Significance of Kinship

The Significance / Importance of Kinship

The people relationship system based on mating and reproduction is one of the deepest forms of primary differentiation regulating most people’s socialization and assembly in clans and other groups. Kinship relations are so widespread and important in pre-industrial societies that one can conclude that they are a structural framework of the societies. Kinship in other more complex societies is not only a structure but a part of a web-like system.

1. Role of Kinship: Kinship systems in the community are accepted family relationships through blood relationships, which are called consanguinity and marriage relationships, which are also called affinity. In most pre-industrial societies, a familiar bond is the central identifier of social affiliation; it dictates people’s interaction, grouping, and assimilation of strangers. Each family has norms for interpersonal connections, which are extremely important when it comes to forming affiliations and absorption of new factions or congregations.

2. Kinship in Different Societies: However, agreement on who has a right to what is a central issue in rights and responsibilities of most cultures and Western societies, but equally important are other social structures like workplace citizenship and common economic or political interest. However, as stated earlier, kinship is still important in industrialized societies, for instance, through nuclearity and inheritance laws. Ceremonial times such as Thanksgiving in the United States bring out the importance of extended families.

3. Perception and Expectations of Kinship: As with most systems of social organization, many people tend to consider their system of kinship as the default and unchanging one. Endogamous marriages are restricted within certain epochs; however, nieces and cousins are forbidden in marriage and sexual contact and there is respect for the bond of consanguinity. The kinship rules describe the relationships between the relatives as well as the possible ways of interaction within these relationships, such as obedience, respect, friendship, avoidance, friendliness and defense. Such norms pass unnoticed and are part and parcel of everyday life until one is exposed to the variation exhibited by other social cultures. 

4. Functionality of Kinship Practices: Societies have, over time, been shaped by anthropologists depending on the evolution of their kinship system, although it is appreciated that these practices are functional in the particular society. They are valuable assets of society as they work to ensure that there is order and harmony within the society. However, it will not be beneficial for all practices and some of the customs, including sati, female infanticide and selective abortive practices, should not be blindly appreciable.

5. Modern Influences on Kinship: Today, the occupational system is responsible for a large part of the forces that shape the kinship system. For instance, a villager engaging in business in a town feels that he or she needs to put his or her roots down and build up a network of kinship in the town to assist in the promotion of the business. This shows how opportunities defined in the occupational domain can determine changes in the pattern of households and the kinship system.

Even though it is enmeshed within certain economic and social structures, kinship is fairly autonomic on the behavioural and organizational levels. Concerning kinship, practices should be reconstructed based on cultural acceptability and functional uses while at the same time assessing the drawbacks that may be posed to the worth of an independent individual as well as the welfare of society.