La parentela: cos'è e cosa non è

by Marshall Sahlins

In questo saggio, Sahlins affronta il tema antropologico per eccellenza, ovvero la natura della parentela. E lo fa elaborando un'originale prospettiva basata sull'idea di «reciprocità»: i parenti sono tali non tanto perché sono consanguinei, ma perché condividono affettivamente e simbolicamente gli uni le vite (e le morti) degli altri. Lungi dal rimandare alla semplice procreazione, l'idea di parentela è una relazione transpersonale basata su una comune esperienza esistenziale. Per quanto rilevanti siano il sangue, il latte, il seme, la carne, o qualsiasi altra cosa intervenga nella procreazione, questi non sono soltanto fenomeni fisiologici, ma eredità sociali, dotate di significato, che collocano il bambino all'interno di un terreno relazionale molto più esteso e strutturato. Siamo cioè di fronte a una costruzione simbolica del concetto di appartenenza ben più complessa della semplice consanguineità.

Genres: Anthropology, Nonfiction, Science

126 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 2012

About the author

Marshall David Sahlins was an American cultural anthropologist best known for his ethnographic work in the Pacific and for his contributions to anthropological theory. He was the Charles F. Grey Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and of Social Sciences at the University of Chicago.

Reviews

[Read me two times · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interessantissimo (mini)saggio sulla parentela, dal punto di vista antropologico, sociologico, filosofico ed etnografico. È curioso che tutti gli studi riportati nel testo (e sono tanti) siano su società piccole e non ascrivibili al mondo occidentale.
La parentela è reciprocità, il sangue non sarà acqua ma di sicuro non è nemmeno così fondamentale quanto tutto il resto, che costituisce il vero legame.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

insightful, beautifully written study that undoes any sense that kinship is a matter of biology.

[Roberto Yoed · Rating 2 out of 5]

An absolute theory of kinship, Sahlins proposes that this phenomena is "all culture" (p. 89).

While I share his critique to blood and genealogical theories of kinship, because gift exchange, enemies and religion also produce kinship, I don't see how all culture is indeed kinship. One could argue that kinship is one of the many factors that condition human agency, but not the most important nor the explaination of everything else.

Symbolic thought, language and kinship still operate under a world where the economic forces have the last word: kinship is almost irrelevant in imperialism, exploitation, alienation and ideology. Even in primitive societies, the chief and big men dominate the common folk because of their position in hierarchy (and that position is justified because they had accumulated all the lands and agricultural product; kinship there functions as ideology).

If we follow Sahlins perspective, then we are going to end up concluding that kinship precedes the economic forces, and if a god given right is what explains the accumulation, and not the other way around, then we have returned to idealism.

[Joey · Rating 4 out of 5]

when my professor said he was gonna send me this I misheard it as "I'll send you this kinship essay by Stalin"

The galactic mimesis begins in the microcosm of the group's mutuality of being... or is it in the imaginative powers of the ruler? One has merely a limited view of kinghip without a greater understanding of Sahlins's argument for the cultural forces that shape the being of a collective and their fealty to a king. The king is an Anti-Kin that establishes a dominion of order over new lands and previous kinships and yet through their demand of offerings and subsequent gift of life and distribution of supplies they turn the kinship practices into paradoxical ones which, when the King successfully embodies this transcendent being maker, the antithesis of Kin becomes both King and a super-kin or a higher embodiment of the divine forces and ancestral history and sovereign might which utterly transforms and scales up the capacity of kinship amongst groups within their dominion.

[Meema · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two essays from a giant in the discipline of Anthropology,Marshall Sahlins. He argues kinship is culture and a relationship that is invoked through atmosphere and society rather than biology as one may instinctively assume. Through citing ethnographic studies from tribal and island people to using Aristotle and Durkheim, as and when needed, Sahlins makes his point of how strangely the simple bonds of blood do not necessarily exist and if they do exist, it is only under the umbrella of cultural practice. Through shared history and struggle and everyday life practices kinship is formed. Well argued , my only criticism is while the ethnographic information was eye-opening it also serves to other the other. There were not enough examples from the so-called mainland or dominant majority cultures and that raises at least a 'huh?!' from this reader. Interesting read nonetheless.

[Molsa Roja(s) · Rating 5 out of 5]

An extraordinary piece! I first got to the topic moved by Haraway's motto, "Make kin, not babies": it made me asked myself, what exactly is to be kin? Is there anything outside this oppressive, strictly biological Western kin? And indeed, there is. If one is looking for other ways of making kin, here there are hundreds of examples of ways in which people become more than neighbours: through land, through commensality, through name-sharing, and whatnot. Honestly, I think this is absolutely extraordinary and is a massive work in thinking outside our own paradigm, trying to get else-where, as Haraway would say. Even if so, I really missed more-than-human kin, which Sahlins doesn't explictitly talk about and is typical from totemist and animist ontologies: not only kin, but odd-kin.

[C. Varn · Rating 4 out of 5]

While not a perfect introduction--you do need to reference and dig into many of the anthropological and kinship study controversies beyond Sahlin's gloss--this book is an solid overview of the debates around the meaning of kinship in anthropology. It's pithy and yet often dense, and while Sahlin's a clear agenda here, it does present the research controversies fairly clearly.

[Hakan Karabas · Rating 1 out of 5]

Eğer akademik çalışma yapmıyorsanız, vaktinizi başka kitaplar ile değerlendirmenizi öneririm.

[Dimitris Alexakis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Απαιτητικό ανθρωπολογικό δοκίμιο με μια πολύ ενδιαφέρουσα προσέγγιση για τη συγγένεια ως αμοιβαιότητα ύπαρξης

[Phyllis]

You would never know what kinship is by reading this. That's for sure.