NSF Award
8904457
This project will study ritual kinship among Indians in Oaxaca, Mexico. The research will census ritual kinship relations in a community of Indians, record patterns of behavior by women in ritual kinship and other social activities, and collect archival and oral documentation about ritual kinship. The hypotheses to be tested are that female patterns of ritual kinship are across the same social statuses, while male patterns tend to cross social statuses to link higher and lower status men. This research is important because informal and formal networks of social relations exist in all societies. These networks are commonly structured by gender and social status, and understanding how these variables interact will help us understand how and why individuals gain or lose their place in social networks, with the attendant fortunate or unfortunate consequences.
