ArticlePhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences2019
The expendable male hypothesis.
Article in Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers.
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13 citing papers in PubMed, 43 citations in OpenAlex.
- Measuring perceived fitness interdependence between humans and non-humans.Evolutionary human sciences · 2024Article
- Sperm whale clans and human societies.Royal Society open science · 2024Review
- Gender disparities in material and educational resources differ by kinship system.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Review
- Does gender structure social networks across domains of cooperation? An exploration of gendered networks among matrilineal and patrilineal Mosuo.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Market integration, income inequality, and kinship system among the Mosuo of China.Evolutionary human sciences · 2023Article
- Why People Keep an Intimate Relationship : Investigating Ultimate and Proximate Reasons.Human nature (Hawthorne, N.Y.) · 2022Article
- Communal breeding by women is associated with lower investment from husbands.Evolutionary human sciences · 2022Article
- The human life history is adapted to exploit the adaptive advantages of culture.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2020Review
- From matrimonial practices to genetic diversity in Southeast Asian populations: the signature of the matrilineal puzzle.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2019Article
- The evolution of female-biased kinship in humans and other mammals.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2019Article
- One piece of the matrilineal puzzle: the socioecology of maternal uncle investment.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2019Article
- When does matriliny fail? The frequencies and causes of transitions to and from matriliny estimated from a de novo coding of a cross-cultural sample.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2019Article
- Emergent matriliny in a matrifocal, patrilineal population: a male coalitionary perspective.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2019Article
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Matriliny is a system of kinship in which descent and inheritance are conferred along the female line. The theoretically influential concept of the matrilineal puzzle posits that matriliny poses special problems for understanding men's roles in matrilineal societies. Ethnographic work describes the puzzle as the tension experienced by men between the desire to exert control over their natal kin (i.e. the lineage to which they belong) and over their affinal kin (i.e. their spouses and their biological children). Evolutionary work frames the paradox as one resulting from a man investing in his nieces and nephews at the expense of his own biological offspring. In both cases, the rationale for the puzzle rests on two fundamental assumptions: (i) that men are in positions of authority over women and over resources; and (ii) that men are interested in the outcomes of parenting. In this paper, we posit a novel hypothesis that suggests that certain ecological conditions render men expendable within local kinship configurations, nullifying the above assumptions. This arises when (i) women, without significant assistance from men, are capable of meeting the subsistence needs of their families; and (ii) men have little to gain from parental investment in children. We conclude that the expendable male hypothesis may explain the evolution of matriliny in numerous cases, and by noting that female-centred approaches that call into doubt assumptions inherent to male-centred models of kinship are justified in evolutionary perspective. This article is part of the theme issue 'The evolution of female-biased kinship in humans and other mammals'.
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