How The Kinship System Works In The San Culture

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How the kinship system works in the San culture Ashford University Introduction to Cultural Anthropology ANT 101 March 31, 2012 How the kinship system works in the San culture. In this paper I will describe what kinship is, how it affects the San culture, and how it relates to our own society. I will also discuss how kinship impacts the way the San culture think, acts, and lives. Kinship is another word for family. It can be anyone related to you from your parents down to your children’s kids and so on. It plays a very big role in the San society. In a band it mainly comprise of you and your immediate family like your father, mother, children and grandparents or your children’s children. Most bands are this way. Our test book explains this best. Nowak & Laird (2010) among foragers, there is a continuous movement of goods through kinship ties and residential proximity, which strengthens people's obligations to each other. The obligation to share, and the mobile lifestyle, inhibits the accumulation of individual wealth. No one exercises ownership in the form of access or control over resources; thus, there are no differences in wealth between people. (3.1 introduction, para.3) When a man wants to get married he has to follow strict rules set in place. They are not allowed to marry a second cousin or closer. Once a man gets married he and his wife return to the groom’s band to live. This helps the band create a bigger kinship which lives in different area that comes in handy during scarce or hard times. This is shown in our text book by Nowak & Laird (2010) Marriage strengthens economic, political, and social links between bands. It brings families closer together through the creation of new visiting and exchange relationships. These connections are important in band societies, because marriage ties extend the web of relationships so that in

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