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This article deals with the notion of equality in Louis Dumonts work, specifically relative
to ideology and sex distinction in kinship terminology. It provides a new reading of his
writings on kinship, analyzing his discussion of South Indian terminology and marriage,
the contrasting value of affinity and consanguinity in caste society, and equality of the sexes.
Dumonts works on kinship are used to open a comparative examination of sex distinction
in kinship terminology. This article seeks to extend this analysis of equality and hierarchy
in kinship to other societies and ideologies, in order to explore the applicability of this
approach to understanding of contemporary transformations in kinship relationships.
Keywords: value, Dumont, affinity, gender, comparison
indicate that all holistic societies stress hierarchy to the same degree, nor do all
individualistic societies stress equality to the same degree (ibid.: 4). Furthermore,
Dumont explains, equality and hierarchy must combine in some manner in any
social system (ibid.: 5). He claims that it is possible for equality to be valued...
without its being an entailment of individualism (ibid.: 5).
This essay grapples with this uncertain definition of equality. Is equality op-
posed to power, or to hierarchy? If, up to a certain point, equality is opposed to
power, is it the same notion of equality which can sometimes be present in a hierar-
chical ideology? And in the latter case, what is the meaning of this type of equality?
The surprising discovery of elements of equality within the hierarchal ideology of
the caste system, in Dumonts study of Dravidian kinship terminology, prompts
closer examination.
Dumonts contribution to kinship studies is substantially less known1 than his
work on ideology or caste hierarchy in India. This, however, has not always been
the case. His first published piece on kinship, in 1953, the provocative article The
Dravidian kinship terminology as an expression of marriage, elicited vivid com-
ments from A.R. Radcliffe-Brown (Dumont 1983: 1835). Since then, numerous
authors have engaged with Dumonts ideas on South Indian kinship. His approach
to kinship sparked significant debate among specialists of India and Indian kinship
regarding the nature and terminology of Dravidian kinship (see Trautmann 1981;
Rudner 1990; Parkin 1992; Pfeffer 1993; Busby 1997; Viveiros de Castro 1998). In
the piece Affinity as a value, published in English in 1983, Dumont responded to
his critics and put forth his principal arguments on affinity in an effort to end
years of contentious debate on topic (see Madan 1986 for a review).
Over the past twenty years, Dumonts ideas on kinship have resurfaced in
Amazonian anthropology. In the 1970s, Joanna Overing (1973, 1975) introduced
Dumonts Dravidian model of kinship to scholars in Amazonia. Three decades
later, Eduardo Viveiros de Castro (2001) argued for the relevance of Dumonts
arguments on equality between consanguinity and affinity in Amazonia, drawing
on Dumonts notion of affinity as a value to develop his theory of perspectivism.
His analysis diverges, however, from Dumonts model, in that Dumont argued that
equality between consanguinity and affinity gained its relevance within the hier-
archy of the caste system. Recent scholars (e.g., Gregory 2010, 2013) have again
turned their attention to the value question in India, renewing the debates on
affinity by approaching the value of other kin relations.
In this article, I examine a question largely overlooked in debates on affinity
as a value: that of the equality of the sexes in South Indian terminology, which
underlies Dumonts argument of the equivalent (equal) value of affinity and
1. Dumonts papers on kinship were often first published in English. Most of them have
been translated, including the most contentious article (Dumont 2006). This text pro-
vided a comparison between English and French kinship studies. Translation had to
face the different meanings attributed to key concepts in English and in French: the
meaning of kinship itself, and others such as descent, filiation, and so on. Parkins
Introduction (Parkin 2006) is very useful in this respect. See also my discussion at the
end of this article. Dumont himself was long opposed to a translation because of these
terminological issues.
hypothesis that all social systems are systems of inequalities, kinship included. In
this context, it is all the more surprising that the analysis of terminologies was not
fully included in the effort to understand inequalities or differences between men
and women. Attributing a term to different types of social relationships, kinship
terminologies inevitably mark differences between relatives, more or less numer-
ous according to terminological systems, but at minimum distinguishing genera-
tion, age, and sex. What then, is the significance of these differences which are not
accounted for? Do they constitute inequalities? As modes of classification, kinship
terminologies inevitably inform the ways people are classified as relatives, without
distinguishing their roles or functions.
The examination of Dumonts works both on equality and on kinship terminol-
ogies is located at the interface of these questions. The first part of this article con-
siders Dumonts notion of equality, as presented in his comments on Tocquevilles
thoughts on egalitarian ideology and in his own writings on gender. Having clari-
fied the terms of the discussion, the central part of the article examines the inter-
section of caste hierarchy and kinship terminology. I analyze the status of affinity
and consanguinity, as well as the equality of the sexes in South Indian kinship ter-
minology. I then present my own ethnographic material from eastern Indonesia to
further explore Dumonts analysis of kinship terminology. Finally, I briefly address
Dumonts comparison of kinship terminologies in North India and Western societ-
ies, relative to ideology. In conclusion, I suggest some research directions concern-
ing the status of consanguinity and affinity in contemporary societies.
4. Dumont further develops this idea in his essay On value (Dumont 1980b: 238). A
reprint of this article was published in Hau: Journal of Ethnographic Theory, Volume 3,
Issue 1, pp. 287315. Available here:
http://www.haujournal.org/index.php/hau/article/view/hau3.1.028
constitution of man and woman. Tocqueville asserted that there were natural au-
thorities in families and there was a natural head of the conjugal association.
This is clearly a question of gendered functions, duties, and rights in the marital
context, or marital power that should not be subverted. Tocqueville claims that,
In no country has such constant care been taken as in America to trace two clearly
distinct lines of action for the two sexes, and to make them keep pace one with the
other, but in two pathways which are always different (ibid.). And yet, Tocqueville
found that Americans held women in high esteem, noting their confidence in the
understanding of a wife, and profound respect for her freedom (ibid.).
Women pose a problem for Tocqueville, which points to issues still debated to
this day concerning equality, similarity, difference, and subordination.5 He con-
cludes chapter XII saying, Thus the Americans do not think that man and woman
have either the duty or the right to perform the same offices, but they show an
equal regard for both their respective parts; and though their lot is different, they
consider both of them as beings of equal value.
And yet, he asserts that whilst they have allowed the social inferiority of wom-
an to subsist, they have done all they could to raise her morally and intellectually
to the level of man. He finally claims that the singular prosperity and growing
strength of that people ought mainly to be attributed ... to the superiority of their
women (ibid.), offering no further comments on this assertion.
On the one hand, Tocqueville highlights a tension between the existence of
an egalitarian mentality and the dissimilarity of women and men, which reveals
the limits of this equality. On the other, he insists on the equal worth of men and
women, and, surprisingly, the superiority of women, which simultaneously contra-
dicts equality.
According to Tocqueville, mens and womens roles contrast specifically in the
context of marriage, their positions as husbands and wives. He views gender dif-
ferences as limited to their roles given by nature. He insists that there is comple-
mentarity, whatever their difference (dissimilarity), but finds that this feature does
not exclude a certain equality in social worth. This raises the question: Outside the
context of marriage and conjugal roles, what, then, prevents the equality of men
and women?
Scholars have suggested various interpretations of this passage. Furet (1981: 33)
contends that Tocqueville insists on equality of conditions as a constitutive princi-
ple of democratic social order ... a norm and not a fact. Marcel Gauchet (1980: 99)
states that equality as a principle and an ideal cannot account for the differences
that manifest themselves at another level; difference, especially the real division of
sexes, is not cancelled, but relegated to the background. He asserts that this is not
an ontological difference, but that this difference is at the same time deprived of
its substance and yet assumed so that its presence does not prevent any adult from
finding similarity with the other he dominates (ibid.). In contrast, Dumont, who
highlights Tocquevilles conflation of the social and the natural form, or universal
5. Debates since the 1980s (see, e.g., Ortner and Whitehead 1981; Collier and Yanagisako
1987a; Moore 1988) have addressed social systems of inequality, treating difference as
a social construction defined by each society. I have discussed these questions at length
in Barraud (2001) and in Als and Barraud (2001).
including sex distinctions, within the framework of caste, in an effort to offer a new
perspective on questions of hierarchy and equality.
Endogamy is one of the principles underlying the separation of castes, which, by
definition, appears to exclude hierarchy within the caste itself. The nature of caste
hierarchies has been long debated in scholarship on India. Dumont (1980a: 43)
sees the separation of castes as reducible to a single true principle, namely the
opposition of the pure and the impure. This opposition underlies hierarchy, which
is the superiority of the pure to the impure, underlies separation because the pure
and the impure must be kept separated, and underlies the division of labor because
pure and impure occupations must likewise be kept separate. How, then, might we
grapple with differences of status within endogamous castes or subcastes? If castes
are separate owing to their differences in status, it would seem that a given status
would be extended throughout a given caste. This is where Dumont begins his
study of marriage.
Dumont addresses several aspects of hierarchy in his discussion of marriage in
India. First, he considers the relationship between castes and kinship (including
affinity), examining to what extent the ideology of hierarchy influences the field
of kinship (ibid.: 11213). A second aspect, related to the first, is whether or not
kinship configurations, specifically kinship terminologya circumscribed do-
maincomprise hierarchical oppositions. Dumonts aim here is to shed light on
the relationship between the ideology of caste hierarchy and domains which are
not directly determined by it. His writings on kinship introduce theories that he
developed more fully later on, concerning hierarchy, comparison, the need to de-
part from our own ways of thinking in kinship analysis, the limits of generalization,
and the importance of reconsidering ones own analyses in response to discussion
and critique.
I will begin with Dumonts famous article Hierarchy and marriage alliance in
South Indian kinship (1957).7 This title makes clear Dumonts attempt to grapple
with the relationship between ideological hierarchy and forms of marriage. I draw
on this text to highlight his treatment of sex distinction in the limited but influen-
tial domain of kinship terminology (as subsystems of kinship in general) (Dumont
1983: 23). To justify his approach, Dumont often insists on the specificity of kinship
terminology, as a clearly bounded, simply patterned, indigenous system of catego-
ries (ibid., emphasis in original). He asserts that in kinship terminology one finds
the terms in which the people actually think their kinship relationships, and they
are for us more important ... because the terms in which the people actually think
are more important than what they say ... about the terms in which they think that
they are thinking (ibid.: 2324).
In this article Dumont first seeks to establish the common character among
subcastes close to one another in the caste hierarchy, who nonetheless diverge in
terms of kinship characteristics (descent, residence, marriage rules, etc.) (ibid.: 36).
Dumonts second goal was to find, within the internal constitution of the caste
group, something of the principles that govern its [hierarchal] external rela-
tions (ibid.: 37). He examined whether caste hierarchy was also present in kinship
7. Hierarchy and marriage alliance in South Indian kinship was published in French in
1975 (Dumont 1975a) and reprinted in Affinity as a value (Dumont 1983).
kinship vocabulary revealed by the analysis. If one expresses a rule as marriage with
the mothers brothers daughter, Dumont explains, it appears as a rule for deriving
a mans marriage from a relationship excluding any idea of marriage of affinity, i.e.
from a relationship of consanguinity (ibid.). However, if the rule is interpreted as a
feature of affinity, it takes on another meaning. It then expresses a condition ... to
maintain a certain form of intermarriage8 (ibid.: 72). He thus claims that the rule is
not an instrument allowing one to deduce a secondary category (a marriage) from
a primary category (a consanguinity relationship) (ibid.: 71). Rather, this regula-
tion determines ones marriage by reference to ones ascendants marriage, which
means reproducing the marriage of ones father (or ones grandfather according to
the form of marriage) if the rule is maintained (ibid.: 72). The consequence of the
rule in the case of South India is that affinity (kinship through marriage) is trans-
mitted from one generation to the other. It thus acquires a diachronic dimension,
which Western systems only attribute to consanguinity.9
On the contrary, in Western systems, while the relationship of a man to his
brother-in-law is an affinity relation, the relation between their children is a con-
sanguinity relation, described by the kinship term cousins. Dumont easily dem-
onstrates that it is not true in South India, where both children inherit the affinity
relation of their fathers. Children are linked to each other by affinity, a relation
transmitted from generation to generation, such that cousins in Western terms
are brothers-in-law or potential brothers-in-law.
8. The French version adds: of a certain type of affinity (Dumont 1975a: 48).
9. Whenever I use the expressions with us, our systems, we Westerners, our/their,
and so on, or whenever I quote Dumont using these expressions, it must be recalled
that Dumont, since his earliest analyses, always advocated the analysis of the subject
studied (caste, kinship, hierarchy, ideology, etc.) with the anthropologists own society,
culture, ideology, and so on (see, e.g., his introduction to Homo hierarchicus). He as-
serts that anthropology has the aim of putting modern society in perspective in rela-
tion to the societies which have preceded it or which co-exist with it, and of making in
this way a direct and central contribution to our general education (Dumont 1980a: 2).
10. The French version (Dumont 1975a: 50) adds, in the vocabulary while marriage rules
specifically emphasize its importance.
penetrates all social domains (kinship, marriage, etc.).11 He asserts that, within
kinship proper, i.e. within the domain defined through the system of kinship cat-
egories, hierarchy plays its role within a framework it does not determine, and is
thus conceptually subordinate to kinship (Dumont 1983: 168).
The suggestion that equality in India manifests itself through the absolute dis-
tinction of (equal) sexes is surprising in light of Dumonts acknowledgment that
sex distinctions are inherently hierarchical (the hierarchical opposition between
man and womansupra Adam and Eve). For Dumont, the hierarchical distinction
applies to a particular type of unit (the couple) or relationship (between husband
and wife). It must thus be conceptually differentiated from the perfect equality of
the sexes in South Indian terminology. The latter is an analytical and conceptual
equality that exists within kinship terminology. Gender equality in kinship termi-
nology does not entail equity of social relations between men and women. Nor is
it the type of equality Dumont discussed in the context of individualism. Here he
defines equality as perfect symmetry between the sexes, which he opposes to
the segregation of the sexes in social life (ibid.: 24). I suggest, however, that this is
an equality that exists solely outside of any social relation. This type of equality, like
that in individualism, separates each individual from the others, given that the two
sexes are separated in the South Indian affinity terminology.
As is often the case in Dumonts theories, these matters are not black or white.
Here equality is present without it being an entailment of individualism. Equality
of the sexes, or the perfect similitude in the treatment of sexes, in conjunction with
the axial distinction ibid.: 28), is emphasized in that affinity has equal status with
consanguinity, or a value equal to it (ibid.: vii, emphasis in original). At this point,
the kinship terminology does not hierarchize the sexes.
Dumont insists on the perfect equivalence and the equal status of consanguinity
and affinity in this system (ibid.: vii and 170). Values are, by definition, consid-
ered durable. While Western affinity is ephemeral (see above Dumont 1971: 15,
in Parkin 2006: 4), South Indian affinity is permanent, possessing a value equal to
that of consanguinity (Dumont 1983: vii). In India, although hierarchy penetrates
subcaste endogamy (seen in the different statuses within the subcaste itself), in kin-
ship terminologies, equality of the sexes and of affinity and consanguinity prevails.
Returning to Conklins paradigm once more and to the equistatutory opposition,
Dumont (1983: 26) states that it is a configuration in which no hierarchical dis-
tinction of levels is found.12
Dumont concludes, Let me state again that this analysis claims to deal only
with the basic level of distinction in the vocabularyequal status of consanguinity
and affinityand to thus deliver the basic cognitive grid through which the people
think their kinship relationships. It is incomplete in the sense that secondary levels
of distinction are not explored (ibid.: 35).
11. In another passage, Dumont (1983: 169) expresses this idea in simple terms: with
regard to our problem of the relation between caste and kinship, or hierarchy and
equality, in South India.
12. I diverge from Dumont on this point, prefering the formulation equality of the sexes
to equality between the sexes. The latter could be interpreted as equality between men
and women, whereas the analysis at hand focuses solely on the terminological level.
The last section of this article discusses the importance of affinity relationships
in other contexts, such as the roles and functions of affines in matters of inheri-
tance that illustrate the central role played by marriage, including gifts, wedding
and mourning prestations, the ceremonial role of the maternal uncle, and so on.
In summary, in South India, and within the hierarchical caste system, kinship
terminology is organized by a simple distinctive opposition (which Dumont de-
scribes as a paradigm) which establishes the equal value of consanguinity and
affinity, in conjunction with the marriage rule, as well as the perfect symmetry
between and equality of the sexes.
These conclusions lead me to reflect upon sex distinctions and the relationship
between consanguinity and affinity when it is not a structural opposition, in other
kinship systems and terminologies.
This hierarchy is contained in the distinction that encompasses both sexes (there
is a single relative sex term for brothersister and a single relative sex term for
husbandwife), thus attributing them a different status with regard to the distinc-
tion (Dumonts principle of the unit: 1980a: 24041).13
What is striking is that this analytical disjunction emerges between actual mar-
riage partners and in the subsequent relationships between their houses for at least
two generations after a marriage. The hierarchy inherent in the sex distinction takes
the form of different statuses given to the wifes and the husbands houses: the wifes
brothers ancestors being attributed a higher status than the sisters descendants, who
are considered helpers of the former.14 The kinship terminology presents a sort of
formal synchronic symmetry of the sexes in the central generation. However, any
marriage creates a diachronic dissymmetry of the sexes for the descendants of this
marriage (who have different statuses). This is one of the main features of the societies
where the brothersister relationship is central in the analysis of kin terminologies.
Kei society thus presents a contrasting configuration, in which affinity nearly
disappears. It is a configuration where a marriage induces a change of status, es-
tablishing higher- or lower-ranked relationships between intermarried houses. In
other words, although there is no distinction of sex in the use of kinship terms, in
the social relations between brothers and sisters, and husbands and wives, a sex
distinction does exist. Within this distinction, there is a hierarchy, which exists in
tandem with differential statuses of marriage relationships.
For further comparison with South India, we can briefly underline a point con-
cerning Kei ideology (Barraud 1990; Als and Barraud 2001). In South India, while
trying to understand the relationship between ideology (the pure and the impure,
caste and hierarchy) and kinship features, Dumont finds in kinship terminology
what he calls equality of the sexes and equal status between consanguinity and af-
finity. At the same time, he discovers that differences of status (hierarchy) enter the
caste through marriage. In Kei, by contrast, values are defined in reference to two
sets of ideas, which, for simplicity, may be described as the internal organization of
the society (subordinate level) and the relationship with the world beyond society
(superior level). Marriage must be considered at both levels. Maternal affines (the
mothers brother and their ancestors) have a higher status at the subordinate level
of ideology. Sisters destined to marry outside the house are called women strang-
ers from birth. These out-married sisters, their husbands and descendants, are as-
sociated with the superior level of the world beyond society. In this case, marriage
and sex distinction have a dual status.
In Dumonts terms, equality would be an inappropriate description of this
configuration. South India displays in its kinship terminology an equistatutory op-
position between affines and consanguines for each sex. South Indian kinship ter-
minology includes distinct words for each sex, which receive equal treatment. This
is not the case in the Keiese terminology, where a single term designates both sexes.
The sex distinction here is manifested through the relation.
13. The sex distinction, and particularly its relative sex modality in different societies, is
central to Als and Barrauds Sexe relatif ou sexe absolu? (2001).
14. This feature is well known as being a characteristic of Eastern Indonesia societies.
15. To understand the situation, we may perhaps recall the more extreme case of our own,
Western, societies in which kinship does not, as in simpler societies, order directly or
indirectly the whole of social life (Dumont 1966: 110, emphasis in original).
In the French system, he says, there are, strictly speaking, only two affinity terms,
gendre (son-in-law) and bru (daughter-in-law). Other affinal terms are compound
words, composed of consanguine terms like pre (father) or frre (brother) and a
prefix marking affinity. In French, beau-pre (father-in-law), beau-frre (brother-
in-law), and so on, do not constitute distinct categories with respect to father and
brother. Dumont thus asserts that among modern Westerners, affinity is subor-
dinated to consanguinity, for my brother-in-lawan affine[]becomes an uncle,
a consanguine relative, for my children. In other words, affinity is ephemeral, it
merges into consanguinity in the next generation (Dumont 1983: vii). There are no
positive marriage rules, there is no repetition of the marriage relations in successive
generations. And sexes are equal in the ideology, both ideally and in terminology.
Note that in English, the vocabulary is even more limited: son-in-law is com-
posed of son, daughter-in-law of daughter, while French has gendre and bru.
Whereas French still has special terms in certain cases, English only has second-
ary determinants. Comparatively ... the dichotomy in English usage corresponds
to a sort of apotheosis of consanguinity and a concomitant devaluation of affinity
(Dumont 1971: 14, in Parker 2006: 4).
However, Dumont sees in this system a sort of central distinction, between di-
rect line and collateral line within descent: the terminology distinguishes father
and uncle, brother and cousin, son and nephew, and so on ... and also the sexes
(Dumont 1962: 35). This does not organize in any way the status of affinity, which is
residual. Thus kinship consists of consanguinity only and introduces, says Dumont,
an opposition within a substance, descent (ibid.) between direct and indirect line.
***
In summary, in South India, in the context of caste hierarchy, kinship terminology
exhibits an equal treatment of the sexes in conjunction with the axial distinction,
equivalence in value of consanguinity and affinity, with respect to the marriage rule.
In Kei society, the axial distinction is the sex distinction; there is a sort of sym-
metry between the positions of both sexes at egos generation (brothersister) and
a dissymmetry of the brothersister relation, which is revealed at the next genera-
tion after a marriage occurs. There is dissymmetry and hierarchy in the relation
between two generations in conjunction with marriage; this is a hierarchy, which is
reversed at the superior level of ideology.
In North India, the hierarchy of the caste enters the field of kinship, particularly
in affinity relations, such that the two sexes are not equal or equivalent in this re-
gard. There is no strict opposition in the terminology and no axis, but the sibling
relationship serves as a guiding principle, which organizes kinship.
In Western systems, where egalitarian ideology dominates, there is no strict
central opposition in the kinship terminology. At this level, sex distinction is clear
in the non equivalence of consanguinity and reduced affinity. Taking into account
the fact that kinship in Western societies nowadays does not order the whole of
social life, one can say, however, that with regard to value and permanence, only
consanguinity is transmitted and affinity is not valued.16
16. An anonymous reviewer of this article rightly underlined the great influence of the
church in defining Western kinship and affinity and property transmission. There is
Concluding remarks
In Western societies, where equality is an ideal, if not a reality, hierarchy is largely
unsuspected and underestimated. I am not an expert on French kinship or marriage,
but it seems to me that their relation to ideology engenders three conclusive remarks.
First, the devaluation of affinity in kinship terminology must be examined with
regard to the contemporary desire to give both sexes equal treatment. Empirical-
ly, there are today a growing and infinitely expandable number of affinity terms
used in contexts where affinity is no longer present. I am thinking of terms which
designate the spouse of egos mother or father, in French beau-pre (stepfather)
and belle-mre (stepmother), or the children of egos spouse: beau-fils (stepson),
belle-fille (stepdaughter), who are neither affines nor consanguine relatives for the
children but who take the place of kin.17 Given the valorization of consanguinity
relative to affinity, could the use of affinity terms (beau-pre, belle-mre) by chil-
dren (parentchild relationship, a filiation relationship) lead to the confusion of
relations and a further devaluation of affinity? Furthermore, does consanguinity
itself not lose its value, becoming a kind of second-rate consanguinity? To follow
Dumonts questioning, one can ask what causes this ordering of affinal relatives
and the devaluation of affinity in Western societies (Dumont 1966: 110).
My second point is a comment on filiation (Dumont 1962: n. 13) in France. Does
speaking of filiation (in French) produce confusion between its two meanings? On
the one hand, the parentchild bilinear relationship (filiation in English), and,
on the other, filiation as descent, that is, understood as transmission of mem-
bership in an exogamous group, unilineal and even patrilineal in many Western
societies, connected to a genealogical arrangement tracing a relation back to ascen-
dants. This confusion is also reported by Agns Fine regarding the parentchild
indeed a historical context to take into account to explain the contemporary devalua-
tion of affinity, which I did not include in the comparison of English and French termi-
nologies. I am grateful to this reviewer for this important observation.
17. See the recent French Report (Thry and Leroyer 2014) on the question of access
to origins, and the familial place of beaux-parents (stepparents); and a reflexion on
filiation, to account for the evolutions of contemporary family. If the discussion of
marriage is central in this interesting report, nowhere are the statuses of affinity or the
question of the affinal terms used in the context of filiation examined.
relationship (specifically parenthood) and the English filiation. When the term
is used in the first sense (parentchild relation) and in the contexts described in
the first point (beaux-parents, terms which in French connote affinity), there is
a collusion of meanings between affinity and consanguinity. The term parents in
French, meaning relatives in English, becomes a catch-all term in which no dis-
tinctions are made. The second notion tends to cover the first, which means that
the parentchild link tends to occupy all that contains filiation (Fine 2001: 46). It
also contributes simultaneously to a confusion with affinity, owing to the use of the
same terms in second marriages. Affinity is recognized only through a preference
for consanguinity (parentchild relationship) at the same time as consanguinity is
reduced to the parentchild relationship (parenthood).18
Finally, my third point is that in all examples of kinship terminologies presented
here, except the French one, the sex distinction operates in conjunction with an-
other principle to organize the kinship vocabulary relative to marriage and affinity.
On the other hand, in Western kinship terminologies, sex distinction, although
present, is not able to organize a consanguinityaffinity relation, since affinity is an
attribute of consanguinity and does not significantly oppose it. The sexes are ideo-
logically equal (if not in reality), but sex distinction has no effect in the construc-
tion of elementary kinship oppositions. One could say that marriage and affinity
in Western systems do not have much to do with la parent (kinship in English,
in its broadest definition), on the restricted level of the construction of elementary
kinship oppositions. Their status on the ideological level is also unclear (an issue
which preoccupies contemporary debates regarding marriage, if not affinity strictly
speakingsee footnote 17which, at this point, is beyond the scope of my own
research).
And again I give the floor to Dumont, on comparison.
While with us, only consanguinity is inherited, in South India affinity
is transmitted also from one generation to another, making it an exact
counterpart of consanguinity. In saying this, we conceptually move from
our own conceptual system to the one that is studied, and our comparison
is complete. We subsumed under a formula our conception and their
conception ... we have not achieved the universal, but only a step toward
it, because there is in the world a wide variety of kinship systems based
on other principles. (Dumont 1992: 244, emphasis in original)
18. See Parkins (translation of Dumonts Introduction to two theories, for his discussion
of the translation of French filiation: Dumont also addresses the double meaning of
French filiation (meaning both descent and the parentchild links which descent con-
sists of: though it is relatively rare in English, the same word is used there in the latter
sense only (Parkin 2006: xii). And again, in his discussion of Radcliffe-Browns defini-
tion of kin and of siblingship, I quote Parkins translation of Dumont: Siblingship is left
aside, consanguinity thus being linked only to the relation of filiation (elementary) or
descent (multiple), a nuance to be noted in the way the French term filiation is used.
And in the translators note 1: In other words, French filiation is used to translate
both filiation (ties between parents and children) and descent (the extension of such
ties backwards in time from the perspective of the present) from English (Parkin in
Dumont 2006: 6).
After rejecting dichotomies, and natural differences, the editors of Gender and
kinship propose a premise that social systems are systems of social inequalities.
This follows the question of how attributes and characteristics of people are cul-
turally recognized and differentially evaluated and its corollary: what are a soci-
etys cultural values? (Yanagisako and Collier 1987: 3940). The key phrase here,
however, is values entail evaluation, meaning that all things and actions are not
equal in a system of social relationships, and values create inequalities (ibid.).
This is where the advantage of Dumonts theory of hierarchy becomes clear.
As we have seen, hierarchy does not create inequalities but distinguishes levels
in which the values attributed to elements can be reversed. The logic of equality
excludes anything that is not of equal value, whereas hierarchy includes multiple
levels of elements of different values, without exclusion. The separation of sexes
in kinship terminology does not attribute a priori a value to one sex or the other.
Similarly, the affinityconsanguinity distinction, as criteria of analysis, does not
attribute a value to one or the other. Only the analysis of the entire terminological
system allows for the attribution of status. The combination of a limited number of
terms in a terminology does not account for natural differences and even seems
to erase them, as we have seen with the term relative sex in the Keiese terminol-
ogy. Equality is not in place, according to Dumonts use of the term (in his discus-
sion of the equality of sexes in South Indian terminology), which points exclusively
and significantly to an equal treatment of the sexes as a formal kinship category by
contrast with the caste hierarchy.
Once more, Dumonts comparative method is at work here (see also Dumont
1975b: 15657). The notion of equality has been presented first in comparison
with Tocquevilles idea that equality abolishes differences and implies similarity
except in the case of men and women: dissimilarity of women but equal value with
men, in the egalitarian mentality. Dumont argued that Tocqueville confused equal-
ity and identity, which the latter locates in human nature. In contrast, Dumonts
approach to hierarchy distinguishes equality, identity, and difference, distinctions
that remain at the heart of contemporary discussions of gender as a social con-
struct. In this respect, a closer reading of Dumonts work can shed light on ques-
tions of equality and gender relations. This was my aim in this essay through the
examination of kinship terminology. This analysis limits the scope of the question,
illustrating the place of notions of equality within the hierarchical context of the
caste system. The challenge we now face is to determine to what extent and in
what contexts a reversal is feasible. The present analysis has revealed the presence
of equality within hierarchy, leading to the question: How might hierarchy be con-
ceivable within egalitarian contexts?
In 1988, in her book Feminism and anthropology, the British anthropologist
Henrietta L. Moore wrote, The different theoretical positions within feminist
anthropology are best demonstrated through a consideration of the debate which
dominates the subject: is sexual asymmetry universal or not? In other words, are
women always subordinate to men? (Moore 1988: 13).
In this article, I have proposed an answer to these questions. Yes, there is always
sexual asymmetry. No, women are not always subordinate to men. And the value
subordination (not to be confounded with the either/or implied in formulations
of equality vs. domination) that takes place in the social manifestation of the sex
distinction is not uniform, but rather unfolds in diverse ways, which include rever-
sals of hierarchal relations.
Acknowledgments
This article has benefited from long discussions with my colleagues Ismal Moya
and Andr Iteanu. The English version was greatly improved with the assistance of
Chelsie Yount-Andr, to whom I am deeply grateful.
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Ccile Barraud is a Senior Researcher Emeritus at the National Center for Scien-
tific Research (CNRS, France). She has conducted extensive fieldwork in Southeast
Moluccas, Eastern Indonesia, since 1971. Her research focused initially on under-
standing houses as social groups. She is the author of Tanebar-Evav: Une socit de
maisons tourne vers le large (ditions de la Maison des Sciences de lHomme, 1979),
Sexe relatif ou sexe absolu (with Catherine Als, ditions de la Maison des Sciences
de lHomme, 2001), and of an essay on the notion of property in Austronesian lan-
guages and in the Indo-Pacific area (in Andr Iteanu, ed., La cohrence des socits:
Mlanges en hommage Daniel de Coppet, Maison des Sciences de lHomme, 2001).
She is currently engaged in a cooperative GermanFrench program on the theme
Encountering religions in Southeast Asia and beyond.
Ccile Barraud
Centre Asie du Sud-Est
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
cole des Hautes tudes en Sciences Sociales
Paris
France
barraud@msh-paris.fr