Kinship in Neckarhausen, 1700–1870

Studying one German village in depth, Sabean questions the idea that the more modern society became, the less kin mattered.

David Warren Sabean (Author)

9780521583817, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 13 January 1998

652 pages, 131 b/w illus. 159 tables
23.4 x 15.5 x 3.5 cm, 1 kg

"Powerful and thought-provoking, Sabean's work has once again clarified our 'thinking about past social processes.'" Journal of Social History

This work analyses shifts in the relations of families, households, and individuals in a single German village during the transition to a modern social structure and cultural order. The findings call into question the idea that the more modern society became, the less kin mattered. Rather, the opposite happened. During 'modernization', close kin developed a flexible set of exchanges, passing marriage partners, godparents, political favors, work contacts, and financial guarantees back and forth. Sabean also argues that the new kinship systems were fundamental for class formation, and he repositions women in the center of a political culture of alliance construction. One of a series of important local studies coming out of the Max Planck Institute for History, it is the most thorough-going attempt to work between the disciplines of social and cultural history and anthropology, and it demonstrates the power of microhistory to reconceptualize general historical trends.

Introduction: 1. An introduction to kinship
2. Vetterleswirtschaft: rise and fall of a political discourse
3. The politics of incest and the ecology of alliance formation
Cohort I (1700–9): 4. Introduction to kinship during the early decades of the eighteenth century
5. Kinship as a factor in marriage strategy
6. Marriage and kinship practices
7. Ritual kinship
8. Naming children
Cohort II (1740–9): 9. Restructuring the system of alliance
10. Village politics at mid-century
Cohort III (1780–9): 11. Consanguinity as a principle of alliance
12. The formation of an alliance system
13. Ritual kinship and alternative alliance
14. Naming an patrilineal alliance
Cohort IV (1820–9): 15. Kinship at the beginning of the nineteenth century
16. Kinship and practice at the turn of the century
Cohort V (1860–9): 17. Kinship in the mid-nineteenth century village: an introduction
18. Networking with kin around the mid-nineteenth century
19. Matrifocal alliance
Conclusion: 20. Consanguinity in European perspective
21. Neckarhausen in European comparative perspective
22. Kinship and class formation
23. Kinship and gender.

Subject Areas: Modern history to 20th century: c 1700 to c 1900 [HBLL], European history [HBJD]