Iroquois kinship (also known as bifurcate merging) is a

kinship In anthropology, kinship is the web of social relationships that form an important part of the lives of all humans in all societies, although its exact meanings even within this discipline are often debated. Anthropologist Robin Fox says that ...

system named after the

Haudenosaunee The Iroquois ( ), also known as the Five Nations, and later as the Six Nations from 1722 onwards; alternatively referred to by the Endonym and exonym, endonym Haudenosaunee ( ; ) are an Iroquoian languages, Iroquoian-speaking Confederation#Ind ...

people, also known as the ''Iroquois'', whose kinship system was the first one described to use this particular type of system. Identified by Lewis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work '' Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family'', the Iroquois system is one of the six major kinship systems (

Eskimo ''Eskimo'' () is a controversial Endonym and exonym, exonym that refers to two closely related Indigenous peoples: Inuit (including the Alaska Native Iñupiat, the Canadian Inuit, and the Greenlandic Inuit) and the Yupik peoples, Yupik (or Sibe ...

, Hawaiian, Iroquois,

Crow A crow is a bird of the genus ''Corvus'', or more broadly, a synonym for all of ''Corvus''. The word "crow" is used as part of the common name of many species. The related term "raven" is not linked scientifically to any certain trait but is rathe ...

Omaha Omaha ( ) is the List of cities in Nebraska, most populous city in the U.S. state of Nebraska. It is located in the Midwestern United States along the Missouri River, about north of the mouth of the Platte River. The nation's List of United S ...

, and Sudanese).

Kinship system

The system has both classificatory and

descriptive In the study of language, description or descriptive linguistics is the work of objectively analyzing and describing how language is actually used (or how it was used in the past) by a speech community. François & Ponsonnet (2013). All aca ...

terms. In addition to gender and generation, Iroquois kinship also distinguishes 'same-sex' and 'cross-sex' parental siblings: the brothers of Ego's (the subject from whose perspective the kinship is based) father, and the sisters of Ego's mother, are referred to by the same parental kinship terms used for Ego's Father and Mother. The sisters of Ego's father, and the brothers of Ego's mother, on the other hand, are referred to by non-parental kinship terms, commonly translated into English as "Aunt" and "Uncle". The children of one's parents' same-sex siblings, i.e. parallel cousins, are referred to by sibling kinship terms. The children of Aunts or Uncles, i.e. cross cousins, are not considered siblings, and are referred to by kinship terms commonly translated into English as "cousin". In some systems, the kinship terms applied to cross-cousins are the same as those applied to brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law, due to preferential marriage practices (see below).

Marriage

Ego (the subject from whose perspective the kinship is based) is encouraged to marry his cross-cousins but discouraged or prohibited from marrying his parallel cousins. In many societies with Iroquois kinship terminologies, the preferred marriage partners include not only first cousins (mother's brother's children and father's sister's children), but more remote relatives who are also classified as cross-cousins by the logic of the kinship system. Preferential cross-cousin marriage can be useful in reaffirming alliances between unilineal lineages or

clan A clan is a group of people united by actual or perceived kinship and descent. Even if lineage details are unknown, a clan may claim descent from a founding member or apical ancestor who serves as a symbol of the clan's unity. Many societie ...

Usage

The term Iroquois comes from the six

Iroquois The Iroquois ( ), also known as the Five Nations, and later as the Six Nations from 1722 onwards; alternatively referred to by the Endonym and exonym, endonym Haudenosaunee ( ; ) are an Iroquoian languages, Iroquoian-speaking Confederation#Ind ...

tribes of northeastern North America. Another aspect of their kinship was that the six tribes all had

matrilineal Matrilineality, at times called matriliny, is the tracing of kinship through the female line. It may also correlate with a social system in which people identify with their matriline, their mother's lineage, and which can involve the inheritan ...

systems, in which children were born into the mother's

and gained status through it. Women controlled some property, and hereditary leadership passed through the maternal line. A woman's eldest brother was more important as a mentor to her children than their father, who was always of a different clan. "Iroquois tradition had the lineage of the clan or tribe traced through the mother's side. However, the amount of power women held in the tribe decreased with time due to the American revolution." (Lappas, Thomas). Some groups in other countries also happen to be independently organized for kinship by the Iroquois system. It is commonly found in unilineal descent groups. These include: #The

Anishinaabe The Anishinaabe (alternatively spelled Anishinabe, Anicinape, Nishnaabe, Neshnabé, Anishinaabeg, Anishinabek, Aanishnaabe) are a group of culturally related Indigenous peoples of the Americas, Indigenous peoples in the Great Lakes region of C ...

of North America, who include the Algonquin, Nipissing,

Mississauga Mississauga is a Canadian city in the province of Ontario. Situated on the north-western shore of Lake Ontario in the Regional Municipality of Peel, it borders Toronto (Etobicoke) to the east, Brampton to the north, Milton to the northwest, ...

Ojibwe The Ojibwe (; Ojibwe writing systems#Ojibwe syllabics, syll.: ᐅᒋᐺ; plural: ''Ojibweg'' ᐅᒋᐺᒃ) are an Anishinaabe people whose homeland (''Ojibwewaki'' ᐅᒋᐺᐘᑭ) covers much of the Great Lakes region and the Great Plains, n ...

Saulteaux The Saulteaux (pronounced , or in imitation of the French pronunciation , also written Salteaux, Saulteau and Ojibwa ethnonyms, other variants), otherwise known as the Plains Ojibwe, are a First Nations in Canada, First Nations band governm ...

Odawa The Odawa (also Ottawa or Odaawaa ) are an Indigenous North American people who primarily inhabit land in the Eastern Woodlands region, now in jurisdictions of the northeastern United States and southeastern Canada. Their territory long prec ...

and

Potawatomi The Potawatomi (), also spelled Pottawatomi and Pottawatomie (among many variations), are a Native American tribe of the Great Plains, upper Mississippi River, and western Great Lakes region. They traditionally speak the Potawatomi language, ...

peoples. Many of these people were traditional neighbors to the Iroquois, but they spoke languages of the Algonquian family. Other populations found to have the Iroquois system are #Most of the Bantu-speaking cultures of Eastern and Southern

sub-Saharan Africa Sub-Saharan Africa is the area and regions of the continent of Africa that lie south of the Sahara. These include Central Africa, East Africa, Southern Africa, and West Africa. Geopolitically, in addition to the list of sovereign states and ...

— see Sesotho kinship for an example. #Many

Melanesia Melanesia (, ) is a subregion of Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It extends from New Guinea in the west to the Fiji Islands in the east, and includes the Arafura Sea. The region includes the four independent countries of Fiji, Vanu ...

n societies.

South India and Sri Lanka

Some communities in

South India South India, also known as Southern India or Peninsular India, is the southern part of the Deccan Peninsula in India encompassing the states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Telangana as well as the union territories of ...

use the kinship tradition described above.

Melanesia

Many of the cultures of

Vanuatu Vanuatu ( or ; ), officially the Republic of Vanuatu (; ), is an island country in Melanesia located in the South Pacific Ocean. The archipelago, which is of volcanic origin, is east of northern Australia, northeast of New Caledonia, east o ...

use this type of kinship system. In

Bislama Bislama ( ; ; also known by its earlier French name, ) is an English-based creole language. It is the national language of Vanuatu, and one of the three official languages of the country, the other ones being English and French. Bislama is the ...

(Vanuatu pidgin), paternal uncles and maternal aunts are referred to as ''smol papa'' "small father" and ''smol mama'' "small mother" respectively.

References

* Lappas, Thomas. ""for God and Home and Native Land": The Haudenosaunee and the Women's Christian Temperance Union, 1884–1921." ''Journal of Women's History'' 29.2 (2017): 62-85. ''ProQuest.'' Web. 28 Feb. 2022. * Starna, William A. "Lewis H. Morgan on Iroquois Material Culture." ''The American Indian Quarterly'', vol. 20, no. 1, winter 1996, pp. 137+. ''Gale Academic OneFile'', link.gale.com/apps/doc/A18832341/AONE?u=tel_a_pstcc&sid=bookmark-AONE&xid=18e8d6c0. Accessed 1 Mar. 2022. *William Haviland, ''Cultural Anthropology'', Wadsworth Publishing, 2002.
The Nature of Kinship
*Hammond-Tooke, W. D., 2004. ttp://www.sahumanities.org/ojs/index.php/SAH/article/download/183/142 ''Southern Bantu origins: light from kinship terminology'' Southern African Humanities Vol. 16 Pages 71–78 Pietermaritzburg December, 2004 {{Family