The attitude to family in chinese culture and cherokee indians

The Cherokee Indians are one of the largest Native American tribes in the United States of America. They call themselves Ani-Yunwiya, which means “ principle people”. They reside in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Alabama. The Cherokee consist of seven clans. It is a common misconception that the Cherokee Indians lived in tipis. They lived in open air dwellings with roofs made of bark in the past. Today they typically live in ranch houses, apartments, and trailers.

Their communities are built on a clan system. It is not allowed for people to marry within their own clan. It was very important for them to belong to a clan. Families are of matrilineal descent. In Cherokee society, your clan is determined by the clan that your mother is from. Families are determined by matrilineal descent. When a woman marries, her husband comes to live with her in her village and she owns the house. The women’s roles are to take care of the house, farm, and her family. The men’s role is to hunt and go to war. They are encouraged to marry into their maternal or paternal grandfather’s clan. They are a farming people. Even though in most societies it is frown upon for fornication and adultery, there seems to be no cultural prohibitions against fornication or adultery. A father has less rights than the mother and does not have the right to punish his children. If a father were to punish or hurt his children, he would have to go before the tribal leaders. Today they live near the Great Smokey Mountains National Park on land called Qualla Boundary.

The capital of China is Beijing. This year is the year of the Dog. Family is the most important aspect for Chinese society. Most households are patrilineal extended households. This means that more than one generation is living under the same roof and it is on the father or husband’s side of the family. The Chinese believe in early marriage. When the father or both parents die within a household the son will then gain control over the house. He gets to decide how to divide any estate or money between everyone else in the household. Women had to live with their husband and his family.

In the Chinese culture, having a son is more valuable than having a daughter. Chinese culture is becoming somewhat more modern. China has the world’s second largest economy. In the cities they have apartment buildings and local markets. However, out in the country they still have some of the same type of house they have had in the past. Women are to take care of the home and are dominated by the males in their life throughout their whole lives. Women in an extreme case if extra income is needed in the household would then be able to work, usually in occupations that require sewing and weaving.

When a Chinese couple gets married, the wife does not take on the name of her husband. However, the children do receive their father’s last name. In the Chinese family everyone must uphold the family’s name and no not do anything to dishonor the family name. They are respectful of each other and hold the elderly in high regards.

Both of these societies cherish and believe that that family is the number one thing. Both societies also live close by if not in the same household as other family members. Both their domestic lives and family dynamics are changing slowly with time to become more modernized. In the Cherokee Indians the women are who determine the family dynamic and the Chinese are the exact opposite. While the Chinese have arranged marriages, the Cherokee are free to marry whoever they choose so long as they are not from within the same clan. In both societies women take care of the children and household.

The human behavior research has shown me is that even though there is slow gradual change to becoming more modern by the economy, and industrialization, the domestic life and kinship is not changing much over time. In Chinese cultures human behavior is showing that women today are having a little more freedom than before and can work in various other occupations than in the past, but they still must obey the males in their life. In the marriage aspect arranged marriages are starting to decline. Time has shown that the Cherokee Indians have adapted to their surroundings and environment and changed with time. They still strongly believe in only marrying other clans, however their living arrangements are becoming more modern and with the changes in society the men are assuming more roles than just the hunter and going to war.

Being that the Cherokee Indians are more off on their own land and have their own schools for their society, it makes it hard for them sometimes to assimilate into our society. In the Chinese society abuse against women is a major thing with the men having complete control over their wives and family. It has been a growing concern.