Patrick Heady

Culture, Perception, and Artistic Visualization: A Comparative Study of Children's Drawings in Three Siberian Cultural Groups.

In a study of three indigenous and non-indigenous cultural groups in northwestern and northeastern Siberia, framed line tests and a landscape drawing task were used to examine the hypotheses that test-based assessments of context sensitivity and independence are correlated with the amount of contextual information contained in drawings, and with the order in which the focal and background objects are drawn. The results supported these hypotheses, and inspection of the regression relationships suggested that the intergroup variations in test performance were likely to result from differences in the attention accorded to contextual information, as revealed by the drawings. Social and environmental explanations for the group differences in context sensitivity are also discussed. The conclusions support the argument that cultural differences in artistic styles and perceptual tests reflect the same underlying perceptual tendencies, and they are consistent with the argument that these tendencies reflect corresponding differences in patterns of social and environmental interaction.

A “Cognition and Practice” Approach to an Aspect of European Kinship

Despite the long history of kinship studies, we still lack agreed theories capable of explaining the connection between terminological systems and kinship practice. This article argues for a cognitive approach centering on two distinct but complementary aspects of identity. It is argued that patterns of shared identity are implied by terminology and combine with other factors to motivate practice—in a feedback loop which transmits influences between terminological systems and political and economic institutions. The argument is illustrated by statistical and historical analyses of an aspect of European kinship.

Contemporary godparenthood in Central and Eastern Europe: introduction

This introduction to the collection opens up the conversation between historians and anthropologists about the practical significance and social meaning of spiritual kinship. By discussing the key findings of five anthropological studies—in Italy, Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, and Moldova—we point to resemblances and differences. We examine common structural elements of the spiritual kinship system and the religious and material meanings involved. We find differing symbolic logics as well as different intensities of godparental practices, which can be described as a geographical, east-west gradient. Speaking broadly, the more to the east a place is, the more thriving the practice. In explaining the variation, ethnographic insights suggest that long-term differentiating trends are important, and also contemporary historical factors—substantial economic and political changes since the mid-twentieth century.

Priests and Midwives: Godparenthood and the Cognitive Framing of Kinship and Local Ties

Godparenthood is a distinctive form of ritual kinship associated with Christianity—most strongly developed in Catholic and Orthodox societies. There is general agreement among researchers that it is important both subjectively and practically. Nevertheless, the underlying logic of the system remains rather elusive—since the usual explanations, in terms of either patronage or religious belief, receive rather limited support from the data. Ethnographic evidence shows that the dyadic and triadic relationships of god(co)parenthood often involve neither practical patronage nor spiritual guidance. It is clear that a satisfactory explanation of godparenthood needs to go beyond these surface functions: the question is how? In this article, I argue that there are parallels between god(co)parenthood as it operates in Catholic Europe and the sacralization of kinship ties in segmentary lineage systems found in other parts of the world. In both cases, sacralized kinship ties link individuals to encompassing kinship categories which can also be localized in appropriate ways. I argue that this provides a cognitive framework in which kin-based and locally based cooperation can operate in a mutually sustaining fashion—and that the commitment to god(co)parenthood reflects the felt need for cooperation of this kind. To support this interpretation, I refer to fieldwork in northeast Italy. I also draw on historical and survey data to show that the interpretation is consistent with the history and geography of godparenthood within Europe.

Editors’ introduction: Murdock and Goody revisited

In recent years, various social science disciplines have witnessed an acceleration or resurgence of interest in the long-term historical development, spatial patterning, and implications of human family organization. The topic has long persisted as a key theme in historical demography, but recently it has gained particular momentum due to the revolution in the availability of largescale historical databases (Szołtysek, 2016). Explorations of household patterns are increasingly thriving in archaeology, in which detecting, analyzing, and understanding household units in their spatial dimension, and relationships between household members, continue to be central tasks (Tringham, 2001). Economists have recently begun to incorporate demographic behavior into a “unified growth theory,” and to treat family as an important driver of developmental capacities among societies (Carmichael et al., 2016). In anthropology, too, there are parallel developments, though they have taken a rather paradoxical turn. There have always been tensions among anthropologists between cultural and biological views of kinship, and between interpretative and quantitative methodologies. The advent of the new evolutionary anthropology in the 1960s set off a process of schismogenesis1 in which quantitative and biological approaches have become increasingly