HOW HAS MY FAMILY CHANGED OVER TIME?
(30% of Grade)
We are now approaching the section of the course that deals with kinship. The kinship poster project has three parts, based on interviews you do with a family members. The three components of the poster project are 1) a kinship chart 2) an essay that accompanies the kinship charts that explains how your family has changed 3) interview questions and answers submitted to me but not part of the public presentation. Poster Presentations during the last classes in May
THE KINSHIP CHART — MY FAMILY AND KIN
Part 1) The Kinship Chart
Create a diagram of your family kinship group using the basic anthropological notation system. We will review this in class, but you can get a head start by looking at this site:https://consanguinityandaffinity.wordpress.com/2013/06/08/how-to-draw-kinship-diagrams/comment-page-1/
At a minimum, you should include all your grandparents, aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters and first cousins, but you should try to go beyond this to include a wider circle of kin. Make sure you have included relationships in which people have divorced, separated or died.
Part 2) The Essay or Power Point Presentation
Accompanying the chart, you make a presentation that address the following broad question:
ESSAY: IN WHAT WAYS, IF ANY, HAVE THE PATTERNS OF FAMILY LIFE IN MY FAMILY CHANGED OVER TIME
In order to answer this question you need to find out the answers to the following:
How did the cohabiting (or non-cohabiting) couples in your family meet one another? For example, did they meet at work or school, or were they introduced by a friend or relative, etc.
What factors influenced each of the couples’ choices of partners? (For example, social class, race, ethnicity, religion, occupation, wealth, physical attractiveness.)
How old were the partners when they first married or decided to cohabit together. Did they have an engagement party, bachelor party, stag night, or any other celebration preceding the wedding or decision to live together? If they married, what kind of ceremony (religious, secular, judicial etc. did they have?) Were there any disputes or issues about this that had to be resolved? Did they go on a honeymoon? If so, when and where?
What were your parents and grandparents doing when they were your age? How many single parent families are in your kinship group?
Does your family have any rule or preference for endogamy?\\
What is the rate of separation or divorce in your family? How many times have individuals been married?
What kinds of jobs or work do your family members do? How has that changed over time?
What general changes in family life, if any, did you discover as a result of your research?
In order to do this project, you will need to interview older relatives and others who have knowledge of your family history. You should write up a series of interview questions about what you intend to ask that person. You can review these questions with me before you proceed. Your final interview questions and answers will be submitted as part of the project.
If you prefer, you may use pseudonyms for the names of your family members when you submit your project. If anyone is uncomfortable for whatever reason with this specific project, and would prefer to do an alternative kinship project, please come and see me.
If you need more help, come and see me.