"In the Arab world, people belong to kinship groups (lineages and tribes). Many lineages are named after animals, birds, and plants. Why? This survey evaluates five old explanations - "totemism," "emulation of predatory animals," "ancestor eponymy," "nicknaming," and "Bedouin proximity to nature." It suggests a new hypothesis: Bedouin tribes use animal names to obscure their internal cleavages. Such tribes wax and wane as they attract and lose allies and clients; they include "attached" elements as well as actual kin. To prevent outsiders from spotting "attached" groups, Bedouin tribes scatter non-human names across their segments, making it difficult to link any segment with a human ancestor. Young's argument contributes to theories of tribal organization, Arab identity, onomastics, and Near Eastern kinship"--
In the Arab world, people belong to kinship groups that are named after wolves, birds, and plants. Why these names? Youngs book questions old explanations and suggests a new hypothesis: Bedouin tribes use such names to obscure internal cleavages.
Acknowledgements
List of Figures and Tables
Abbreviations
Volume 1
1 Explaining the Non-human Names of Arab Kinship Groups
1The Puzzle: Why Use Terms for Non-human Species as Names for People and
Groups?
2The Importance of Kinship Group Names and the Mundane Elements of Culture
3The Distinctiveness of Arab Names for Kinship Groups in Comparative
Perspective
4A Traditional Explanation of Kinship Group Names: The Predatory Animals
Hypothesis
5Exceptions to the Predatory Animals Hypothesis: Why Use the Names of
Vermin and Other Valueless Species as Personal and Tribal Names?
6Robertson Smiths Solution: Totemism
7Comparing the Arab Case with More Elaborated Cases of Totemism
8The Lingering Traces of Totemism in Scholarship about the Middle East
9Evaluating Nöldekes Explanations: The Inadequacy of the Anecdotal
Approach
10Testing Nöldekes Explanations of Why Animal Names Are Given to Groups
11A New Explanation: Obscuring Internal Cleavages
12Deriving Testable Hypotheses from the Obscuring Internal Cleavages
Explanation
13The Broader Context: The Meanings of Arab Tribal Names
14How to Read the Remaining
Chapters in This Book
2 Compiling a Data Base of Arab Kinship Groups Named after Natural Species
1The Starting Point: Finding a Suitable List of Arab Kinship Groups
2The Difficulties of Translation
3The Process of Comparing Terms for Natural Species with Kinship Group
Names
3 Methods for Compiling a List of Arabic Terms for Birds
1Theoretical Background: Anthropological Research on Folk Taxonomies and
the Definition of Arabic Bird Terms
2Obstacles That Complicate the Comparison of Bird Terms with Kinship Group
Names
4 Finding and Translating Arabic Terms for Mammals
1The Difficulty of Defining Non-taxonomic Terms for Mammals in Modern
Standard Arabic
2The Impact of Classical and Early Islamic Scholarship on Arabic Biological
Terminology
3An Alternative to Standard Dictionaries: Local Tradition
4The Utility and Limits to the Usefulness of Local Tradition for Defining
Animal Terms in Arabic
5An Artificial Hierarchy of Arabic Animal Terms
6Additional Terms for Mammals below the Species Level of Classification
7Problems in Comparing Terms for Mammals with Kinship Group Names
5 Arabic Terms for Plants, Insects, Reptiles, and Marine Life
1Problems in Collecting Terms for Plants
2Terms for Insects and Spiders, Reptiles and Amphibians, and Marine Life
6 Evaluating Existing Explanations in Light of Empirical Evidence
1The Predatory Animals Hypothesis
2Testing the Ancestor Eponymy Hypothesis: Comparing the Personal Names of
Ancestors with the Collective Names of Kinship Groups
3Nickname Eponymy as an Explanation of Group Names Derived from Terms for
Natural Species
4The Naturalistic Explanation
7 Group Names, Bedouin Social Organization, and the Flow of Information
1Two Ideal Types of Social Organization in the Arab World: The Bedouin
Tribe and the Sedentary Tribe
2Sedentary Tribes That Have Bedouin Features
3Conflict Resolution and Bedouin Control Over Genealogical Information
4The Bedouin Tribe as a Stratified Collection of Peripheral Groups around a
Core of Kin
5Economic Inequality and Political Stratification in Bedouin Tribes
6Geography and Political Stratification in Bedouin Tribes
7The Attachment of Foreign Elements to the Bedouin Tribe
8The Cultural Dimension: Native Representations of Attachment to the Tribe
9Using Non-human Names for Kinship Groups as Empty Ciphers that Conceal
Foreign Origins
8 Tests of the New Explanation
1The Heterogeneous Composition of Bedouin Tribes
2Test Number One: A Search for a Correlation between Variation in Tribal
Heterogeneity and Variation in the Names Chosen for Kinship Groups
3A Second Test of the Obscuring Internal Cleavages Hypothesis: Comparing
Bedouin with Non-Bedouin
9 Conclusions: Varying Levels of Support for Five Hypotheses
1The Goals of the Analysis
2The Goals of This Book
3Topics for Future Research
References
Index
Volume 2/1
Acknowledgements
List of Figures and Tables
Abbreviations
Appendix A: List of Taxonomic Bird Terms in Arabic
Appendix B: List of Non-taxonomic Bird Terms in Arabic
Appendix C: Comparison of Standard Arabic Bird Terminology with Two Sets of
Colloquial Arabic Terms (after Zalat and Gilbert 2008: 164197 and Hobbs
1989: 129133)
Appendix D: List of Taxonomic Terms for Mammals in Arabic
Appendix E: List of Non-taxonomic Terms for Mammals in Arabic
Appendix F: List of Taxonomic Plant Terms in Arabic
Appendix G: List of Non-taxonomic Plant Terms in Arabic
Appendix H: List of Terms for Insects, Spiders, and Scorpions in Arabic
Appendix I: List of Terms for Reptiles and Amphibians in Arabic
Appendix J: List of Terms for Marine Life (Fish, Sharks, Corrals, Etc.) in
Arabic
Volume 2/2
Appendix K: List of Kinship Groups Named after Birds
Appendix L: List of Kinship Groups Named After Mammals
Appendix M: List of Kinship Groups Named after Plants
Appendix N: List of Kinship Groups Named after Insects, Spiders, and
Scorpions
Appendix O: List of Kinship Groups Named after Reptiles and Amphibians
Appendix P: List of Kinship Groups Named after Types of Marine Life
Appendix Q: Ancestor Eponymy: Kinship Group Names Derived from
Biological Terms That Are Also Used as Personal Names
Appendix R: List of Nicknames Derived from Terms for Natural Species Found in
the Onomasticon Arabicum
Appendix S: Non-genealogical Names of Tribes, Sub-tribes, and Clans in
Nineteenth-Century Palestine
Appendix T: List of Sedentary Kinship Groups Named after Natural Species in
Northern Jordan
William C. Young, Ph.D. (1988), Associate Professor of Anthropology (retired), has published an ethnography of the Rayidah Bedouin of Sudan (Harcourt Brace, 1996) and many articles about Arab cultural traditions (hospitality, Bedouin society, and ritual).
