[Note: this transcription was produced by an automatic OCR engine]

14

is not intended to be an ethnographic account, as moieties are rare in the Western Desert
and as marriage with first cross-cousins is not allowed with the interesting exception of
the Mandjildjara-speaking people [Tonkinson l99l:64]. While the form adopted here for
representing the section system does not fully account for the ethnography, it has, however,
the advantage of facilitating the understanding of the relationships within the system, which
can then be easily extrapolated to actual situations.

Following this diagram, there are two matrilineal moieties, A and B, and two pahilineal
moieties, 1 and 2. All possible combinations of these moieties give rise to four sections, e.g.
Al, A2, B1 and B2. The relations between sections are expressed through rules of marriage
and filiation in such a way that one always has to marry a person of the opposite patrimoiety,
as well as of the opposite matrimoiety. If Ego is the combination B1, then he/she must choose
a partner from “A", and from “2”, that is, “A2”. The section system itself is cyclic and follows,
if we consider direct genealogical lines, a matrilineal or indirectly matrifilial principle, so
that Ego’s mother’s mother is always of the same section as Ego, and the former‘s partner,
that is, Ego’s mother’s father, always of the same section as Ego’s partner. Of course, it is also
patrilineal or indirectly patrifilial as Ego’s father’s father is always of the same section as
Ego, too.

Sections that are in a spouse relationship are also in a cross—cousin relationship. Apotential
wife for male Ego is of the same section as the children of his father’s sister and his mother’s
brother, that is, the section that combines Ego’s opposite matri- and patrimoieties. Figure 1
represents these basic relations.

O=A
B1 A2
A1 = 132:] =A O=A
A2 = 31 A1| B2 BZI Al
A
A2 B1

A constitutes one malrimoiety, B the other
1 constitutes one patrimniety, 2 the other

Figure 1: Formal representation of the four section system left and its equivalent in
theoretical genealogical terms right

Awoman of sectionA1 ma.rries a man of section B2 who is related to her as “spouse” and
cross—cousin, and their children are A2. If the woman is B2 and the man A1, then the children
are Bl. Thus, equations or sections in the same row link intermanying sections, and arrows
or sections in the same column connect a mother to her child. From the formal nomenclature
mentioned above, one can see that children always combine one “character” of each of their
parents: A2 inherits “A” from his/her mother and “2" fiorn his/her father.