Kinship Past, Kinship Present: Bio-Essentialism in the Study of Kinship

Abstract

In this article, I reconsider bio-essentialism in the study of kinship, centering on David Schneider's influential critique that concluded that kinship was "a non-subject" (1972:51). Schneider's critique is often taken to have shown the limitations of and problems with past views of kinship based on biology, genealogy, and reproduction, a critique that subsequently led those reworking kinship as relatedness in the new kinship studies to view their enterprise as divorced from such bio-essentialist studies. Beginning with an alternative narrative connecting kinship past and present and concluding by introducing a novel way of thinking about kinship, I have three constituent aims in this research article: (1) to reconceptualize the relationship between kinship past and kinship present; (2) to reevaluate Schneider's critique of bio-essentialism and what this implies for the contemporary study of kinship; and (3) subsequently to redirect theoretical discussion of what kinship is. This concluding discussion introduces a general view, the homeostatic property cluster (HPC) view of kinds, into anthropology, providing a theoretical framework that facilitates realization of the often-touted desideratum of the integration of biological and social features of kinship.[bio-essentialism, kinship studies, homeostatic property cluster kinds, Schneider, genealogy] ABSTRAIT Cet article reconsidère le bio-essentialisme dans l'étude de la parenté, en mettant l'accent sur la critique influente de David Schneider soutenant que la parenté est un «non-sujet» (1972:51). La critique de Schneider est souvent considérée comme ayant démontré les limites des conceptions de la parenté fondées sur la biologie, la généalogie et la reproduction. Dans les nouvellesétudes de la parenté, cette critique a conduit ceux qui travaillent sur la parenté conç ue comme apparentementà présenter leur entreprise commeétant opposée auxétudes bio-essentialistes. Commenç ant avec un récit reliant parenté passée et présente et offrant une nouvelle faç on de penser la parenté, cet article a trois objectifs cardinaux: (1) redéfinir la relation entre la parenté passée et la parenté présente, (2) réévaluer la critique par Schneider du bio-essentialisme et ce qu'il implique pour l'étude contemporaine de la parenté, et (3) enfin réorienter la discussion théorique de ce qu'est la parenté. Cette discussion se termine par l'introduction en anthropologie d'un schème conceptuel -le groupement de propriétés homéostatiques (GPH) vue de catégories naturelles -fournissant un cadre théorique pour l'intégration tant recherchée des car- RESUMEN Este artículo reconsidera el esencialismo biológico (bio-esencialismo) en el estudio del parentesco, centrándose en la influyente crítica de David Schneider. A menudo se considera que la crítica de Schneider ha demostrado los problemas y las limitaciones de teorías del parentesco anteriores, basadas en la biología, la genealogía y la reproducción. Su crítica contribuyó a que aquellos que trabajaban el parentesco como afinidad ("...

Re-Making Kinship. From Community to Family

“…In this context, it is the consolidation of descent that is expressed. This Sephardic experience in France follows the proposition made by Wilson (2016) and Shryock (2013) to reanalyse kinship both in its biological and cultural dimensions. As Jonathan Boyarin (2013) states, a kinship is, to be sure, not merely biological or « racial », but it is nevertheless inherited.…”

“…This consolidation of kinship ties happened in a cultural community thanks to the emotional experience of sharing a common heritage. Thus, the discussion goes further the dichotomy between biology and social kinship and nourish a balanced perspective to rethink kinship in the present, interpretation suggested by Wilson (2016) who encourages the reintegration of bio-essentialism in the field. It is by being inspired by the work of anthropologist working on kinship after the critique of Schneider such as Weston (1991), Marilyn Strathern (1992), Marshal Sahlins (2011), and more recently Naomi Leite (2017), that I 5.…”

“…Like many religious communities where a specific language, culture and ethnicity are intertwined with religious identity (Cantwell Smith 1991 ;Despland 1999 ;Ngonbri 2013), the idea of being a « real », « authentic » Sephardic person is embodied in lineage and, as defined by Jewish law, it is matrilineal-based 3 . However, even if what Joseph described reflects the preoccupation of many individuals in our Western society regarding biologic kinship and blood (Schneider 1980 ;Wilson 2016), it still remains that this reality is constantly being challenged by the social and cultural reality of how people create and maintain kinship ties, notably in the context of our post-modern and super-diverse (Vertovec 2007) societies. Indeed, on the one hand we observe a strong embodiment of kinship with blood and biology (Schneider 1980), but on the other hand, LGBTQ rights movements around the world are creating new possibilities regarding kinship, based on the possibility of choice, such as Kath Weston suggested with the idea of the « family we choose » through her studies of gay and lesbian families (Weston 1991).…”

“…The concept of « mutuality of being » was first proposed by Stasch (2009) in his analysis of Korowai kinship in Papua New Guinea, a term that Sahlins (2011 ; later adopted to characterize a broad range of human cultural forms of kinship in its more inclusive sense. With this concept, the anthropologist was trying to critique and summarize a voluminous literature on kinship that notably includes the tension between conception of kinship as biological and social (Wilson 2016).…”

The ‘Social Construction’ of David Schneider as ‘A Giant of Anthropology’

“…If procreative kinship is not universal, or not important in much of the world, then neither is the nuclear family, the bête noir of ‘radical’ feminism. Still more important, I suspect, and still related to relatively recent societal trends, is what Wilson (:573) has put his finger on: ‘This [Schneiderian] conception of kinship reflects the shift in kinship … in the West in the 1960s and 1970s, a shift that involved experimentation with different ways of being a mother, a father, a child, and a family …: working mothers, the spread of contraception, skyrocketing divorce rates, Brady Bunch families, communal living and free love …’ This, of course, is a ‘deconstruction’ of the ‘deconstructionists’ in kinship studies. But it does not make them wrong: virtually all the available ethnographic data do that!…”