Family, Marriage, and Kinship

Your course materials today cover the topic of kinship and relatedness. As you will read, there are many ways of deciding who and how people are related among human social groups. Your text and notes discuss the idea of fictive kinship as an alternative to biological or marital relationships. Fictive relationships are those made by choice and include friendship, adoption, fostering, etc.

Today I would like you to consider fictive and biological kinship, as well as the ways in which these traditional anthropological patterns are not distinct. Please think carefully about how kinship is determined among the Lankwai as people become more related to each other as they share food at a common hearth and less related as they cease to do so. Please also think deeply about the ideas of fostering and adoption as well as the ideas of friendship and chosen family as you read your text. Please read the following articles which discuss the idea that biological relatedness is somewhat fluid and that we may choose kinship in unique ways.

Does Your Microbiome Shape Your Friendships? Link here: https://www.sapiens.org/biology/microbiome-social-behavior/

After completing this readings please address the following questions in your essay:

1). What are the three basic forms of relatedness as described in your course materials?

2). What are some forms that fictive kinship takes as described in your course materials?

3). How does your gut microbiome indicate a connection between biological and fictive kinship? How are friendships possibly influenced by gut bacteria?

4). Describe some of the important fictive kin relationships in your own life. How do they compare to those based on biology or marriage?