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Ring cohesion, as a theory relevant to social cohesion, offers itself in the analysis of matrimonial relinking as an outgrowth of a structural approach: "Structural studies are, in the social sciences, the indirect outcome of modern developments in mathematics which have given increasing importance to the qualitative point of view in contradistinct...
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Context 1
... A single empirical marriage may be of one or more ring types and many-but not all-different types of ring can co-occur. An example is shown in Figure 1, a ge- nealogical diagram with triangles for males, circles for females and squares for par- ents of both or either sex. To convert this to a p-graph, each couple is considered as a node, as in Figure 2. The marriage labeled A in diagram (a) in both figures is of two different types: sister exchange with B and FaBrDa. ...
Context 2
... the network in Figure 1(a): here there are two marriages and three branches within a single family. This is not a single ring, however, but multiple rings. ...
Context 3
... other is that close marriages that reinforce lineage cohesion, such as FaBrDa, are easily available with the high frequency of such coresident women available, and these also account for the highest percentage of marriages with those in any given marriage type. Given that the size of the consanguineal marriage cycles is sufficient to account for all the independent marriage, the nonconsanguineal relinkings may be considered for the most part as nonindependent cycles and by- products of consanguineal marriages, as in Figure 1. ...
Citations
... The only theory of marriage we could find that even mentions the term 'ring' is 'ring cohesion theory'. But it studies networks or rings of marriages and how they integrate social groups(White, 2004). 10 If this is adopted as an important goal within the discipline, it may result in different consilient theories. ...
We propose a bridge-builder perspective on social ontology. Our point of departure is that an important task of philosophy is to provide the bigger picture. To this end, it should investigate folk views and determine whether and how they can be preserved once scrutinized from the perspective of the sciences. However, the sciences typically present us with a fragmented picture of reality. Thus, an important intermediate step is to integrate the most promising social scientific theories with one another. In addition to this, social ontology can provide input to and benefit from other philosophical disciplines that engage in normative theorizing. Thus, we propose that social ontology connects not only with folk ontology and scientific ontology but also with fields such as ethics and political philosophy. Building bridges between them serves to formulate a credible and encompassing worldview that is of theoretical and practical significance.
... Among social relations, kinship arguably establishes the most fundamental links between human beings. Structural anthropology [7] recognizes family links as the connections that support alliance, cohesion, and reciprocity [8]. While in modern Western societies the influence of familial ties on social processes may have considerably faded, they played a fundamental role until relatively recent times -as exemplified, for instance, by the ruling dynasties of Europe [9]. ...
We study the structural properties of a class of model social networks representing blood sibling and sibling-in-law relationships, in the case where the size of the married population varies between successive generations. These kinship networks are characterized by Poissonian degree distributions and the presence of a connected component encompassing a large part of the population, along with high values of clustering and assortativity. By means of numerical simulations and comparison with Erdős-Rényi networks of the same size and connectivity, we show that global clustering and assortativity remain high unless the size of the married population drops drastically. In contrast, the largest connected component collapses when the married population shrinks to just about two thirds of its size in the previous generation.
... Finalmente, la tabla 1 nos presenta información estructural de densidad, es decir la cantidad de enlaces efectiva respecto a las potencialmente factibles. Estructuralmente, las redes matrimoniales son ralas -o sea, con poca densidad, no estando todos los nodos conectados entre sí(Newman 2005;White 2004White , 2005)-dada la naturaleza de las relaciones.En este sentido la densidad más alta se presenta entre los decenios 1780 y 1790, periodo de gran crecimiento a través de migraciones desde la metrópoli, la bonanza económica, aspectos que coinciden también con el impacto de las reformas borbónicas en el Río de la Plata, entre las cuales destacamos medidas como el auto de libre internación (1777) y el Reglamento de libre comercio (1778) y lo que se suma el propio crecimiento poblacional de la ciudad de Buenos Aires. El grado promedio determina cuántas relaciones directas desarrolla una familia nuclear para cada decenio: obsérvese cómo la cantidad de enlaces crece considerablemente a la par que se conforman y procrean las familias nucleares, llegando a máximos en los mismos decenios de mayor densidad. ...
En cualquier grupo de poder el prestigio de las familias que lo componen fluctúa en el tiempo. Al analizar estas fluctuaciones, comprendemos mejor la evolución y el ciclo de vida interno del poder de estos grupos. En este artículo estudiamos la dinámica de las familias nucleares del Cabildo de Buenos Aires desde 1700 hasta 1820. Aplicamos un enfoque de análisis de redes sociales que nos permite observar cómo las familias nucleares surgen a través de matrimonios y se expanden a través de la línea consanguínea por reproducción, así como por lazos rituales a través de instituciones de padrinos y asociaciones comerciales y políticas. Encontramos, en este sentido, un ordenamiento jerárquico de familias con base a diferentes criterios de importancia individual dentro de la red que se sustentan en última instancia en el apoyo económico de acuerdo a las respectivas actividades, en atributos sociales como la limpieza de sangre y la distinción o linaje así como en el desempeño de cargos políticamente relevantes en el ayuntamiento. Ilustramos nuestros análisis con visualizaciones y estimaciones de la importancia relativa de cada familia y de cómo esta importancia cambió durante el periodo analizado.
... Structurally, marriage networks are sparse (Newman, 2006;White, 2004White, , 2005 given the nature of the relationships. Also, these ties are strong, i.e. frequent interaction relations and source of direct emotional support and other resources; as opposed to the weak links postulated by Granovetter (1973). ...
We analyze structural properties and visualization of a historical-data-constructed social network of the families with members in the Cabildo (city council) of colonial Buenos Aires. The data was obtained through the review of birth, marriage, and death records kept in various institutions and expanded from online genealogical sources. We find structural properties and visual presentations and also a link centrality analysis that shows that ritual relationship represents an important glue that held together with the network.
... Although the role of familial ties in modern human interactions may appear somehow devaluated-especially, from a Western-world perspective-consanguinity and marriage relations still determine, for a large part of mankind, the social core to which each individual is bound by shared aections and cultural anity, and which therefore yields the springboard for jumping into broader, more complex social environments. Kinship relations are crucial to the founding theories of structural anthropology [1,2], as they grant the basis of social cohesion, alliance, and reciprocity [3]. To oer a few instances of human communities where family ties play or have played a paramount role in social dynamics, let us first mention the well-known case of European pre-democratic governments, controlled by a handful of closely related dynasties whose intertwined circumstances drove the fate of millions of people during centuries [4]. ...
... In the realm of structural anthropology, social patterns induced by consanguinity and marriage relations are usually studied for small groups, extending up to just the closest relatives and, thus, typically involving of the order of ten individuals or less [3,6,7]. The importance of tackling the study of larger groups-in particular, by means of network analysis-has been advanced more than two decades ago [8], but the diculty of getting statistically significant kinship data from real societies still constitutes a hindrance to such a project. ...
... This is numerically demonstrated for our kinship networks in section 4.1. Small cycles, which can also appear for other values of ρ (see figure 1 for ρ = 0.01 and 1), correspond to the kinship structures that anthropologists call 'marriage rings' [3], or 'circuits' [6,7]. These structures, which are generated by exchange of close relatives during mating, have been recognized in actual societies as important ingredients of social cohesion [1,3], but their occurrence by chance has also been discussed [7]. ...
... They solve the problem of distinguishing between a married uncle and a remarriage of a father or between stepsisters and nieces (NOOY, MRVAR, BATAGELJ, 2011). White (2004) points out that half-siblings are distinguished in the Bipartite P-Graph format, in which individuals are one set of nodes and couples another. Figure 4 exemplifies this kind of genealogical graph. ...
... In a P-Graph (Figure 3), it is impossible to distinguish between a married uncle and a new marriage from a father, or between half-sisters and nieces (MRVAR, BATAGELJ, 2004). P-Graphs do not distinguish half-siblings because when the same parent is in two different marriages the half-sibling relationship resembles that of cousins (WHITE, 2004). ...
... Eles solucionam, desta forma, o problema de replicação de indivíduos em diferentes arestas, para casos de múltiplos casamentos (NOOY, MRVAR, BATAGELJ, 2011). White (2004) aponta que meia-irmandades são distinguidas no formato Bipartite P-Graphs, no qual indivíduos correspondem a um conjunto de vértices, e casais, a outro. ...
... Em um P-Graph (Figura 3), é impossível distinguir entre um tio casado e um novo casamento de um pai, ou entre meia-irmãs e sobrinhas (MRVAR, BATAGELJ, 2004). P-Graphs não distinguem meio-irmãos porque, quando o mesmo pai está em dois casamentos diferentes, o relacionamento de meiairmandade assemelha-se com aquele de primos (WHITE, 2004). ...
Resumo-Genealogias são estudos da ancestralidade de indivíduos, onde se estabelecem parentescos e relacionamentos. Famílias podem ser vistas como redes sociais e, como tal, seus componentes estruturais são passíveis de análises matemáticas e a Teoria dos Grafos, em particular, auxilia na diagramação de representações genealógicas, provendo visualizações intuitivas de seus componentes e conexões, através de três formalizações: Ore Graphs, P-Graphs e Bipartite P-Graphs. Estes, no entanto, possuem algumas limitações quando tratados isoladamente (relações de irmandade, múltiplos casamentos). Este artigo propõe uma representação alternativa e complementar: os K-Graphs (Grafos de Parentesco). Abstract-Genealogies are studies of the ancestry of individuals, where kinships and relationships are established. Families can be viewed as social networks and, as such, their structural components are susceptible to mathematical analysis and Graph Theory, in particular, assists in diagramming genealogical representations by providing intuitive visualizations of their components and connections through three formalizations: Ore Graphs, P-Graphs and Bipartite P-Graphs. These, however, have some limitations when treated separately (siblings relations, multiple marriages). This article proposes an alternative and complementary representation: the K-Graphs (Kinship Graphs).
... Este ponto merece uma breve digressão. A distinção entre anéis minimais e não-minimais, proposta por White (2004), a meu ver é apenas relativa, pois depende das seleções efetuadas durante a modelagem de uma rede genealógica. Assim, por exemplo, segundo a modelagem padrão (Rivers, 1910), todo anel A1C1 é minimal. ...
Para Schneider, os estudos antropológicos de parentesco estão ancorados em uma Doutrina da Unidade Genealógica da Humanidade que teria distorcido a percepção etnográfica e consagrado um “non-subject”. Esta Doutrina pode ser assim resumida: em todas as culturas humanas, parentesco tem a ver com o reconhecimento de vínculos naturais entre os indivíduos, assim afiançando sua tradução universal em termos genealógicos. Este artigo se contrapõe à crítica de Schneider em duas frentes: indaga se necessariamente convém entender o método genealógico como um dispositivo de tradução; em outra, questiona se o método genealógico requer tal Doutrina para se definir. Paralelamente, a partir da pesquisa etnográfica concernente aos Enawene-Nawe, este artigo, nos horizontes da teoria da aliança, argumenta em favor da reabilitação do método genealógico que, neste século, não pode abrir mão de ferramentas computacionais. Isto, considerando que “a primeira tarefa da antropologia, pré-requisito de todas as outras, é entender e formular os símbolos e sentidos e suas configurações, de que uma cultura particular consiste” (ênfase no original, Schneider, 1984: 196).
... Structural equivalence in kinship terminologies is concomitant with a kinship network phenomenon known as 'relinkage' (Houseman 1997;White 1997;White 2004;Hamberger et al 2011;, wherein any two people who are directly linked, are also indirectly linked by a redundant secondary chain of relations such that they form a circuit (as described more generally for social networks in the previous section). Where such a circuit is consanguineous, it must by definition incorporate at least one other, shorter matrimonial circuit of minimum width 1 (Hamberger at al 2011) 49 . ...
... In this context, it seems reasonable to observe, in line with Lévi- (Lévi-Strauss 1969: xxxiv). Furthermore, White (2004), and White & Johansen (2005) have shown at such circuits accumulate into what are called 'k-components' or 'marriage cores', comprised of multiple intersections of such circuits, manifest in topological regions of variable density. White (2004) and Hamberger et al (2011) elaborate on this phenomenon by providing a formal language and accompanying procedures for detecting the 'cycle basis' of marriage cores, comprised of a set of irreducible circuits or 'rings'. ...
... Furthermore, White (2004), and White & Johansen (2005) have shown at such circuits accumulate into what are called 'k-components' or 'marriage cores', comprised of multiple intersections of such circuits, manifest in topological regions of variable density. White (2004) and Hamberger et al (2011) elaborate on this phenomenon by providing a formal language and accompanying procedures for detecting the 'cycle basis' of marriage cores, comprised of a set of irreducible circuits or 'rings'. The prevalence of one or another such set in a given network is held to provide insights to the prevailing kinship culture among network members, which give rise to more elaborate, reducible (or 'generalised') network structures. ...
This thesis presents a formal empirical anthropological analysis of the Indigenous population of the Central Murray Darling Basin (CMDB) region of South East Australia. The first part of the analysis comprises a review of past theoretical assumptions underlying social anthropological models of Indigenous population dynamics generally. The second part comprises a conventional kinship network analysis of a 3138-person population model, and introduces a newly developed spatiotemporal kinship network analysis of the same population model. Results are compared.
The mainstream discipline of social anthropology, especially as practiced in Australia, is not a formal science but rather more closely aligned with philosophy and the humanities. It is nevertheless concerned with a field of study - human sociality - that also concerns a number of scientific disciplines. Despite this overlapping concern there is no disciplinary integration or 'consilience' between social anthropology and these other scientific fields. Irrespective of this lack of consilience, social anthropology has, since the early 1970s, been treated as a forensic science by the Australian judicial system with regard to legislation affecting Indigenous people. The result has been a slowly developing recognition that the discipline of social anthropology lacks a formal paradigmatic basis, and as such, is of limited use in either a forensic application, or in any other field that requires evidence based research, such as health and demography.
Historically, social anthropological research into Indigenous Australian sociality has played an important role in the discipline's theoretical development. Since the inception of social anthropology in the 1870s, research conducted with Indigenous Australian people has formed a key feature of all major theoretical texts, and has been used to support key theoretical assumptions. Most important among these assumptions has been a loose collection of tacit mathematical concepts, which correlate with basic principles of group theory. These group theoretic principles can be traced through more than a century of key texts in social anthropological theory, especially with regard to theories of language and kinship. The explication of this pattern forms the focus of the first part of the thesis.
The second part of the thesis introduces a relatively new methodology within social anthropology that has set as its goal the formalisation of the discipline, including a reorientation towards empirical evidence and integration with other fields of science concerned with human sociality. A key technique in this methodology is social network analysis (SNA), and its specialised form, kinship network analysis (KNA). Using this latter technique, the thesis re-analyses a number of group theoretical assumptions in Australian and international anthropological texts, and compares these with fresh analyses of newly assembled Indigenous population data from the CMDB region. A further, novel technique of spatiotemporal kinship network analysis (stKNA), developed by the author, is then also introduced and applied to this new data. This analysis indicates that rather than forming groups, Indigenous Australian populations are characterised by extensive and cohesive kinship networks spanning great geographic distances and deep historical time.
... Apesar de os EN não se casarem com parentes, os cônjuges nunca são totalmente desvinculados uns dos outros. Consequentemente, cada novo casamento produz novos circuitos de relacionalidade na rede de parentesco, aqui denominados anéis matrimoniais (HOUSEMAN; WHITE, 1996;WHITE, 2004;HAMBERGER et al., 2004). Estes circuitos são formados por cadeias de relações de dois tipos: (A)finidade (casamento) e (C)onsanguinidade (filiação). ...
Este artigo tem um duplo objetivo – um de caráter documental e outro de cunho teórico. Por um lado, o trabalho visa fornecer informações que permitem esboçar o perfil demográfico de um povo ameríndio da Amazônia Meridional Brasileira e sobrepor informações antropológicas a esses dados quantitativos que retomam, na clave das ideias e valores nativos, aspectos de alguma maneira implicados neste perfil. A expectativa é que tal sobreposição, como nos contrapontos musicais, traga sentidos que estão ausentes nas séries de dados consideradas isoladamente. Por outro lado, o artigo procura chamar a atenção para o interesse analítico de um fenômeno empírico raramente explorado, embora muitas vezes intuído pela pesquisa etnográfica: as redes de “anéis matrimoniais” tecidas por esses povos. O estudo destas redes traz para o primeiro plano uma região de fronteira interdisciplinar que reclama o aprofundamento do diálogo entre a demografia de sociedades de pequena escala e a antropologia do parentesco, ambas interessadas, cada uma a seu modo, nas formas de reprodução desses coletivos.
