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PROCESS IN THE CHINESE KINSHIP SYSTEM
Author(s) -
KROEBER A. L.
Publication year - 1933
Publication title -
american anthropologist
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.51
H-Index - 85
eISSN - 1548-1433
pISSN - 0002-7294
DOI - 10.1525/aa.1933.35.1.02a00150
Subject(s) - kinship , citation , history , process (computing) , library science , genealogy , sociology , anthropology , computer science , programming language
PROCESS IN THE CHINESE KINSHIP SYSTEM By A. L. KROEBER THE last for 1932, Chen I N and Shryock number of the article on Chinese Terms of Relationship contribute an AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST which is both valuable for its material and penetrating in its analysis. In one respect their interpretation can be carried farther. The Chinese system appears to consist of a classificatory, that is non-descriptive,l base, which has been made over by additions into a descriptive system similar in its working to the English one, in fact is more precisely and suc cessfully descriptive than this. Relationships through males and through females have not been merged as in West European systems; distinction between elder and younger siblings has been kept; and at the same time the number of describing terms is greater than in Europe. The consequence is that the Chinese distinguish precisely, by terms or phrases of specific denotation, a greater number of relationships than we do, without having recourse to circumlocutory or enumerative phrases; and at the same time they have kept more of their former presumably non-descriptive base. In short, their system shows how a non-descriptive system was made over into a descriptive one by devices different from and independent of our own yet very similar so far as their effect or functioning goes. The pointing out of this change is the purpose of the present paper. The kernel or base of the Chinese system is as follows. Fu, f. MU,m. Tzu, son (also child). NU, d. Hsiung, o. br. Ti, y. br. Tzu, o. sis. Mei, y. sis. Tsu, gr. par. (specifically, f.'s f.) Sun, gr. ch. (specifically, son's son) 1 The term classificatory continues to be used, although all the discussion about it does not meet the objection long ago raised that fundamentally the common criterion of classi ficatory systems is that they are different from European ones. Until the term is purged of this culturally egocentric connotation, it is as unfortunate as agglutinative in linguistics, Turanian in ethnology, and irrational as a means of distinguishing the other animals from man. Important, too, is Lowie's point (AA 30: 264, 1928) that classificatory and descrip tive are logically not complementary.