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I would like to tell about the politico-ideological aspect of the Anthropology of the Nair Sambandham. 1/n https://twitter.com/Dhvamsaka/status/1119968019927556098
In 1949, a rare right wing Anthropologist, GP Murdock undertook a cross cultural survey of more than 200 societies. One of his conclusions was that the marriage is an universal social institution, a necessity for the human society.2/n
This view is in contrast to the Marxist view that the marriage evolved historically from a Pre-marriage stage and is just a form of opression of one gender over another and future utopian society can evolve without this institution.3/n
Kathleen Gough,a Marxist Anthropologist did her study in Kerala in 1950s. She wrote in her study that the Nayar Sambandham was only a symbolic marriage and thus violated GP Murdock's view that the Marriage is universal.4/n
As it strengthened the Marxist viewpoint, her study spread like a wildfire among the Marxist and left leaning scholars as an example that violates universality of the marriage.5/n
Today all elementary books of Anthropology contain the example of Nayar Sambandham as an exception to the institution of marriage. 6/6
