Distant Kin Research Articles

Holding the Line: The Telephone in Old Order Mennonite and Amish Life by Diane Zimmerman Umble

164 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE amusingly depicting the confrontations ofauto drivers with animals, peasants, policemen,judges, and other enemies. Some of the stories are hardly credible, probably invented by clever journalists. One wonders about the complaint of some English farmers who alleged that dust raised by autos rushing by on country roads and settled on their fields dulled their scythes and sickles twice as fast as normal. Many of the yarns attributed to the French context are familiar to students of auto history elsewhere, such as the one about the Nor­ man resident who in 1899 invented an “articulated tree” that was hinged near its base and would be dropped on a motorist. M. Pouzet supplies better documentation for this story than any other, includ­ ing several photos from a magazine showing the tree and the wind­ lass used to raise it for another plunge. In the United States someone is supposed to have rigged a similar articulated tree on a road near Toledo. Unsurprising also are the accounts of farmers pushing dis­ eased cows and chickens onto the road to be dispatched by speeding cars or even throwing themselves under slower-moving vehicles in hopes of minor injury and reimbursement. Common causes such as the early autos’ surprising speed, dust, noise, and smell, along with antagonism of the poor toward wealthy drivers, brought similar results wherever the motor car appeared. This book is in no way scientific or scholarly; there is no effort at quantification; but it is useful for an hour or two of entertainment. It also reminds us of early opposition to a new technology, similar to but stronger than was the case for railroads or computers. James M. Laux Dr. Laux has written extensively on automobile history. His books include The European Automobile Industry (New York: Twayne; Toronto: Maxwell Macmillan Can­ ada, 1992). Holding the Line: The Telephone in Old Order Mennonite and Amish Life. By Diane Zimmerman Umble. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univer­ sity Press, 1996. Pp. xvi+192; illustration, notes, appendix, index. $35.00 (hard cover). Few arguments about technology and culture have been as emo­ tionally wrenching as the Mennonite and Amish communities’ dis­ putes about the telephone early this century. On the one side, objec­ tions: “Telephone lines now form a great network connecting cities, towns, and even Christian people. . . . But spiritually this is a sinful network, as Paul teaches us in 2 Cor. 6,14-17, Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers, etc. Another thing, there is much talking through the phone which amounts to nothing” (p. 119). On the other side, a defense: “The phone is in itself nothing as far as spiritual things are concerned. It is an instrument like many others that we have. If we use it wrong, it is sinful; if we use it right it is not Technology and culture Book Reviews 165 sinful” (p. 124). So serious were these disputes that they hastened permanent schisms among both the Mennonites and Amish. In Holding the Line, Diane Zimmerman Umble recounts the tele­ phone quarrels that split the Old Order Mennonites and Old Order Amish in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. These fights seem to sharply define the clash between modern technology and traditional “community.” The Anabaptist movements tightly bound members together and walled them off from outsiders through distinct doc­ trine, practice, and appearance, and by strong fellowship and stern group discipline. But disagreements nevertheless repeatedly divided them—for example, over English in prayer services, or the use of farm machinery. The fights resulted in secession and the formation of new subcommunities, each adapting to the modern world to vary­ ing degrees. The telephone sparked such divisions in both Lancaster County groups (and elsewhere in the United States, too). The telephone was helpful to rural people for handling emergencies, managing a farm, keeping in touch with distant kin, and so on. Conservative members did not quarrel with their fellows using an “English” neighbor’s or a public telephone, but they campaigned against allowing members to have one in the home. A home telephone was an unnecessary and proud indulgence, encouraged intercourse with (and symbolized) the outside world, reduced face-to-face contact, and tempted women...

Absence of within–colony kin discrimination in behavioural interactions of swarm–founding wasps

Within-colony kin discrimination has not been demonstrated conclusively for any social insect, perhaps partly because highly polymorphic genetic markers necessary to assess within-colony relatednesses have only recently become available. We use microsatellite loci to investigate within-colony kin discrimination in behavioural interactions in the neotropical multiple-queen wasp, Parachartergus colobopterus. Within-colony kin discrimination would be particularly advantageous in this species since average genetic relatedness among colony members overall is low (0.32 =/- 0.06), compared to the relatedness value between full sisters of 0.75. Using seven colonies of individually marked females, we recorded behavioural interactions that were cooperative (222 grooming, 2438 feeding), aggressive (511 body or wing biting, 240 mandible biting) or neutral (1676 antennating). We expected cooperative behaviours to favour closer kin and aggressive behaviours to be directed towards more distant kin, but found that none of the behaviours we investigated showed discrimination on the basis of relatedness. We could have detected a difference in relatedness values of as little as between 0.03 and 0.12, depending on the behaviour being analysed. Thus, we found no evidence for kin discrimination in within-colony behaviour in this species.

Human kinship as a descendant-leaving strategy: A solution to an evolutionary puzzle

Ethnographic examples are used to demonstrate three aspects of human kinship altruism that can be explained neither by the standard evolutionary explanations of altruism (i.e., kin selection, and reciprocal altruism) nor the controversial theory of group selection. First, humans favor closer kin over more distant kin even at genealogical distances where kin selection is essentially nonoperative. Second, this favoring of “close” distant kin over “distant” distant kin is prescribed by tradition and does not depend on the greater likelihood of reciprocal altruism from the closer kin. Finally, the favoring of “close” distant kin over “distant” distant kin does not depend on co-membership in the same social group. To explain this universal aspect of human social behavior, an alternative evolutionary explanation of altruism—referred to as the “descendant-leaving strategy model”—is presented.

Kinship bonds are not necessary for maintaining matrilineal rank in captive Japanese macaques

Although kinship is of central importance in matrilineal (nepotistic) dominance systems, various lines of evidence indicate that its role has probably been overestimated. For example, alliances among nonkin, patterned on the basis of dominance per se, contribute to the maintenance of rank and to the remarkable stability of matrilineal rank orders. But because kin and nonkin alliances exert their stabilizing effects on the rank order simultaneously, the effect of nonkin alliances per se is unknown. We tested whether nonkin alliances are sufficient to ensure the stability of matrilineal rank relations in a laboratory-housed group of Japanese macaques (Macaca fuscata). We first created a group composed of two female subgroups: (1) a subordinate subgroup of close kin known to constitute an effective revolutionary alliance and (2) a dominant subgroup composed mostly of nonkin and distant kin known to support each other against lower-ranking females. In the course of 12 consecutive experimental manipulations, we reduced progressively the relative power of the dominant subgroup by manipulating its size and age composition. The members of the dominant subgroup maintained their rank in all experimental situations except when alone. Thus, nonkin alliances remained effective up to extremely pronounced levels of power imbalance. These results suggest that the remarkable stability of matrilineal rank orders is not conditional upon the existence of nepotistic alliances and strong matrilines of close kin.

Models of Affiliative Relationships Among Free-Ranging Rhesus Monkeys (Macaca Mulatta)

Abstract Several organizing principles based on maternal kinship and/or dominance relationships, have been proposed to explain the structure of female-female macaque affiliative relationships. Social interactions among adult rhesus females of one free-ranging social group on Cayo Santiago, Puerto Rico were observed for four consecutive years to determine the extent to which patterns of affiliative interaction met several predictions of three such hypothesized organizing principles: kin-based attractiveness, attraction-to-high-rank and the similarity principle. We employed a multiple regression extension of the Mantel test (Smouse et al., 1986) to test the independent effects of kinship and rank distance on measures of affiliation and reciprocity. Close kin not only engaged in more affiliative behaviour than distant kin (see our companion paper, Kapsalis & Berman, this volume), they were more likely to support one another in agonistic encounters and to exchange grooming for alliance support and access to drinking water. We found evidence that low-ranking females were attracted to high-ranking females in some years of study, and that grooming by low-ranking females was exchanged with tolerance at a monopolizable resource by high-ranking grooming partners. However, we were unable to test conclusively for the effects of competitive exclusion. Little evidence was found to support the predictions of the similarity principle. We concluded that kin-based attractiveness was probably the primary organizing principle operating in the study group but that elements of attraction-to-high-rank may operate in concert to some extent.

Kinship, familiarity and mating avoidance in Barbary macaques, Macaca sylvanus

Abstract. Long-term data on sexual behaviour in Barbary macaques revealed a strong mating inhibition between co-residing maternal relatives, and between those, mostly unrelated, males and females with a caretaking relationship during the female's infancy. Sexual interactions were observed in only 15 out of 371 possible maternal dyads. There was a bias towards distant kin and towards dyads in which the male was older than the female. Sexual interactions were recorded in only two out of 14 former caretaking dyads with a strong relationship but in 10 out of 17 dyads with a weak and/or temporary relationship. Unfamiliar maternal relatives and paternal relatives showed no mating avoidance. Three out of four of these maternal dyads, and 67 out of 133 possible paternal dyads became incestuous. Paternity was determined by DNA-fingerprinting. Almost all paternal dyads became incestuous after more than 2 years of co-residence. Owing to high sexual activities outside the period of conception and the inability of related and unrelated males to monopolize access to fertile females, only two out of 62 potentially inbred infants were actually inbred via the paternal line. Establishment of a mating inhibition but also its absence in some individuals indicated that only familiarity during early life, regardless of genetic relatedness, was responsible for mutual sexual indifference. This mental mechanism of inbreeding avoidance is regarded as an important trigger for male natal migration.

Some neo-Darwinian decision rules for altruism: Weighing cues for inclusive fitness as a function of the biological importance of the decision.

A neo-Darwinian heuristic for decisions involving altruism is'hypothesized in this article. Following W. Hamilton's (1964) analysis of inclusive fitness, the assumption of this study is that tendencies to help another person are selected against, except when the donor and recipient are related and share genes underlying these tendencies. An important social psychological implication of Hamilton's formulation is that in group-living individuals (a) natural selection favors those who are prone to help others as a function of the latters' relatedness, potential fecundity, or other features indicating a recipient's capacity to enhance the donors' inclusive fitness, and (b) this effect is especially strong when help is biologically significant (e.g., the recipient will not survive otherwise). Such a heuristic is demonstrated in several studies involving hypothetical decisions to help: In life-or-death situations, people chose to aid close kin over distant kin, the young over the old, the healthy over the sick, the wealthy over the poor, and the premenopausal woman over the postmenopausal woman; whereas when it is a matter of an everyday favor, they gave less weight to kinship and opted to help either the very young or the very old over those of intermediate age, the sick over the healthy, and the poor over the wealthy.

Kingship, Power and the Hsüan-Wu Men Incident of the T'Ang

This article will discuss the politics of succession in the Northern Dynasties and the early T'ang. The discussion will focus on the institution of the retired emperorship (t'ai-shang huang-ti, 7&W). In a broad sense, modes of political succession are component parts of the general political culture of a polity (be this polity a tribe, empire, or nation-state). The development of specific modes of political succession are, of course, a function of contingent historical circumstances. The historical actors may not be fully conscious of being the architects of enduring political institutions. However, for the historian looking back over a large expanse of time, broad patterns can be discerned. The pre-modern native Chinese empires practiced a form of succession to the throne. That is, in terms of both ideology and often praxis, the imperial succession was expected to travel from the father to the eldest son born of the main consort. The tribal confederacies and empires of North Asia (which were often political competitors with Chinese regimes) had a tendency to practice a variety of forms of horizontal succession. Horizontal succession could mean brother to brother (often, though not always, focusing on uterine brothers), nephew to uncle or to even more distant kin, depending on specific circumstances. Generally, North Asian political culture was familiar with the practice of a rotating succession. North Asian regimes also demonstrated a notable capacity consciously, and quite rapidly, to switch from one mode of succession to another, that is, from a horizontal mode to a vertical mode, or vice versa (note the Hsiung-nu practice during the early Eastern Han period, the Toba alteration of the succession in the late fourth century under Tao-wu-ti, and the practice of the Turkish regimes in Asia Minor). In the tribal confederacies and pre-modern empires, succession

Tears of Rain: Ethnicity and History in Central Western Zambia

Part 1 Tears of rain - ethnicity and history in central Western Zambia: 1. The contemporary point of departure: The Nkoya-speaking people and their chiefs - 1.1 The Nkoya 1.2. Nkoya subgroups and the recent process of their ethnic convergence the proliferation for the study of history 1.3. The major Nkoya chiefs and their political environment today the distant Lunda association chiefs, royal kin and headmen: the internal structure of the neo-traditional Nkoya polities the indigenous Barotose administration and the colonial state. the post-colonial state Mutando and Kahre: moiety-like structure and the struggle for seniority 2. The Likota Iya Bankoya manuscript - 2.1 History of the Likota Iya Bankoya manuscript 2.2 Likota Iya Bankoya as belonging to a genre of historiographic production characteristics of the genre and methodological implications. (Part Contents).

Familial Caretaking

This article develops the theme of rethinking family as a social form by positing an overall approach that suggests the development of various specific definitions of family, each suitable for the empirical or theoretical exploration of a set of family issues. The development of one example, familial caretaking, a definition of family for use in the context of social policy, will illustrate the potential effectiveness of this approach. The concern of government is to conceptualize the familial in terms concrete behavioral aspects of care and responsibility because if the family does not provide care, the state may have to take over the responsibility and provide the care. Overall, this definition of family is fluid in that it includes nonkin as well as distant kin. It also raises the issue of the gender division of labor with respect to family caregiving responsibilities. The unwillingness, on the part of the state, to support all forms of familial caretaking increases the likelihood of employing mechanisms of social control and authoritarian drift.

Levels of Inbreeding Among Prairie Dogs

Because inbreeding and outbreeding both involve distinct benefits, some optimal level of inbreeding-outbreeding should result under natural conditions. Testing this hypothesis has been difficult, mainly because the detailed pedigrees necessary for defining levels of inbreeding have been unavailable for animals other than humans. A 14-yr study of black-tailed prairie dogs (Cynomys ludovicianus) has shown that individuals avoid extreme inbreeding with close kin such as parents, offspring, and full and half siblings, but they regularly inbreed with more distant kin such as full and half first cousins, full and half first cousins once removed, full and half second cousins, and so on. Previous research with other wild animals has not documented such a high frequency of moderate inbreeding. An examination of five measures of reproductive success failed to reveal inbreeding depression.

Stability and Change in the Informal Task Support Network of Frail Older Persons

This study examines predictors of stability and change in composition, size, and intensity of help of the informal task support networks of frail elders and their primary caregivers. The sources of data are the 1982 and 1984 National Long Term Care Surveys and the companion 1982 Informal Caregivers Survey. There was slightly more stability than change in the size and composition of family task support networks. We found little evidence that shifts in network composition were in the direction of including more distant kin. Changes in network size and intensity of help occurred in response to changes in health and functional status of the frail older person, but not in response to the level of burden of the primary caregiver.

An evolutionary analysis of rules regulating human inbreeding and marriage

AbstractEvolutionary theory predicts that humans should avoid incest because of the negative effects incest has on individual reproduction: production of defective offspring. Selection for the avoidance of close-kin mating has apparently resulted in a psychological mechanism that promotes voluntary incest avoidance. Most human societies are thought to have rules regulating incest. If incest is avoided, why are social rules constructed to regulate it? This target article suggests that incest rules do not exist primarily to regulate close-kin mating but to regulate inbreeding between more distant kin (especially cousin categories) and sexual relations between affinal relatives (often nonkin). Three evolutionary hypotheses about cousin marriage and affinal kin mating follow from this suggestion: (1) Rules regulating mating between affinal kin are means of paternity protection. Cousin marriage (inbreeding) is regulated because, if it occurs, it can concentrate wealth and power within families to the detriment of (2) the powerful positions of rulers in stratified societies and (3) the relatively equal social statuses of most men in egalitarian societies. Tests using the comparative method on a worldwide sample of 129 societies supported the three hypotheses. Two alternative anthropological hypotheses (derived from Freudian theory and alliance theory) failed to be supported.

Humans as primates: The social relationships of Efe pygmy men in comparative perspective

The Efe are short-statured specialized hunger-gatherers living in the moist tropical forest in northeast Zaire. They live in small mobile groups averaging 18 individuals and practice viripatrilocal residence — what primatologists refer to as male philopatry and female dispersal. This study uses methods commonly employed by primatologists to study the social relationships of Efe men. It compares their association and affiliation patterns with those of two nonhuman primate species that show male philopatry and female transfer. The analyses of 376 hr of focal behavior observations on 16 Efe men reveal that the majority of their associations were with other adult men. Men associated preferentially with kin over non-kin, and with close kin more than with distant kin. Men's close relationships, or “companionships,”sensu Smuts' (1985) “friendships” among anubis baboons, were predominantly with other adult men; however, each man who cohabited with a woman had his strongestcompanionship by far with that woman. These quantitative measures of affinity are consistent with the Efe's pattern of viripatrilocal residence, where-by males remain in their natal group with their close male kin and females join or are recruited from other patriclans. The social relationships of Efe men are similar in some respects to those of hamadryas and chimpanzees; however, Efe men's social networks are larger and more fluid. We speculate that the explanation proposed for male philopatry and female dispersal among nonhuman primates also applies to the Efe.

The evolutionary significance of incest rules

Evolutionary theory predicts that humans should avoid incest because the behavior depresses individual fitness through production of defective offspring. Selection for avoidance of close-kin mating has resulted in a developmental mechanism that promotes voluntary incest avoidance. If avoided, why are social rules constructed in most cultures to regulate incest? The suggestion in this article is that incest do not regulate close-kin mating, but instead regulate inbreeding between more distant kin and sexual relations between nonkin. Inbreeding (e.g., cousin marriage) is hypothesized to be regulated because if it occurs, it can concentrate wealth and power within families threatening the powerful positions of rulers in the society. The hypothesis was supported using a worldwide sample of 129 societies, whereas two other alternative hypotheses (one dealing with coadapted genomes, and the other with sexual reproduction and host/ parasite coevolution), were not.

The function of kin discrimination

Kin discrimination should be a tactic in the fitness strategy of individuals. Two postulates derived from inclusive fitness theory that fitness benefits toward kin are correlated with degree of relatedness and that social behavior of members of a kin group is always cooperative are refuted by analyses of the social dynamics of yellowbellied marmots. Cooperative behavior occurs predominantly between mother/ daughter and sister/sister pairs, but such pairs also compete. More distant kin are treated similarly to unrelated animals, social behavior is primarily agonistic. Patterns of space-use, matrilineal formation and organization, social dynamics, and reproductive suppression of close kin suggest that marmots attempt to maximize direct fitness.

Significance of the social relationships of Efe Pygmy men in the Ituri forest, Zaire

AbstractEfe Pygmies in northeast Zaire exhibit features of social organization (small group size, flexible but predominantly patrilocal residence, close relations with kin, and pair bonds) that are common to many hunting and gathering societies. This study uses methods commonly employed in studies of nonhuman primates to investigate the associations of Efe men with other individuals as a function of their age, sex, and kinship, and it tests the hypothesis that Efe are patrilocal because hunting efficiency is improved by hunting with male relatives.The analyses of 376 hours of focal behavior observations on 16 Efe men and observations of 71 cooperative group hunts show that the majority of associations between Efe men were with other adult men. Men associated preferentially with kin over nonkin, and they associated with close kin more than with distant kin. Men's close relationships (what we call “Companionships” sensu Smuts' “Friendships” in baboons) were predominantly with other adult men, but each man who cohabited with a woman had his strongest Companionship by far with that woman. Neither the efficiency of hunts nor the hunting success of individual men were found to be related to the degree of relatedness of hunters nor the proportion of relatives on the hunt. Alternative hypotheses concerning the functional significance of patrilocality and male kin groups are considered. We conclude that strong affiliative bonds between male kin and between males and females may arise as much from the need for strong allies in the face of competitive social situations as from economic or ecological necessity.

Inheritance of wealth as human kin investment

Like many other animals, humans appear to have evolved to invest time and energy in their relatives in order to maximize inclusive fitness. Inheritance of material wealth may be a uniquely human form of kin investment. If fitness-maximizing dispositions do influence will-makers, beneficiaries may be favored according to their relatedness and reproductive value. An analysis of 1000 probated wills showed that this was the case. Close relatives were favored over distant kin, as were kin of higher reproductive value. Wealthier decedents favored male kin, while poorer decedents favored females. This pattern might reflect a facultative shifting of resources toward males when the family's resources are sufficient to ensure reproductive competitiveness, and toward the safer option of females when resources are less abundant. The results support the possibility that fitness-maximizing dispositions do influence will-makers. It is likely that such dispositions are flexible and responsive to the physical and social environment.

Nepotism in prairie dogs ( Cynomys ludovicianus) varies with competition but not with kinship

Behavioural interactions among black-tailed prairie dogs ( Cynomys ludovicianus) of the same sex clearly show nepotism (the favouring of kin). Males and females consistently interact more amicably with kin than with non-kin. Nepotism in this context is striking for two reasons. First, individuals do not interact more amicably with close kin such as offspring and full-siblings than with more distant kin such as half-siblings, full-nieces, half-nieces, and half-nephews. Second, nepotism varies inversely and dramatically with changes in competition for either oestrous females (among males) or nesting burrows and breeding rights (among females).

A longitudinal study of changes and adaptation in the support networks of Welsh elderly over 75

Despite conventional wisdom that urbanization has worsened the lot of the elderly and that rural or traditional societies are, therefore, more benign environments for the very old, data from a wide cross-section of developed and developing societies suggest that more similarity than difference exists. The evidence is that most old people in all societies rely on and receive comparable levels of support from their family, friends and neighbors. Less, however, is known about the process of social support over time. This paper reports the results of a longitudinal study of the support networks of the old elderly (75+), looking at changes over four years in a sample of 100 old people, 30 of whom were followed in-depth for 6 years. The findings demonstrate a high level of stability in network size, radius and close kin membership. Membership of distant kin, neighbors and friends is found to be more fluid. Within the network, considerable task flexibility was observed with the qualification that intimate physical care fell exclusively in the family domain. In this case, support networks appear to adjust to meet increasing need for support.