Kinship and Descent

Kinship and descent are each notions that have been of particular preoccupation to social anthropologists, as much due to their importance as because of the difficulties they present. It is worthy to note their close link, stemming from a common social and biological character (only the former being necessary).

In particular, kinship refers to social relationships that usually coincide with biological ones. This is the case with the two forms of real kinship:consanguinity and affinity. Pseudokinship or fictitious kinshiptakes place when the social relationships simulate the ones arising through real kinship (consanguinity or affinity) but without any biological relationship. For example, in many societies, children who are breast-fed by the same mother are considered siblings. We can viewritual kinship as a special form of fictitious kinship, which necessitates a ritual for its creation, rituals such as godparenthood, adoption, or fraternization.

The term descent denotes the relationship that bonds the child to its mother or father, through which the elements that constitute the main characteristics of their status are transmitted. These include name, surname, heritage, and so on. Descent rules determine mainly membership to the parents' kinship groups; in other words, descent is more of a social convention than a biological relationship. Consanguinity may exist, but it is in no way a necessary requirement. For instance, we consider adopted individuals (fictitious or ritual kinship) to have the same descent as the members of the group that adopted them. Just as it applies to individuals, descent can pertain to groups when group members biologically descend from a common ancestor or when they declare this to be the case, as slaves did by assuming membership of their owner's kinship group.

[Page 1370]Morgan and especially Pitt-Rivers and Radcliffe-Brown formulated a series of theories that reproduction by way of descent is the main principle of kinship. These theories are known as descent theories. A different view to these older theories is aired by Lévi-Strauss's alliance theory, which links the exchange of women and the interdiction of incest as the organizational principles of kinship.

In all societies, kinship and descent are two different notions: Kinship is a social relationship that may or may not coincide with a biological one; descent is a social convention that may require a biological relationship.