Kin Groups

Scope Note

General statements dealing with several specific types of kin groups. In every society, individuals maintain interpersonal relationships, characterized by particular kinship terms and culturally patterned behavior, with each type of relative recognized by the prevailing kinship system. In addition, an individual is normally affiliated with one or more kin groups, each consisting of some, but not all, of his relatives. By "descent" is meant a cultural rule defining the types of relatives with whom an individual is affiliated in a kin group. It need not, and commonly does not, imply that these relatives are more closely akin to him than are those who do not belong to the same group. The major types of kin groups are defined in the narrower terms.