The Emergence of Order from Disorder as a Form of
Self Organization
The evolution of cultural constructs is not well understood.
Cultural evolution has been modeled based on genetic evolution (sociobiology),
in analogy with genetic evolution (dual inheritance) and as a process of
transmittal of information units (memes). None of these is completely
satisfactory as each fails to come to grips with the way in which cultural
constructs may be in the form of an abstract, symbolic system. One
such cultural construct, fundamental to the organization of human societies,
is kinship with its expression in the form of a kinship terminology.
The kinship terminology provides a means for identifying who are one's kin
and the boundary of one's kinship domain, for many societies, is the boundary
of the society. Yet another means of relating one individual to another
that is ontologically prior to a kinship terminology is through genealogical
tracing, the basis of "family trees." The fact that there may be two
conceptually distinct, though overlapping, constructs for determining a conceptual
linkage that relates one person to another within the same society raises
the question of why one or the other alone is not sufficient. I argue
that the two constructs-- a kinship terminology and genealogical tracing
-- are qualitatively different in terms of the kind of order that each provides
for the collection of persons making up a society. I suggest that the
kinship terminology arises through abstraction of the organizing principles
of genealogical tracing and resolves what otherwise would be a conceptual
disorder were the boundaries of the society determined through genealogical
tracing alone.