Kinship terminology
Résumé
Kinship terminologies, a set of words of a language that reflects genealogical connections in culturally specific ways, were among the first cultural elements that held early anthropologists' attention and remained central to the discipline until the 1970s. Like language in general, terminologies are thought to be structured and to reflect peoples' ways of classifying kin. Despite the numerous variations human cultures have developed, the many different terminologies can be grouped into five basic types, labeled Hawaiian, Dravidian, Iroquois, Sudanese, and Eskimo. The terms that constitute a terminology are distinguished or characterized according to a number of criteria, such as whether a term is a reference or an address, consanguineal or affinal, classificatory or descriptive. After thirty years of neglect, the study of kinship and kinship terminology has regained importance in anthropology in recent years, particularly in the context of applied research.