Murdock and Talcott Parsons Views on Family
Murdock-
George Peter Murdock (1949) wanted to know if the family was not just cultural but universal (he claimed that it was universal). * Common residence * Economic co-operation * Adults including both sexes * At least two have socially approved sex * One or more children * Biological or adopted
This he thought was the universal minimum. Which adults had sexual relations depended on the culture. He believed the nuclear family was the universal core of the world's large variety of kinship systems. From this a family could be extended vertically (with upper generations) or horizontally (with brothers and sisters of those with offspring).
A criticism of Murdock was that to claim something is universal, it only needs one exception to falsify it. Kathleen Gough falsified Murdock’s theory with her study of the Nayar Women of India.
Before reaching puberty, Nayar women in India were married to a man according to the Talikettukalydnam rite. This three days of actual or mock defloration might be their last living contact.
From then on, as “mother”, each woman would take up to 12 sandbanham husbands, who visited her one at a time at night. A man could have an unlimited number of wives. The woman kept her room in the house, and it was first come, first served to supper and bed, so a man too late would sleep on the verandah of the house.
So women getting pregnant could have any one of up to 12 as the father. So one of them of equal sub-caste (social class) declared as the father (whether he was or not) and gave a present of cloth and/ | | Clearly women getting pregnant could have any one of up to 12 as the father. So one of them of equal sub-caste declared as the father (whether he was or not) and gave a present of cloth and/ or vegetables to the attending midwife. A frequent visitor might send luxuries at festivals. That was it. The men weremercenary warriors and gave no attention to raising children or staying with the woman. |
George Peter Murdock (1949) wanted to know if the family was not just cultural but universal (he claimed that it was universal). * Common residence * Economic co-operation * Adults including both sexes * At least two have socially approved sex * One or more children * Biological or adopted
This he thought was the universal minimum. Which adults had sexual relations depended on the culture. He believed the nuclear family was the universal core of the world's large variety of kinship systems. From this a family could be extended vertically (with upper generations) or horizontally (with brothers and sisters of those with offspring).
A criticism of Murdock was that to claim something is universal, it only needs one exception to falsify it. Kathleen Gough falsified Murdock’s theory with her study of the Nayar Women of India.
Before reaching puberty, Nayar women in India were married to a man according to the Talikettukalydnam rite. This three days of actual or mock defloration might be their last living contact.
From then on, as “mother”, each woman would take up to 12 sandbanham husbands, who visited her one at a time at night. A man could have an unlimited number of wives. The woman kept her room in the house, and it was first come, first served to supper and bed, so a man too late would sleep on the verandah of the house.
So women getting pregnant could have any one of up to 12 as the father. So one of them of equal sub-caste (social class) declared as the father (whether he was or not) and gave a present of cloth and/ | | Clearly women getting pregnant could have any one of up to 12 as the father. So one of them of equal sub-caste declared as the father (whether he was or not) and gave a present of cloth and/ or vegetables to the attending midwife. A frequent visitor might send luxuries at festivals. That was it. The men weremercenary warriors and gave no attention to raising children or staying with the woman. |