Prescriptive marriage alliance Research Papers (original) (raw)
Comparative ethnological research suggests that there is a certain uniformity to the patterns organising relationship terminology at a global level, which has made it possible to identify the general regularities that govern them. This... more
Comparative ethnological research suggests that there is a certain uniformity to the patterns organising relationship terminology at a global level, which has made it possible to identify the general regularities that govern them. This paper deals with an attempt to reconstruct the semantic evolution of the Old Lithuanian appellative mótė “wife; woman mother” through the prism of the changes taking place in the Baltic kinship system. It is suggested that the initial kinship system of the Balts coincided with the Omaha-type kinship-terminology system, formed in the Proto-Baltic period in connection with the popularization of cyclical form of generalized exchange between patrilineal descent groups, which act as a segments of larger exogamous groups. This exchange was based on a prescriptive unilateral marriage of a man with a matrilateral cross-cousin (mother’s brother’s daughter) or its more distantly related collateral counterpart, called “mother” in the Proto-Baltic kinship terminology (i.e. relative from the mother’s descent group). The high level of compliance with this defined norm regulating martial selection was maintained amongst Lithuanians probably until the mid-12th century, when, against the background of deepening socio-economic differences, there was a crisis of this form of matrimonial exchange. Despite this, the terminology of the Omaha type survived fragmentarily in the Lithuanian language until the 16th and 17th centuries, thus making it possible to try to highlight the structural features resulting from it. (The author assumes no responsibility for the English summary from the attatched paper).
Tarak Chandra Das (1898-1964) was an anthropologist of Calcutta University.Das conducted extensive fieldworks in Chotanagpur in the then Bihar and in Assam.Das was interested in the application of Anthropology.Two books written by T.C.... more
Tarak Chandra Das (1898-1964) was an anthropologist of Calcutta University.Das conducted extensive fieldworks in Chotanagpur in the then Bihar and in Assam.Das was interested in the application of Anthropology.Two books written by T.C. Das bears testimony of his observation and collection of data through anthropological fieldwork.. One is his monograph on the Purum Kuki tribe of north-eastern India. and the other is on the Great Bengal Famine during the Second World War.[Bengal famine (1943):As revealed in a survey of the destitutes of Calcutta,1949].