The Kinship System

The Kinship System

Kinship can be defined as a close connection marked by community of interests or similarity in nature or character. It is also a connection by blood or marriage or adoption. In this piece of work a Kannadiga family's kinship system in India will be described to illustrate and show the understanding of kinship.

In this assignment the family discussed is my family, who fall under the Kannadiga culture and religion: Hinduism. Families coming under this group of people, have a male ego which means that all kinship relationships are referred to the male of the family, that male being the eldest of the family, in his absence his wife is referred to as ego or the next eldest person of the family. In this case being my father. This culture follows a unilineal descent principle through the patrilineal descent of the family. The identity of the father (Fa) is passed on to the children or following generations and not the mother's (Mo). The children have the last name of the Fa's side. The marriage partners are decided by the parents and elders of the family, i.e. by Fa, Mo and grand parents from the Fa's side. This is known as the arranged marriage system which is widely followed in India, love marriages or selection of partner by choice is not very much appreciated and accepted in Indian cultures and religions. But in recent times the bridegroom has been able to select his own bride. After the marriage process the wife (Wi) has to leave her Fa's house and move's with the husband (Hu) in his or his Fa's house and joins his kinship system (Patrilineal descent). This is known as Virilocal or Patrilocal system.

The marriage preferably takes place only amongst the same cast; in this case Hindu Kannadigas which is the Endogamy way of marriage, but a marriage cannot take place if the male and female come under the Fa's descent or Mo's descent i.e. amongst cousins a marriage cannot take place. Along with time people have started accepting to get their children married in other casts, cultures and religion like Tamilians, Kerlities etc coming from different states of India if the male and female select each other by themselves (love marriage). The marriage is a monogamy marriage where there is only one spouse of each sex and they cannot have another spouse at the same time, but a second marriage can take place after the completion of first marriage due to divorce or death of a spouse but this has not been widely accepted in India and also in the Kannadiga culture, there are no certain rules for a widow to marry someone else, or a male should or can marry someone related to the female spouse as a substitute after the death of the life partner.

Many families follow the Extended family system where grandparents, parents, uncles and aunts and all children live together so that the new generation understands the meaning of family ties and bonds and all the rituals of