Answer to Question #253024 in Sociology for Ice_cream

Question

The principle of inheritance, succession and residence have the propensity to impact kin relationships. Discuss

Answer 1

In patrilineal societies, the laws of residence are virilocal, which means that after marriage, a woman returns to her husband's community. In patrilineal societies, a lawful marriage requires the husband and his family to give the bridewealth to the wife's family. If bridewealth had been paid, it was widely expected that if the husband died, his wife would be "inherited" or "remarried" to one of her late husband's brothers, raising her children among the deceased man's relatives. A widowed woman was frequently expected to return to her natal clan with her children if no bridewealth was paid upon marriage. In the case that the bridewealth was paid, women were frequently required to return it to the husband's family, as well as to leave the children with the husband and his relatives in the event of a divorce.

In determining kinship claims such as succession and inheritance rights, marriage and residence laws are crucial. Uxorilocal residency, in which a husband relocates to his wife's village, is a feature of matrilineal communities. The economic livelihood of the household is then based in the woman's village. A husband is supposed to return to his home village following divorce or the death of his wife, and he loses the right to use the land in his wife's village. Because they are matrilineal relatives, children in matrilineal civilizations stay in their mother's community even if their mother dies. In patrilineal cultures, children are generally regarded members of their father's kin group and inherit the father's property upon his death; in matrilineal cultures, kin membership is traced through the uterine line, so children are members of their mother's kinship rather than their father's. A man's heirs in matrilineal systems are his sister's children, not his own.