Kinship System
See also: Australian Aboriginal kinshipYolŋu groups are connected by a complex kinship system (gurruṯu). This system governs fundamental aspects of Yolŋu life, including responsibilities for ceremony and marriage rules.
Yolŋu life is divided into two moieties: Dhuwa and Yirritja. Each of these is represented by people of a number of different groups, each of which have their own lands, languages, totems and philosophies.
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Skin name Clan groups Dhuwa Gumatj, Gupapuyŋu, Wangurri, Ritharrngu, Mangalili,
Munyuku, Maḏarrpa, Warramiri, Dhalwaŋu, Liyalanmirri, Mäḻarra, Gamalaŋga, Gorryindi.Yirritja Rirratjiŋu, Gälpu, Djambarrpuyŋu, Golumala, Marrakulu,
Marraŋu, Djapu, Ḏatiwuy, Ŋaymil, Djarrwark.
A Yirritja person must always marry a Dhuwa person and vice versa. If a man or woman is Dhuwa, their mother will be Yirritja.
Kinship relations are also mapped onto the lands owned by the Yolngu through their hereditary estates – so almost everything is either Yirritja or Dhuwa – every fish, stone, river, etc., belongs to one or the other moiety. A few items are wakinŋu (without moiety).
Read more about this topic: Yolngu People
Famous quotes containing the words kinship and/or system:
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Are not like ours, and yet
A kinship lingers nonetheless....”
—Philip Larkin (1922–1986)
“The North American system only wants to consider the positive aspects of reality. Men and women are subjected from childhood to an inexorable process of adaptation; certain principles, contained in brief formulas are endlessly repeated by the press, the radio, the churches, and the schools, and by those kindly, sinister beings, the North American mothers and wives. A person imprisoned by these schemes is like a plant in a flowerpot too small for it: he cannot grow or mature.”
—Octavio Paz (b. 1914)