Kinship and family structure is important in everyday life. It helps to regulate behavior and the creation of societal groups. These systems differentiate from each other based on the cultural factors that is present in various groups across the world. One cultural factor is gender. I believe that no matter what the kinship and family structure is, women will, for the majority, always be placed at a lower position than men are. Some groups that demonstrate this idea are Incas, Plains Indians, Yanomamo, Navajo, Iroquois, and the Nayars. These groups also exerts the idea that matrilineal systems are not always better for women. The first point is to focus on the gender inequality faced in a patrilineal and patrilocal society. During lecture …show more content…
Majority of the function that help maintain a society, is controlled by men. This is evident in politics, subsistence production, family life, leadership, social organization, ceremonies, and settlement patterns (Bonvillain 92). The treatment faced with women is harsh, emotionally and physically. When the women first marry to someone that was arranged for them, they are to live with their husbands in his village. This isolates women because they are not in the comfort of their own family, making it dangerous for them. Women would not have her family to protect her from a conflict that happens to emerge in the household. Rape and beatings are common to be brought upon women in the village. Since the Yanomamo is a society that endorses warfare, women are taken from neighboring village frequently because of disputes over women or the pleasure of taking someone else's wife. Female infanticide is also present in Yanomamo warfare, if the men do not want their enemies to keep their wives. This decreases women's ability to be free and safe within their own community. With all the control the men have, women cannot help but be dependent on them. Any sign of residence is met with a beating and sometimes sexual assault. Yanomamo women have no power to change their position in society because it was all taken from them and would be hard to get back (Bonvillian …show more content…
In the Navajo, both genders in this society had the right to their independence and autonomy. This is demonstrated by both sexes being allowed to participate in premarital sex. In most patrilineal societies, the men are the only ones condoned to follow along to this practice. In a political standpoint, everyone contributed to the discussion and no one had more power than anyone else. Men and women could also own sheep so that lead for income to be brought in by both sexes. This also led for women to not be as dependent on
The Inuit, Haida, and Iroquois have many similarities and differences in foods, way of life, clothing, housing, art, ect.
The Aztec’s and the Inca’s have many similarities such as religious beliefs, and views about gods. Inca’s views about training for war are different, and the Aztec’s artifacts are somewhat different to. The farm land compared to the Inca’s is differs also, because where the Aztec’s lived the land was elevated about ten thousand feet.
The Cherokees and the Aztecs were very different people in many ways not only in location but also in ways of living. The Cherokees were southwestern woodland farmers. The Aztecs were also farmers in mesoamerica like the Mayans.
When it comes down to comparing and contrasting Native American and Spanish civilization, there is actually a variety of things that make each one stand out from one another. When looking into both the Natives and the Spanish there was more to be found different then there was to be similar in any way. Both societies struggled, but one did have more of an advantage which is why there was such conflict between the two.
In a patriarchal society men normally have the power. This power is generally handed down generation to generation as seen in Sundiata where the lineage of the first kings of Mali is explained generation by generation (Niane 3). It can also be seen in The Romance of Tristan and Iseult when “[T']he barons, Andret, Guenelon, Gondoine, and Denoalen pressed King Mark to take to wife some king's daughter who should give him an heir...”(Bedier 26). In these examples men generally have the primary power. However, there is an argument to be made that women, in both Sundiata, and The Romance of Tristan and Iseult have some significant power in their society.
Gender roles have been a predominant factor in our world since the early emergence of human societies whether they are positive or negative. They are based on expectations that societies have over the people in them. The Epic of Sunjata, shows us how men and women are treated almost equally in different forms. Women are praised for their ability to birth leaders, which is similar to the early Greek Society. In most societies, women are treated less equal than men. This was prevalent in the early Indian society. No matter the gender role, it has been shown that any society cannot survive without both men and women.
The Aztecs and Incas were the two dominant new world societies which greeted and eventually succumbed to the Spanish conquistadors in the early 16th century. Since then, they have occupied some of the most curious comers of the western imagination. Purveyors of scholarly and popular culture render them in various disparate ways: as victims of European colonialism, incompetent militarists, heroic forbears, barbarians, or authentic practitioners of native utopias and cults. The Aztecs and Incas were two Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican civilizations that roamed the land of Latin America throughout 14th and 15th century. Aztec empire ruled much of what is now Mexico from 1428 till 1521, when the empire was conquered by Spaniards. Aztecs controlled a region stretching from the Valley of Mexico in central Mexico east to the Gulf of Mexico and south to Guatemala. Aztecs were great engineers and developed a multifarious social political and religious system with Tenochtitlan as their capital city. Inca Empire stretched it boundaries from Colombia to Chile and reached west to east from the Atacama to Amazonian rain forest. Incas lack the concepts of written language however they had an incredible system of roads. Casco as their capital Inca Empire only lasted a century before it was conquered by Spaniards in early 16th century. The two Mesoamerican civilizations burgeoned independently of each other with no cultural or religious swap. Aztecs and Incan societies were predominantly agricultural. Religions of both societies were shamanistic which were heavily influenced by preceding cultures. These complex polytheistic religions regardless of their chronological exclusivity have significant features in common.
Although often seen as inferior, women have played a prominent role in defining cultures; such is the case for Maya, Inca, and Aztec societies. Similar to the societal divide seen in the Maya, Incan genders were independently established. Women had their own political and religious organization with their own hierarchies of priestesses and commissaries, as men did in their sphere (Powers). The two distinguishable spheres existed abreast, consisting of male and female officials in their respective spheres. A women’s endowment originated from Coya, the queen of the Inca territory, while the man’s originated from the king.
The Mayan, Aztec, and Incan civilizations were all advanced for their time. All of those civilizations had major accomplishments that impacted the technology and information we have today.
Mayan, Inca, and Aztec Civilizations. The Mayan, Inca, and Aztec civilizations each originated in Latin America. The Mayans lived in southern and central Mexico, other Mayans lived in Central America in the present day countries of Belize, Guatemala, and ancient Honduras. The Incas lived along the long coastal strip, and in the high peaks and deep fertile valleys of the Andes Mountains, and along the edges of the tropical forest to the east; this would be the country of Peru, Ecuador, Chile, Bolivia, and Argentina in present days.
Women held a significant role in Navajo society. Females were the primary leaders and owned property. When Navajo men married, they would dwell in the homes of his bride?s family. As women held an influential role in Navajo society, the coming of age at thirteen years old for females was celebrated with great parties, honoring the girl.
Prior to the use of agriculture, life was extremely different for women. The information that historians have obtained is limited, but there are certain aspects of Paleolithic society that have been discovered and point towards a more liberal lifestyle for women. Generally, a woman’s job was to gather food and tend to her children while her male counterpart hunted. These simple divisions allowed both men and women to play significant roles in hunter-gatherer society, which further allowed women to be held in equal if not greater esteem then men. According to Elisabeth Gaynor Ellis and Anthony Elser, authors of World History: Connections to Today, women also held...
What happens when two societies driven by the same goal come face to face? In early seventeenth century Virginia, the English colonists arrived in North America where they began interacting with a new people know as the Powhatan Indians. Both sides saw the benefits that an alliance with one another could have. The English arrived with a large array of technology, for example guns and metal tools, while the natives had an established center of operation with a thriving people and vast knowledge of the land. This alliance would work well but both societies had ulterior motives that were driving their interactions.
The ancestors of the indigenous peoples (Amerindians) were originally from Central East Asia and came across by means of the land and ice bridge which connected Siberia and Alaska at the time in the area what is now known as the Bering Strait to North America during the ice Age about 50,000 years ago They were nomadic peoples who followed their Food and this is presented as a Factor that accounted for them wandering from Asia into North America. Some continued to the east and settled in the cold sub artic regions others Wandered southward through North, Central and South America, Evolving distinct physical and cultural characteristics. Three distinct groups developed societies in parts of the Caribbean and in Central and South Americas. The Tainos were located in Jamaica. Hispaniola, Cuba, Puerto Rico and some parts of the Bahamas and Trinidad. The Kalinagos in Grenada, Tobago, St Vincent, St Kitts and Nevis, Puerto Rico ,Hispaniola and Trinidad . The Mayans were located in Mexico, Belize, Honduras and Guatemala. These societies were organized primarily on a political, religious, economic and social basis (Amerindians to Africans 3rd edition, Dyde et al.2008)
Gender roles are extremely important to the functioning of families. The family is one of the most important institutions. It can be nurturing, empowering, and strong. Some families are still very traditional. The woman or mother of the family stays at home to take care of the children and household duties. The man or father figure goes to work so that he can provide for his family. Many people believe that this is the way that things should be. Gender determines the expectations for the family. This review will explain those expectations and how it affects the family.