Our home and family make up the basis of our lives for most of us, our family can be small or large, but whatever the size we value it above anything else in the world, but what defines a family or a family home? The topic Family is vast, it can include step-family, adoptive family, half family, or even, as most of you will agree, our pets!

What is a family?

Family is a group of people, or in the wild it would be animals (many species form the equivalent of a human family wherein the adults care for the young) are linked by their blood lines (consanguinity), marriage or relationship (affinity) or by sharing the same home (co-residence). One of the primary functions of the family is to produce and reproduce persons —biologically and socially. So what is often the case is that your experience of your family can shift over time. From the perspective of children, the family is a family of orientation: the family serves to locate children socially and plays a major role in their enculturation and socialization.

From the point of view of the parent, the family is a family of procreation, the goal of which is to produce, enculturate and socialize children. However, producing children is not the only function of the family; in societies with a sexual division of labour, marriage and the resulting relationship between two people, is necessary for the formation of an economically productive household.

Types of family

There are three main types of family set ups: a conjugal, a consanguineal, and a matrilocal family.

* Conjugal Family – A conjugal family includes only the husband, the wife and unmarried children who are not of age. The most common form of this family is regularly referred to in Sociological terms as a ‘nuclear family’.

* Consanguineal Family – A Consanguineal family consists of a parent and his or her children, and other people.

* Matrilocal Family – A matrilocal family will consist of a mother and her children. Generally these children are her biological offspring, although adoption of children is a practice in almost every society. This kind of family is common where women have the resources to rear their children by themselves, or where men are more mobile than women.

Kinship Terminology

Archaeologist Lewis Henry Morgan performed the first survey of kinship terminologies in use around the world. Though much of his work is now considered dated, he argued that kinship terminologies reflect different sets of distinctions. For example, most kinship terminologies distinguish between sexes (the difference between a brother and a sister) and between generations (the difference between a child and a parent). Moreover, he argued, kinship terminologies distinguish between relatives by blood and marriage (although recently some anthropologists have argued that many societies define kinship in terms other than “blood”).

Morgan identified six basic patterns of kinship terminologies:

* Hawaiian –  Only distinguishes relatives based upon sex and generation

* Sudanese – No two relatives share the same term, each is different

* Eskimo – In addition to distinguishing relatives based upon sex and generation, Eskimo also distinguishes between lineal relatives and collateral relatives

* Iroquois – In addition to sex and generation, Iroquois also distinguishes between siblings of opposite sexes in the parental generation

* Crow – A matrilineal system with some features of an Iroquois system, but with a ‘skewing’ feature, in which a generation is ‘frozen’ for some relatives

* Omaha – Like a Crow system, but patrilineal

Western Kinship terms

Most western societies employ Eskimo kinship terminology. This kinship terminology commonly occurs in societies based on conjugal (or nuclear) families, where nuclear families have a degree of relative mobility. Members of the nuclear family (or immediate family) use the following kinship terms:

* Mother – the female parent

* Father – the male parents

* Son – a male child of the parent

* Daughter – the female child of the parent

* Brother – a male child of the same parent(s)

* Sister – a female child of the same parent(s)

* Grandfather – father of a father or mother

* Grandmother – mother of a mother or father

* Cousin – two people that share the same Grandparent(s)

Such systems generally assume that the mother’s husband has also served as the biological father. In some families, a woman may have children with more than one man or a man may have children with more than one woman. The system refers to a child who shares only one parent with another child as a “half-brother” or “half-sister.” For children who do not share biological or adoptive parents in common, English – speakers use the term “stepbrother” or “stepsister” to refer to their new relationship with each other when one of their biological parents marries one of the other child’s biological parents.

Any person (other than the biological parent of a child) who marries the parent of that child becomes the “stepparent” of the child, either the “stepmother” or “stepfather.” The same terms generally apply to children adopted into a family as to children born into the family.

Other terms used within families are:

* Grandson – a child’s son

* Granddaughter – a child’s daughter

* Uncle – could be a father’s brother, mother’s brother, or a father’/mother’s sister’s husband

* Aunt – Similarly, could be a father’s sister, mother’s sister or father’s/mother’s brother’s wife

* Nephew – The Sister’s son, brother’s son, wife’s brother’s son, wife’s sister’s son, husband’s brother’s son, husband’s sister’s son

* Niece – The Sister’s daughter, brother’s daughter, wife’s brother’s daughter, wife’s sister’s daughter, husband’s brother’s daughter, husband’s sister’s daughter