A stem family is an extended-family form, first described by the sociologist Frédéric Le Play, in which parents live together with one married child, that child's spouse, and their children, while other children leave the household or remain in it unmarried. The arrangement links the nuclear family of the chosen child to their natal family across generations, concentrating inheritance in a single line rather than dividing it among all children.
Facts
Descent RuleSourced to the subject's own accountNot a single descent rule: a stem family keeps one child, together with that child's spouse and children, in the parental household while other children leave home or remain in it unmarried, organizing succession through household membership and inheritance rather than through a rule of lineage; the arrangement is documented with inegalitarian inheritance in Japan and Korea and with more egalitarian property transfer in traditional Romania, northeastern Thailand and among Mesoamerican indigenous peoples. 1 Typical RegionSourced to the subject's own accountDocumented historically across Western Europe, where stem-type extended families were prevalent with England a rare exception, and named specifically for Japan and Korea under an inegalitarian inheritance variant and for traditional Romania, northeastern Thailand and Mesoamerican indigenous peoples under a more egalitarian property-transfer variant. 1 Connections
Associated With
The traditional Basque etxe household is a documented stem-family system in which a single designated heir inherits the family homestead intact.
Stem family is a single-heir extended-family variant first described by Frederic Le Play.
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Extended Family
Wikipedia- Extended family, Stem family subsection
Description section, stem family definition sentence
A stem family is a kind of extended family, first discussed by Frédéric Le Play. Parents will live with one child and his/her spouse, as well as the children of both, while other children will leave the house or remain in it, unmarried.
Around the world section, Western Europe and stem-family inheritance-variant sentences
the term has also been used in some contexts to describe a family type where parents live with a married child and their spouse and children, but the transfer of land and moveable property is more or less egalitarian, as in the case of traditional Romania, northeastern Thailand or Mesoamerican indigenous peoples.
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