course work
Short essay titles will be put up on Learn. The mark awarded will be an overall
assessment of quality, based on the following criteria:







Quality of ethnographic evidence
Analysis (awareness of relevant theoretical debates
Critical assessment of theoretical positions); use of relevant literature (evidence
of independent literature search
Linkage between ethnography and theory)
Structure of argument (original ideas and approach
Intelligent use of analysis, argument, criticism and debate)
Style and presentation; and correct citation of references.
It is important to remember however, that the overall mark is the result of a holistic
assessment. For example, brilliance in one criterion cannot override weakness in other
criteria.
Tutorial participation
The system of written assessment, the “personal response”, will form the backbone of
students’ tutorial participation. Each week you will be required to come to class with a
short piece of written work, about 100-200 words long. You will write a short paragraph
of your own personal response to the tutorial readings for that week. A personal
response is not a summary of the reading, but rather your reaction to it: What did you
like or not like about the piece? What questions did it answer or leave unanswered?
You will be required to bring a paper copy of your personal response to class, a copy
of which will be handed in to the tutor at the end of the class. You will not receive a
mark or feedback for each individual response, but these responses will feed into the
final tutorial participation mark awarded. The rationale behind this system is: to make
class discussion more focused, to help students formulate their own opinions, to give
more opportunities to practice writing skills, and to provide a basis for awarding a grade
for tutorial participation at the end of the course.
Exam
In assessing your answers we will be looking especially for evidence of breadth of
knowledge on different sections of the course and depth of understanding of particular
topics.
The following are the criteria by which each exam answer will be marked. However, it
is important to note that the overall mark is a result of a holistic assessment of the
answer as a whole.







Does the answer address the question set, and with sufficient focus?
Does the answer show a grasp of the relevant concepts and knowledge?
Does the answer demonstrate a logical and effective pattern of argument?
Does the answer, if appropriate, support arguments with relevant, accurate and
effective forms of evidence?
Does the answer demonstrate critical thinking in relation to arguments and
evidence?
Does the answer attempt to make a point that is original?
Is the answer adequately presented in terms of spelling, grammar and style.
Please refer to Appendix 1 for additional information about assessment and
submission procedures.
Communications You are strongly encouraged to use email for routine communication with lecturers.
We shall also use email to communicate with you, e.g., to assign readings for the
second hour of each class. All students are provided with email addresses on the
university system, if you are not sure of your address, which is based on your matric
number, check your EUCLID database entry using the Student Portal.
This is the ONLY email address we shall use to communicate with you. Please note
that we will NOT use ‘private’ email addresses (such as Yahoo or Hotmail). It is
therefore essential that you check your university email regularly, preferably each day.
LECTURE SUMMARY
Week
Date
Topic
Week 1
14 January
What Is Kinship? (AG, with AB)
Week 2
21 January
Early Kinship and Terminology Structures (AB)
Week 3
28 January
Descent and Residence (AB)
Week 4
4 February
Elementary Structures and Incest (AB)
Week 5
11 February
Procreation and Relatedness (AG)
16 – 20 February: No Lecture: Innovative Learning Week
Reproductive Technologies and Gay Kinship
(AG)
Week 6
25 February
Week 7
4 March
The House: Work and Memory (SM)
Week 8
11 March
Kinship, Law, Politics and Economics [AG]
Week 9
18 March
The Kids are Alright: How Children Make
Families (KR)
Week 10
25 March
What Kinship Is: Course Review (AG, with AB)
CLASSES, READING LIST & BEYOND
Each week’s readings and activities are organized under three headings. Journal
articles will be available through the library e-journal list. Copies of book chapters will
(as far as possible) be available on Learn. You are expected to do a minimum of three
readings per week. At least one in advance of the lecture (see starred reading), one
for the discussion following the lecture, and at least one in preparation for the tutorial.
Students are expected to demonstrate a broad range of reading in examination and
essay answers.
It is essential to read as you go along: reading cannot be left until the rather brief
revision period!
Lecture readings. These are the readings that will be directly discussed in the lecture
itself. Everyone should try to read AT LEAST ONE in preparation for each week’s
lecture. If you cannot decide, we recommend the starred reading. Good answers to
the exam and the short essay will draw on a wide range of these readings.
Discussion readings. For the second hour each week, students will usually work in
small groups with a specific short reading or question. It is essential to read the
allocated discussion reading before the lecture.
Tutorial readings. Again you must read at least one of these before attending the
tutorial, and bring your short written ‘personal response’ to the reading to hand over to
the tutor (see under ‘Assessment’ at the end of this course guide).
General texts on kinship
These will help in defining terms and summarising theoretical issues in the study of
kinship:
Dumont, Louis 2006[1971]. An Introduction to Two Theories of Social Anthropology
Schneider, David M. 1984. A Critique of the Study of Kinship
Barnard, Alan & Anthony Good, 1984. Research Practices in the Study of Kinship
Holy, Ladislav 1996. Anthropological Perspectives on Kinship
Parkin, Robert J. 1997. Kinship: an Introduction to the Basic Concepts
Carsten, Janet 2004. After Kinship
Readers on kinship
The following recent collections provide overviews of anthropological approaches to
kinship. Several of the weekly group readings are taken from these collection, and if
you plan to buy any books for this course these are likely to be the most useful.
Carsten, Janet (ed), 2000. Cultures of Relatedness: New Approaches to the Study of
Kinship. Cambridge: University Press.
Parkin, Robert & Linda Stone (eds), 2004. Kinship and Family: an Anthropological
Reader. Oxford: Blackwell.
Ethnographies
In addition to the weekly readings, students are strongly advised to read from the
following ethnographies (listed in alphabetical order, not order of priority!) which focus
on kinship:
Astuti, Rita 1995. People of the Sea: Identity and Descent Among the Vezo of
Madagascar
Busby, Cecilia 2000. The Performance of Gender: an Anthropology of Everyday Life
in a South Indian Fishing Community
Campbell, J.K. 1964. Honour, Family and Patronage; a Study of Institutions and Moral
Values in a Greek Mountain Community
Carsten, Janet 1997. The Heat of the Hearth: the Process of Kinship in a Malay Fishing
Community
Daniel, E Valentine 1984. Fluid Signs: Being a Person the Tamil Way
Edwards, Jeanette 2000. Born and Bred: Idioms of Kinship and New Reproductive
Technologies in England
Evans-Pritchard, E.E. 1951. Kinship and Marriage Among the Nuer
Good, Anthony 1991. The Female Bridegroom: a Comparative Study of Life-Crisis
Rituals in South India and Sri Lanka
Gow, Peter 1991. Of Mixed Blood: Kinship and History in Peruvian Amazonia
Kapadia, Karin 1995. Siva & her Sisters: Gender, Caste, and Class in Rural South
India
Mayblin, Maya 2010. Gender, Catholicism, and Morality in Brazil: Virtuous Husbands,
Powerful Wives
Parry, Jonathan 1979. Caste and Kinship in Kangra
Schneider, David M. 1980 (2nd edition). American Kinship: a Cultural Account
Stasch, Rupert 2009. Society of Others: Kinship and Mourning in a West Papuan Place
Strathern, Marilyn 1992. After Nature: English Kinship in the Late Twentieth Century
Yan, Yunxiang 2003. Private Life under Socialism: Love, Intimacy and Family Change
in a Chinese Village 1949-1999
Yanagisako, Sylvia Junko 2002. Producing Culture and Capital: Family Firms in Italy
Classes and Reading List
* = Essential reading. Where two are listed, read at least one.
WEEK 1: What is kinship? [AG with AB]
Can we define something called ‘kinship’? This may seem an odd question, given that
according to Robin Fox, ‘Kinship is to anthropology what logic is to philosophy... it is
the basic discipline of the subject’. Yet anthropologists have always disagreed over
what kinship is, and from the 1970s onwards many even disagreed that kinship was
as central as Fox claimed. Recently, however, the topic has undergone a revival, in a
new guise. We will look at some different anthropological approaches to kinship and
their analytic implications, including an introduction to the mid-twentieth century
paradigm of unilineal descent groups.
*Barnard, Alan & Anthony Good 1984. Research Practices in the Study of Kinship.
Academic Press, chap. 1
*Carsten, Janet 2004 After Kinship. Cambridge UP, Introduction.
Needham, Rodney 1971. ‘Remarks on the analysis of kinship and marriage.’ In R.
Needham (ed.) Rethinking Kinship and Marriage (ASA 11), pp 1-34.
Bourdieu, Pierre 1977. Outline of a Theory of Practice, pp 30-71.
Radcliffe-Brown, A.R. 1950. ‘Introduction.’ In AR Radcliffe-Brown & D Forde (eds)
African Systems of Kinship and Marriage, pp 13-23.
Leach, Edmund R. 1961 Rethinking Anthropology, pp 1-27.
Fortes, Meyer 1953 ‘The structure of unilineal descent groups.’ American
Anthropologist 55: 17-41 [also in Time and Social Structure, and Other Essays].
Discussion:
Allocation of groups and readings. We will use some recent media accounts to discuss
the significance of kinship in contemporary life.
Tutorial reading: The genealogy of kinship
Bouquet, Mary 1996. ‘Family trees and their affinities: the visual imperative of the
genealogical diagram.’ Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 2: 43-66.
WEEK 2: Early kinship and terminology structures [AB]
Kinship has a biological basis, but it is constructed very differently in different societies.
There are only a limited number of ways to classify relatives, but virtually all the
possibilities are found ethnographically. Here we look at examples and ask why. And
can we say anything at all about the earliest human kinship systems, hundreds of
thousands of years ago?
*Barnard, Alan 1999. ‘Modern hunter-gatherers and early symbolic culture.’ In R.
Dunbar et al., The Evolution of Culture. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
*Barnard, Alan 2009. ‘Social origins: sharing, exchange, kinship’. In R. Botha & C.
Knight (eds.), The Cradle of Language. Oxford University Press, chap. 12.
Allen, N.J.. et al. 2008. Early Human Kinship. Oxford: Blackwell, chap. 5 (Allen)
Keesing, Roger 1975. Kin Groups and Social Structure. New York: Holt, Rinehart and
Winston, chap. 7.
Kroeber, A.L. 1909. Classificatory systems of relationship. Journal of the Royal
Anthropological Institute 39: 77-84.
Maddock, Kenneth 1971. The Australian Aborigines. London: Allen Lane, chap. 4: ‘The
order of the world’.
Week 2 continued
Radcliffe-Brown, A.R. 1952. Structure and Function in Primitive Society. London:
Cohen & West. chap. 3: ‘The study of kinship systems’.
Rivers, W.H.R. 1964 (1914). Kinship and Social Organization. London: Athlone Press.
pp. 37-96.
For discussion:
1.
What was the earliest kinship system like? More as in Africa, or more as in
Australia?
2.
What determines the ways in which relatives are classified?
Allen, N.J. 2008. Tetradic theory and the origin of kinship systems. In N.J. Allen et al.
(eds.), Early Human Kinship. Oxford: Blackwell, chap. 5.
Barnard, A. 1999. ‘Modern hunter-gatherers and early symbolic culture.’ In Robin
Dunbar et al., The Evolution of Culture. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press,
chap. 4.
Tutorial reading: Back to basics
Radcliffe-Brown, A.R. 1952. Structure and Function in Primitive Society. London:
Cohen & West. chap. 3: ‘The study of kinship systems’.
WEEK 3: Descent and residence [AB]
What is the nature of kin groups? How do descent groups reflect rules of residence?
How many kinds of descent groups are there? Indeed, do classical unilineal descent
structures have any ethnographic reality at all?
*Fortes, Meyer 1953. ‘The structure of unilineal descent groups.’ American
Anthropologist 55: 17-41 [also in Fortes, Time and Social Structure, and Other
Essays]
*Kuper, Adam 2005. The Reinvention of Primitive Society. London Routledge. chap.
8: Descent theory: a Phoenix from the ashes (also in A. Kuper, 1988. The
Invention of Primitive Society. London: Routledge. chap. 10)
Evans-Pritchard, E.E. 1951. Kinship and Marriage Among the Nuer. Oxford: Clarendon
Press.
Keesing, Roger 1975. Kin Groups and Social Structure. New York: Holt, Rinehart and
Winston, chaps. 3-4.
Morgan, Lewis Henry 1877. ‘The growth of the idea of property.’ Ancient Society.
Chicago: Charles Kerr, part 4.
Murdock, G.P. 1949. Social Structure. New York: Free Press, chaps. 7-8.
For discussion:
Do unilineal descent groups have an ethnographic reality?
*Kuper, Adam 2005. The Reinvention of Primitive Society. London Routledge. chap.
8: ‘Descent theory: a Phoenix from the ashes.’ (also in A. Kuper, 1988. The
Invention of Primitive Society. London: Routledge. chap. 10)
Tutorial reading: Indigenous understandings of descent
Stafford, Charles 2000. ‘Chinese patriliny and the cycles of yang and laiwang.’ In Janet
Carsten (ed.) Cultures of Relatedness, pp. 37-54; OR
Astuti, Rita 2000 ‘Kindreds and descent groups: new perspectives from Madagascar.’
In Janet Carsten (ed.) Cultures of Relatedness, pp. 90-103.
WEEK 4: Elementary structures and incest [AB]
What is the incest taboo, and can it be defined as universal? In this lecture we will
consider some of the different theories and explanations for the presence of the incest
taboo, and go on to look at how ‘incest’ might be defined differently.
*Lévi-Strauss, Claude 1969 [1949]. The Elementary Structures of Kinship, Chs 1-5.
Beacon Press.
*Schneider, David M. 1976. ‘The meaning of incest.’ Journal of the Polynesian Society
85 (2): 149-169
Barnard, Alan 1978. ‘Universal systems of kin categorization.’ African Studies 37: 6981.
Freud, Sigmund 1950 [1913] Totem and Taboo. Some Points of Agreement between
the Mental Lives of Savages and Neurotics, chap. 1. ‘On the horror of incest’.
Routledge.
Hooper, A. 1976. ‘“Eating blood”: Tahitian concepts of incest.’ The Journal of the
Polynesian Society 85 (2): 227-241.
Kuper, Adam 2002. ‘Incest, cousin marriage, and the origin of the human sciences in
nineteenth-century England.’ Past and Present 174 (1): 158-183.
Roscoe, Paul B. 1994. ‘Amity and aggression: a symbolic theory of incest.’ Man (N.S.)
29 (1): 49-76.
Wagner, Roy 1972. ‘Incest and identity: a critique and theory on the subject of
exogamy and incest prohibition.’ Man (New series) 7 (4): 601-613.
Westermarck, E. 1891 (1922) The History of Human Marriage. London: Macmillan
Wolf, Arthur P. 1966. ‘Childhood association, sexual attraction, and the incest taboo:
a Chinese case.’ American Anthropologist 68 (4): 883-898.
For discussion:
The incest taboo: part of nature, or part of culture?
Freud, Sigmund 1950 [1913] Totem and Taboo. Some Points of Agreement between
the Mental Lives of Savages and Neurotics. Routledge, chap. 1: ‘On the horror
of incest’.
Fox, Robin 1975. ‘Primate kin and human kinship.’ In Robin Fox (ed.), Biosocial
Anthropology. London: Malaby Press.
Tutorial readings: Incest in the ‘West’
La Fontaine, Jean S. 1988. ‘Child sexual abuse and the incest taboo: practical
problems and theoretical issues.’ Man (N.S.) 23 (1): 1-18; OR
McKinnon, Susan 1994. ‘American kinship/American incest: asymmetries in a scientific
discourse.’ In S. Yanagisako and C. Delaney (eds) Naturalizing Power: Essays
in Feminist Cultural Analysis.
WEEK 5, Wed., Procreation and relatedness [AG]
Where do babies come from? Can we take procreation for granted as a universal fact
of life? Does relatedness have to be based upon biology, and what are implications of
our answer to our understanding of ‘what kinship is’?
*Franklin, Sarah 1997. Embodied Progress: a Cultural Account of Assisted
Conception, chap. 1: ‘Conception amongst the anthropologists’.
*Carsten, Janet 1995. ‘The substance of kinship and the heat of the hearth: feeding,
personhood and becoming related among Malays on Pulau Langkawi.’ American
Ethnologist 22: 223-41 [also pp 309-27 in Parkin & Stone (eds)]
Malinowski, Bronislaw 1932. The Sexual Life of Savages, chap. 7.
Leach, Edmund 1966. ‘Virgin birth.’ Proceedings of the Royal Anthropological Institute
(Also in Leach 1969. Genesis as Myth).
Spiro, M.E. 1968. ‘Virgin birth, parthenogenesis and physiological paternity: an essay
in cultural interpretation.’ Man (N.S.) 3 (2): 242-61.
Powell, H.A. 1968. ‘Virgin birth.’ Man (N.S.) 3 (4): 651-53.
Delaney, Carol 1986. ‘The meaning of paternity and the virgin birth debate.’ Man (N.S.)
21: 494-513
Schneider, David M. 1968. American Kinship: a Cultural Account, pp 21-29
Schneider, David M. 1984. A Critique of the Study of Kinship, pp. 97-112.
Carsten, Janet. 2000. ‘Introduction.’ Cultures of Relatedness, pp. 1-36.
Weismantel, Mary 1995. ‘Making kin: kinship theory and Zumabagua adoptions.’
American Ethnologist 22: 695-704
Carsten, Janet 2004. After Kinship, chaps. 1 & 2
Barnard, Alan & Anthony Good 1984. Research Practices in the Study of Kinship,
chap. 8.
For discussion
Does an approach based on ‘relatedness’ – rather than on the formal characteristics
of the ‘kinship system’ – broaden our understanding of the nature of kinship?
Bodenhorn, Barbara 2000. ‘“He used to be my relative”: exploring the bases of
relatedness among Inupiat of northern Alaska.’ In Carsten (ed) Cultures of
Relatedness, pp. 128-48; OR
Lambert, Helen 2000. ‘Sentiment and substance in north Indian forms of relatedness.’
In Carsten (ed) Cultures of Relatedness, pp. 73-89.
Tutorial reading: How are babies made?
Martin, Emily 1991. ‘The egg and the sperm: how science has constructed a romance
based on stereotypical male-female roles.’ Signs 16 (3): 485-501.
INNOVATIVE LEARNING WEEK
No Lecture
WEEK 6: Reproductive technologies and gay kinship [AG]
With the advent of assisted conception, the possibility has arisen for infertile people,
single and gay parents to have children ‘of their own’. What moral problems do these
new technologies raise? Over this same period social and legal attitudes towards
sexuality and sexual identity have been transformed. How have these changes
impacted on kinship in the 21st century?
*Carsten, Janet 2004. After Kinship, chap. 7.
*Cowan, Sharon 2005. ‘“Gender is no substitute for sex”: a comparative human rights
analysis of the legal regulation of sexual identity.’ Feminist Legal Studies 13: 6796.
Strathern, Marilyn 1992. Reproducing the Future: Essays on Anthropology, Kinship
and the New Reproductive Technologies, chaps. 1-3.
Edwards, Jeanette 2004. ‘Incorporating incest: gamete, body and relation in assisted
conception.’ Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 10 (4): 755-774.
Franklin, Sarah 1997. Embodied Progress: a Cultural Account of Assisted Conception,
especially chap. 5
Cannell, Fenella 1990, ‘Concepts of parenthood: the Warnock report, the Gillick debate
and modern myths.’ American Ethnologist 17(4): 667-88.
Butler, Judith 2002. ‘Is kinship always already heterosexual?’ Differences 13 (1): 1444.
Edwards, Jeanette and Marilyn Strathern, 2000 ‘Including our own.’ In Janet Carsten
(ed.) Cultures of Relatedness, pp. 149-166.
For Discussion: Gay kinship
1.
In what ways does gay kinship raise particular questions for anthropologists?
2.
How are ideas about biology deployed by gay people in either of the cases
below?
Weston, Kay 1995. ‘Forever is a long time: romancing the real in gay kinship
ideologies.’ In S. Yanagisako and C. Delaney (eds) Naturalizing Power: Essays
in Feminist Cultural Analysis; OR
Hayden, Corinne P. 1995 ‘Gender, genetics, and generation: reformulating biology in
lesbian kinship.’ Cultural Anthropology 10 (1): 41-63.
Tutorial Readings: Giving nature a helping hand
Ragoné, Helena 1996. ‘Chasing the blood tie: surrogate mothers, adoptive mothers
and fathers.’ American Ethnologist 23 (2): 352-365; OR
Thompson, Charis 2001. ‘Strategic naturalizing: kinship in an infertility clinic.’ In Sarah
Franklin & Susan McKinnon (eds.) Relative Values: Reconfiguring Kinship
Studies; OR
Kahn, Susan Martha 2000. ‘Eggs and wombs: the origins of Jewishness.’ In
Reproducing Jews: a Cultural Account of Assisted Conception in Israel., pp. 11239 [also pp 362-77 in Parkin & Stone (eds)]
WEEK 7: The house: work and memory (Guest lecture: Dr Siobhan Magee)
In which contexts is ‘the house’ used as an idiom of relatedness? Which practices and
beliefs show houses to be repositories for the transmission of emotional values,
memories, and material possessions associated with the family? The lecture will
discuss how ideas about houses, and what happens inside of them, pose questions
about work and labour. How might anthropological thought on the ‘the house’ be useful
for discussing a comparable nexus of sentiments, labour, and, intergenerational
relations: the family business?
*Carsten, Janet & Hugh-Jones, Stephen 1995. ‘Introduction’ to About the House: LéviStrauss and Beyond.
*Dunn, Elizabeth C. 2004. In Privatizing Poland: Baby Food, Big Business and the
Remaking of Labor. Cornell, chap. 5 (‘Ideas of kin and home on the shop floor’)
Bourdieu, Pierre 1990 ‘The Kabyle house or the world reversed.’ Appendix in The Logic
of Practice. Stanford University Press, pp. 271-283.
Bloch, Maurice 1995. ‘The resurrection of the house among the Zafimaniry of
Madagascar.’ In Janet Carsten & Stephen Hugh-Jones (eds.) About the House:
Lévi-Strauss and Beyond, pp. 69-83.
Bahloul, Joëlle 1996. The Architecture of Memory: A Jewish-Muslim Household in
Colonial Algeria, 1937-1962. Cambridge University Press.
Carsten, Janet 2004. After Kinship, chap. 2
Weismantel, Mary 1995. ‘Making kin: kinship theory and Zumabagua adoptions.’
American Ethnologist 22 (4): 685-704.
Pine, Frances 1996. ‘Naming the house and naming the land: kinship and social
groups in the Polish highlands.’ Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 2:
443-459. OR ‘Memories of movement and stillness of place: kinship memory in
the Polish highlands’, in Janet Carsten (ed.) Ghosts of Memory: Essays on
Remembrance and Relatedness, chap. 5.
Yanagisako, Sylvia J. 2002. Producing Culture and Capital: Family Firms in Italy.
Princeton UP, ‘Introduction’ and chap. 3 (‘The generation of firms’).
For discussion: The house in the diaspora
1.
In what ways can houses come to embody familial memory?
2.
How do processes of dislocation impact on the symbolism of houses?
Leinaweaver, Jessaca B. 2009. ‘Raising the roof in the Transnational Andes: building
houses, forging kinship.’ Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 15: 777-796.
OR
Silverstein, Paul A. 2004. ‘Of rooting and uprooting. Kabyle habitus, domesticity and
structural nostalgia.’ Ethnography 5(4): 553-578.
Tutorial Reading: Disruption and the problem of cumulative continuity
Carsten, Janet 2000. ‘“Knowing where you’ve come from”: ruptures and continuities
of time and kinship in narratives of adoption reunions.’ Journal of the Royal
Anthropological Institute (N.S.) 6: 687-703.
WEEK 8: Kinship, law, politics and economics [AG]
This session examines how kinship, economics, law and politics are related. How do
national histories intertwine with family histories? How and why do the state and its
agents intervene in the intimate spaces of family and kinship? How are notions of
marriage, genealogy and intimacy framed by projects of liberal citizenship?
*Carsten, Janet 2004. After Kinship. chap. 6.
*Bloch, Maurice 1973. ‘The long term and the short term: the economic and political
significance of the morality of kinship.’ In J. Goody (ed) The Character of Kinship.
Goody, Jack 1969. ‘Inheritance, property, and marriage in Africa and Eurasia.’
Sociology 3: 557 [also pp 110-18 in Parkin & Stone (eds)]
Mody, Perveez 2002. ‘Love and the law: love-marriage in Delhi.’ Modern Asian Studies
36 (1): 223-56.
Charsley, Katharine 2005. ‘Unhappy husbands: masculinity and migration in
transnational Pakistani marriages.’ Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute
11 (1): 85-105.
Carsten, Janet 1989. ‘Cooking money: gender and the transformation of means of
exchange in a Malay fishing community.’ Pp 117-41 in Maurice Bloch & Jonathan
Parry (eds) Money and the Morality of Exchange.
Yanagisako, Sylvia 2002. Producing Culture and Capital: Family Firms in Italy, chap.
3
Class discussion
How does kinship become an idiom of national ideology in contemporary nation states?
Das, Veena 1995. ‘National honour and practical kinship: unwanted women and
children.’ Pp 55-83 in her book Critical Events; also pp 212-232 in Faye Ginsburg
& Rayna Rapp (eds) Conceiving the new world order: global politics of
reproduction; OR
Delaney, Carol 1995. ‘Father state, motherland, and the birth of modern Turkey.’ Pp
177-99 in Sylvia Yanagisako & Carol Delaney (eds) Naturalizing Power.
Tutorial reading:
Stoler, Ann 1995. ‘“Mixed-bloods” and the cultural politics of European identity in
colonial Southeast Asia.’ In J.N. Pieterse and B. Parekh (eds) The
Decolonisation of the Imagination, pp. 128-48
WEEK 9: The kids are alright: how children make families (Guest lecture: Koreen
Reece)
Over the course of the semester, we have discussed descent, procreation,
reproductive technologies, and parenthood – all of which frame kinship in terms of
producing children. But how do children produce kinship? This lecture will explore the
ways in which children actively shape kinship, in their circulation, the care they provide,
and the choices they make; and it will consider the unique role children play in adapting
kinship to socio-political change. We will also explore the contradictions that arise
between children’s marked agency in kinship, and humanitarian discourses around
children’s vulnerability and their need for protection. What do anthropological
perspectives on children and kinship suggest for our understanding of children’s ‘best
interests’? And what can they tell us about how contemporary interventions to secure
children’s welfare are reshaping kinship?
Week 9 continued
*Leinaweaver, Jessaca B. 2007. ‘Choosing to move: child agency on Peru’s margins.’
Childhood 14 (3): 375-392.
*Carsten, Janet 1991. ‘Children in between: fostering and the process of kinship on
Pulau Langkawi, Malaysia.’ Man (New Series) 26 (3): 425-443.
Stack, Carol 1970. All Our Kin: Strategies for Survival in a Black Community. New
York: Harper Colophon Books. chap. 5.
Leinaweaver, Jessaca B. 2007. ‘On moving children: the social implications of Andean
child circulation.’ American Ethnologist 34 (1): 163-180.
Weismantel, Mary 1995. ‘Making kin: kinship theory and Zumabagua adoptions.’
American Ethnologist 22 (4): 685-704.
Bornstein, Erica 2001. ‘Child Sponsorship, Evangelism, and Belonging in the Work of
World Vision Zimbabwe.’ American Ethnologist 28 (3): 595-622.
Malkki, Liisa 2010. ‘Children, humanity, and the infantilization of peace.’ In Ilana
Feldman & Miriam Ticktin (eds.) In the Name of Humanity: The Government of
Threat and Care, pp. 58-85.
For discussion: Children, families, and ‘best interests’
1.
How do children make families?
2.
What do anthropological perspectives on kinship and children suggest about
understanding children’s ‘best interests’? What ought the role of humanitarian
interventions that seek to help children (like UNICEF or Save the Children) to
be?
Meintjes, Helen and Sonja Giese 2006. ‘Spinning the epidemic: the making of
mythologies of orphanhood in the context of AIDS.’ Childhood 13(3):407-430.
Mayblin, Maya 2010. ‘Learning courage: child labour as moral practice in Northeast
Brazil.’ Ethnos 75 (1): 23-48.
Tutorial Reading: Children and the dangers of kinship
De Boeck, Filip 2005. ‘The divine seed: children, gift and witchcraft in the Democratic
Republic of Congo.’ In Alcinda Honwana and Filip De Boeck (eds.) Makers and
Breakers: Children and Youth in Postcolonial Africa, pp. 188-214.
WEEK 10: What kinship is [AG, with AB]
Is Sahlins’ recent definition of kinship as ‘mutuality of being’ a persuasive contribution
to anthropological debates about kinship?
*Sahlins, Marshall 2011a. ‘What kinship is (part one)’ Journal of the Royal
Anthropological Institute 17: 2-19.
*–––– 2011b. ‘What kinship is (part two)’, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute
17: 227-242.
See also ‘Symposium on Marshal Sahlins, What Kinship Is - And Is Not.’ Hau: Journal
of Ethnographic Theory 3 (2): 245-316 (2013).
For discussion: Course review
A review of the course, and of different ways in which anthropologists and those they
study have understood the nature of kinship, and its emotional power. Feel free to raise
issues or questions that intrigue or puzzle you. Other sources you might wish to
consider, in addition to those listed in earlier classes, include:
Fortes, Meyer 1970. Kinship and the Social Order: The Legacy of Lewis Henry Morgan,
chap 11: ‘Kinship and the axiom of amity’.
Strathern, Andrew 1973. ‘Kinship, descent and locality: some New Guinea examples.’
In J. Goody (ed) The Character of Kinship.
Peletz, M. 2001. ‘Ambivalence in kinship since the Forties.’ In Sarah Franklin and
Susan McKinnon (eds.) Relative Values: Reconfiguring Kinship Studies.
Ingold, Tim 2007. ‘Genealogical lines.’ In Lines: A Brief History
Lambek, Michael 2011.‘Kinship as gift and theft: acts of succession in Mayotte and
ancient Israel.’ American Ethnologist 38: 2-16.
McKinley, R. 2001. ‘The philosophy of kinship: a reply to Schneider’s Critique of the
Study of Kinship.’ In R. Feinberg and M. Ottenheimer (eds) The Cultural Analysis
of Kinship: The Legacy of David M. Schneider, pp. 131-167
APPENDIX 1 – SUBMISSION & ASSESSMENT INFORMATION
Word Count Penalties
Short Essay:
Your short essay should be a maximum of 1500 words (excluding bibliography).
Essays above 1500 words will be penalised using the Ordinary level criterion of 1 mark
for every 20 words over length: anything between 1500 and 1520 words will lose one
mark, between 1500 and 1540 two marks, and so on.
You will not be penalised for submitting work below the word limit. However, you should
note that shorter essays are unlikely to achieve the required depth and that this will be
reflected in your mark.
ELMA: Submission and return of coursework
Coursework is submitted online using our electronic submission system, ELMA. You
will not be required to submit a paper copy of your work.
Marked coursework, grades and feedback will be returned to you via ELMA. You will
not receive a paper copy of your marked course work or feedback.
For information, help and advice on submitting coursework and accessing feedback,
please see the ELMA wiki at:
https://www.wiki.ed.ac.uk/pages/viewpage.action?title=ELMA&spaceKey=SPSITWiki
Further detailed guidance on the essay deadline and a link to the wiki and submission
page will be available on the course Learn page. The wiki is the primary source of
information on how to submit your work correctly and provides advice on approved file
formats, uploading cover sheets and how to name your files correctly.
When you submit your work electronically, you will be asked to tick a box confirming
that your work complies with university regulations on plagiarism. This confirms that
the work you have submitted is your own.
Occasionally, there can be technical problems with a submission. We request that you
monitor your university student email account in the 24 hours following the deadline
for submitting your work. If there are any problems with your submission the course
secretary will email you at this stage.
We undertake to return all coursework within 15 working days of submission. This time
is needed for marking, moderation, second marking and input of results. If there are
any unanticipated delays, it is the course organiser’s responsibility to inform you of the
reasons.
All our coursework is assessed anonymously to ensure fairness: to facilitate
this process put your Examination number (on your student card), not your
name or student number, on your coursework or cover sheet.
Return of Feedback:
Feedback for coursework will be returned online via ELMA the following dates:
Short Essay = 19.03.2015
Exam= TBC
Procedure for Viewing Marked Exam Scripts:
If you would like to see your exam script after the final marks have been published then
you should contact the course secretary by email to arrange a time to do this. Please
note that there will be no feedback comments written on the scripts, but you may find
it useful to look at what you wrote, and see the marks achieved for each individual
question. You will not be permitted to keep the exam script but you are welcome to
take it away to read over or make photocopies. If you wish to do this please bring a
form of ID that can be left at the office until you return the script. Please note that
scripts cannot be taken away overnight.
The Operation of Lateness Penalties
Unlike in Years 1 and 2, NO EXTENSIONS ARE GRANTED WITH RESPECT TO THE
SUBMISSION DEADLINES FOR ANY ASSESSED WORK At HONOURS LEVEL.
Managing deadlines is a basic life-skill that you are expected to have acquired by the
time you reach Honours. Timely submission of all assessed items (coursework,
essays, project reports, etc.) is a vitally important responsibility at this stage in your
university career. Unexcused lateness can put at risk your prospects of proceeding to
Senior Honours and can damage your final degree grade.
If you miss the submission deadline for any piece of assessed work 5 marks will be
deducted for each calendar day that work is late, up to a maximum of five calendar
days (25 marks). Thereafter, a mark of zero will be recorded. There is no grace period
for lateness and penalties begin to apply immediately following the deadline. For
example, if the deadline is Tuesday at 12 noon, work submitted on Tuesday at
12.01pm will be marked as one day late, work submitted at 12.01pm on Wednesday
will be marked as two days late, and so on.
Failure to submit an item of assessed work will result in a mark of zero, with potentially
very serious consequences for your overall degree class, or no degree at all. It is
therefore always in your interest to submit work, even if very late.
Please be aware that all work submitted is returned to students with a
provisional mark and without applicable penalties in the first instance. The mark
you receive on ELMA is therefore subject to change following the consideration
of the Lateness Penalty Waiver Panel (please see below for further information)
and the Board of Examiners.
How to Submit a Lateness Penalty Waiver Form (LPW)
If there are extenuating circumstances beyond your control which make it essential for
you to submit work after the deadline you must fill in a ‘Lateness Penalty Waiver’ (LPW)
form to state the reason for your lateness. This is a request for any applicable penalties
to be removed and will be considered by the Lateness Penalty Waiver Panel.
Before submitting an LPW, please consider carefully whether your circumstances are
(or were) significant enough to justify the lateness. Such circumstances should be
serious and exceptional (e.g. not a common cold or a heavy workload). Computer
failures are not regarded as justifiable reason for late submission. You are expected
to regularly back-up your work and allow sufficient time for uploading it to ELMA.
How to Submit a Lateness Penalty Waiver Form (LPW) continued
You should submit the LPW form and supply an expected date of submission as soon
as you are able to do so, and preferably before the deadline. Depending on the
circumstances, supporting documentation may be required, so please be prepared to
provide this where possible.
LPW forms can be found in a folder outside your SSO’s office, on online at:
http://www.sps.ed.ac.uk/undergrad/on_course_students/assessment_and_regulation
s/coursework_requirements/coursework_requirements_honours
Forms should be returned by email or, if possible, in person to your SSO. They will
sign the form to indicate receipt and will be able to advise you if you would like further
guidance or support.
Please Note: Signing the LPW form by either your SSO or Personal Tutor only
indicates acknowledgment of the request, not the waiving of lateness penalties. Final
decisions on all marks rest with Examination Boards.
There is a dedicated SSO for students in each subject area in SPS. To find out who
your SSO is, and how to contact them, please find your home subject area on the table
below:
Name of
Email
SSO
Phone
Politics
TBC
TBC
0131
650
4253
International
Relations
Rebecca
Shade
Rebecca.Shade@ed.ac.uk
0131
651
3896
Social
Anthropology
Vanessa
Feldberg
0131
Vanessa.Feldberg@ed.ac.uk 650
3933
Social Policy
Louise
Angus
L.Angus@ed.ac.uk
0131
650
3923
Social Work
Jane
Marshall
Jane.Marshall@ed.ac.uk
0131
650
3912
Sociology
Karen
Dargo
Karen.Dargo@ed.ac.uk
0131
651
1306
Sustainable
Development
Sue
Renton
Sue.Renton@ed.ac.uk
0131
650
6958
Subject Area
Office
Room 1.11,
Chrystal
Macmillan
Building
Room 1.10,
Chrystal
Macmillan
Building
Room 1.04,
Chrystal
Macmillan
Building
Room 1.08,
Chrystal
Macmillan
Building
Room 1.07,
Chrystal
Macmillan
Building
Room 1.03,
Chrystal
Macmillan
Building
Room 1.09,
Chrystal
Macmillan
Building
If you are a student from another School, you should submit your LPW to the SSO for
the subject area of the course, Vanessa Feldberg.
Plagiarism Guidance for Students: Avoiding Plagiarism:
Material you submit for assessment, such as your essays, must be your own work.
You can, and should, draw upon published work, ideas from lectures and class
discussions, and (if appropriate) even upon discussions with other students, but you
must always make clear that you are doing so. Passing off anyone else’s work
(including another student’s work or material from the Web or a published author) as
your own is plagiarism and will be punished severely.
When you upload your work to ELMA you will be asked to check a box to confirm the
work is your own. ELMA automatically runs all submissions through ‘Turnitin’, our
plagiarism detection software, and compares every essay against a constantlyupdated database, which highlights all plagiarised work. Assessed work that contains
plagiarised material will be awarded a mark of zero, and serious cases of plagiarism
will also be reported to the College Academic Misconduct officer. In either case, the
actions taken will be noted permanently on the student's record.
For further details on plagiarism see the Academic Services’ website:
http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/academicservices/students/undergraduate/discipline/plagiarism
Data Protection Guidance for Students:
In most circumstances, students are responsible for ensuring that their work with
information about living, identifiable individuals complies with the requirements of the
Data Protection Act. The document, Personal Data Processed by Students, provides
an explanation of why this is the case. It can be found, with advice on data protection
compliance and ethical best practice in the handling of information about living,
identifiable individuals, on the Records Management section of the University website
at:
http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/records-management-section/dataprotection/guidance-policies/dpforstudents
APPENDIX 2 – GENERAL INFORMATION
Learning Resources for Undergraduates:
The Study Development Team at the Institute for Academic Development (IAD)
provides resources and workshops aimed at helping all students to enhance their
learning skills and develop effective study techniques. Resources and workshops
cover a range of topics, such as managing your own learning, reading, note making,
essay and report writing, exam preparation and exam techniques.
The study development resources are housed on 'LearnBetter' (undergraduate), part
of Learn, the University's virtual learning environment. Follow the link from the IAD
Study Development web page to enrol: www.ed.ac.uk/iad/undergraduates
Workshops are interactive: they will give you the chance to take part in activities, have
discussions, exchange strategies, share ideas and ask questions. They are 90 minutes
long and held on Wednesday afternoons at 1.30pm or 3.30pm. The schedule is
available from the IAD Undergraduate web page (see above).
Workshops are open to all undergraduates but you need to book in advance, using the
MyEd booking system. Each workshop opens for booking 2 weeks before the date of
the workshop itself. If you book and then cannot attend, please cancel in advance
through MyEd so that another student can have your place. (To be fair to all students,
anyone who persistently books on workshops and fails to attend may be barred from
signing up for future events).
Study Development Advisors are also available for an individual consultation if you
have specific questions about your own approach to studying, working more
effectively, strategies for improving your learning and your academic work. Please
note, however, that Study Development Advisors are not subject specialists so they
cannot comment on the content of your work. They also do not check or proof read
students' work.
To make an appointment
iad.study@ed.ac.uk
with
a
Study
Development
Advisor,
email
(For support with English Language, you should contact the English Language
Teaching Centre).
Discussing Sensitive Topics:
The discipline of Social Anthropology addresses a number of topics that some might
find sensitive or, in some cases, distressing. You should read this handbook carefully
and if there are any topics that you may feel distressed by you should seek advice from
the course convenor and/or your Personal Tutor.
For more general issues you may consider seeking the advice of the Student
Counselling Service, http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/student-counselling
Guide to Using LEARN for Online Tutorial Sign-Up:
The following is a guide to using LEARN to sign up for your tutorial. If you have any
problems using the LEARN sign up, please contact the course secretary, Ewen Miler,
by email (Ewen.Miller@ed.ac.uk).
Tutorial sign up will open after the first lecture has taken place, and will normally close
at 12 noon on the Friday of Week 1 (16 January 2015).
Step 1 – Accessing LEARN course pages
Access to LEARN is through the MyEd Portal. You will be given a log-in and password
during Freshers’ Week. Once you are logged into MyEd, you should see a tab called
‘Courses’ which will list the active LEARN pages for your courses under ‘myLEARN’.
Step 2 – Welcome to LEARN
Once you have clicked on the relevant course from the list, you will see the Course
Content page. There will be icons for the different resources available, including one
called ‘Tutorial Sign Up’. Please take note of any instructions there.
Step 3 – Signing up for your tutorial
Clicking on Tutorial Sign Up will take you to the sign up page where all the available
tutorial groups are listed along with the running time and location.
Once you have selected the group you would like to attend, click on the ‘Sign up’
button. A confirmation screen will display.
IMPORTANT: If you change your mind after having chosen a tutorial you cannot
go back and change it and you will need to email the course secretary.
Reassignments once tutorials are full or after the sign-up period has closed will
only be made in exceptional circumstances.
Tutorials have restricted numbers and it is important to sign up as soon as
possible. The tutorial sign up will only be available until 12 noon on the Friday
of Week 1 (16.01.2015) so that everyone is registered to a group ahead of
tutorials commencing in Week 2. If you have not yet signed up for a tutorial by
this time you will be automatically assigned to a group which you will be
expected to attend.
External Examiner
The External Examiner for the Social Anthropology Honours programme is:
Dr Matei Candea
Lecturer, Division of Social Anthropology
Department of Archaeology & Anthropology
University of Cambridge
Free School Lane
CAMBRIDGE CB2 3RF