Marriage as Alliance

Describes types of marriage alliances; Bridewealth, Bride Labor, and Dowry are defined; Types of Cousin Marriage are detailed; Kinship terminology is reviewed

1. Marriage as Alliance
An Examination of Interfamilial
Politics

2. Marriage as Alliance
Another function of marriage is alliance formation between
lineages, clans, tribes, or even nations.
In European history, peace between nations was sealed by
monarchial marriage.
Yanomamö: highest alliance is sealed by marriage outside the
village.
Women marry their cross-cousins, affording her some kind of
protection against an abusive husband.
She has no such protection if she marries outside; marriage outside
the village must reflect high degree of trust.
The main ways to secure alliance are bridewealth and exchange
marriage

3. Bridewealth
Bridewealth—exchange of wealth such as cattle
for a bride—is more than a marriage transaction
Marriage means more than a loss of a daughter:
it is the loss of her reproductive power
Such a loss must be compensated.
Bridewealth entails payment by groom’s kin to
wife’s kin and ensures that the wife’s kin attracts
wives for its sons
Strengthens bond of kin through network of
obligations.

4. Bride Labor and Dowry
There are variations of bridewealth:
Bride labor ensures the woman’s family will be looked
after if her husband son proves his worth by working for
her family for a year or two.
The dowry is the transfer of wealth from wife’s family to
husband.
A condition is that he looks after wife’s welfare even after
his own death
A Dowry is also an assurance that the woman’s status is
on par with her husband’s

5. Exchange Theory: Mauss’s
Analysis of the Gift
Exchange, of bridewealth or of marriage partners creates and
maintains ties between two groups
Marcel Mauss identified three obligations of exchange, of the gift.
The first obligation is to give in order to form or create ties between
two groups (families, clans)
The second obligation is to receive in order to cement ties. Failure
to do so—a refusal of a gift--is to create hostilities.
The third obligation is to repay.
Failure to do so renders the recipient a beggar, resulting in his/her
inferior status.
So these obligations have the force of law, in the absence of formal
law as we know it.

6. Parallel and Cross-Cousin
Marriage
Marriage often involves these three obligations,
especially when the gift exchanges are persons for
marriage. There are two basic types:
Parallel cousin marriage is the marriage of a
person with his/her father’s brother’s child or
mother’s sister’s child
Cross-cousin marriage is the marriage of a person
with his/her sister’s brother’s child or mother’s
other’s brother’s child

7. Patrilateral Parallel Cousin
Marriage
Father’s brother’s children belong to
same patrilineal descent unit
Practiced among Arab nomadic peoples,
such as the Rwala Bedouin in various
parts of the Middle East
This type of marriage serves to preserve
wealth within extended family or lineage
The disadvantage is that it limits any
possible ties between two groups.
Why? Notice here that the couple
belongs to the same patrilineage.

8. Cross-Cousin Marriage
Notice from this diagram that the marriage
partners always belongs to different lineages.
(Marriage is indicated by the horizontal line
below the two figures; siblings are linked by
horizontal line above the two figures)
Why? Because crossing from one sex to the
opposite sex means that you also switch from
one lineage to the other; lineages are unisex.
Mother’s brother’s daughter: belongs to lineage
or clan of the brother
Father’s sister’s daughter: belongs to lineage
or clan of sister’s husband

9. Matrilateral Cross-Cousin
Marriage
Definition: marriage of man to his mother’s brother’s daughter,
He can never marry his father’s sister’s daughter
Man in lineage B takes his wife from Lineage A, but he can never
marry the woman in Lineage C
There are always at least 3 groups that marry in a circle.
Close study of this diagram shows why

10. Matrilateral Cross-Cousin
Marriage: Alliance Patterns
The result is that B can never return his marriage with woman from
A with his sister; she has to marry into Lineage C
Result: Lineage B is a “beggar” to Lineage A: likewise C is a beggar
to Lineage B.
This type of marriage often occurs in stratified societies.

11. Patrilateral Cross-Cousin Marriage
Woman is man’s father’s sister’s daughter
But man is woman’s mother’s brother’s son
Again, male is reference point
Pattern is somewhat more complicated
and rarer in occurrence
Structural implications will be bypassed

12. Bilateral Cross-Cousin Marriage
Two definitions
Man marries either his mother’s brother’s
daughter or his father’s sister’s daughter OR
May marry the one and the same woman who is
his mother’s brother’s daughter AND his father’s
sister’s daughter
This diagram shows how. Carefully trace for the
men in the middle generation the two ties that
link them with their wives.
Result: the two lineages are always paired; this
is how the Yanomamö are organized.

13. Alliance Patterns: Bilateral Cross-
Cousin Marriage
Results: If you have only two lineages and everyone
marries a bilateral cross cousin, you have only one
choice of partner.
In a Yanomamö village, you have only two kinds of
people:
Your patrilineal kinsmen and kinswomen and
Your in-laws, whom you are eligible to marry.
That is why Yanomamö are divided into two halves.
These halves are known as moieties

14. Bilateral Cross-Cousin
Marriage: Results
When fissioning or splitting apart, the villages always divide in pairs
Two kinds of people: your kin and your future spouse’s kin
Iroquois cousin terminology that the Yanomamö villagers use reflect his:
Parallel cousins are terminologically the same as brother (Br) and sister (Z)
Cross-cousin are given different names (Co) : study this chart carefully;
notice the difference in terms of parallel cousins and cross-cousins.

15. Importance of Kin Terms: Bilateral
Reflect how cousins are to behave toward each other
Hawaiian: all cousins merge siblings with cousins.
Bilateral: marriage occurs outside kin covered by
terminology.
Eskimo: our own: immediate siblings separated from
cousins
Often found with nuclear families

16. Importance of Kin Terms:
Unilineal
Iroquois: Parallel cousins merged with siblings
Separated from cross cousins
Yanomamö: give indication of marriageable partners
Guinea: Cross-cousins separated from immediate
siblings and parallel cousins,
Matrilateral and patrilateral cross-cousins are separated
from each other.,
This distinction suggests that one type of cross-cousin
marriage--matrilateral or patrilateral marriage is preferred,
if not prescribed or mandates.

17. Kinship Terminology
Much more could be said
Omaha and Crow reflect
Patrilineal and matrilineal relations,
respectively
Main point: terms are “markers” of basic
relationships

18. Conclusion: Value of Marriage and
Kinship
Involves how gender relations are managed
Sexual relations
Division of labor
Marriage and childbirth
Involves relations outside immediate realm of kin
Economic rights and obligations (next)

Social control through other institutions