Zande - Kinship

Kin Groups and Descent. The society as a whole exhibits a strong patrilineal bias, but relationships are not traced back for more than a couple of generations; local ties have long been based on cognatic, political, and personal criteria rather than on unilineal descent. Accordingly, there is very little interest in tracing the interrelationships of the widely dispersed named patricians, many of which undoubtedly represent remnants of Zande-conquered peoples.

Kinship Terminology. Simple terms exist for mother and parallel kin (except mother's brother) of her lineage and generation, for father and parallel kin of his lineage and generation, for mother's brother and matrilateral cross cousins, for own-generation same-sex parallel elder kin, and for owngeneration same-sex parallel younger kin; there are two terms (male/female Ego) for same-generation opposite-sex parallel kin and for child and parallel members of child's generation, and there is a mutual term for grandparent/grandchild. All other terms are compound.