Patrilineal and Patrilocal Ethnographic Example: The Yanamamo

10-15,000 people living along Orinoco River in Venezuela

125/150 politically independent villages

40 to 250 people per village, average size: 75-80 people

Men and Food:

% of food % of time activity

75 1/3 of time slash-and-burn agriculture

15 (75% of protein) 1/2 of time hunt and fish

10 < 1/4 of time gathering

Women and Food: women spend a lot of time gardening

Village size:

Too big leads to fights then fissioning

Too small leads to being attacked by other villages

Just right? Difficult to achieve

Sex roles: very different for men and women (see reading)

Villages have 2 or more localized lineages in them

Exogamous patrilineages with bilateral cross-cousin marriage

Lineages are not deep: if there are no connections for 3 generations, people do not consider themselves related

Parallel cousins are called “brother” and “sister” (Iroquois kinship)

Marriages are arranged or women are stolen from other villages

1/4 of the married men have 2 or more wives (these are older men)

Co-wives are often sisters (sororal polygyny)

Many younger men have NO wives/Many also killed in warfare

Village fissioning follows descent and alliance

Husbands often treat their wives with violence

Women prefer to be in the same village as their male relatives