OIKOS AS FAMILY*
Nirmal Selvamony
Home is where one starts from
(East Coker, Four Quartets, T.S. Eliot)
A reflection on family may well begin with the Greek word for 'household', namely, oikos. Oikos includes the family, the spirit beings associated with the family, and the land that houses the family and supports it. All traditional (non-modern) societies are constituted by the oikos or some equivalent of it. One cannot think of a human being that does not belong to one oikos or the other. In fact these societies conceive of human identity as being constituted only by the oikos to which a particular human belongs, and not as being constituted by one's individual being. In such societies the basic unit of the society is not the human individual but the oikos. This is true of the Indian village society. For example, in Shamirpet, a village in Telengana, consisting of 2494 persons, S.C.Dube found only two single persons who did not belong to any family. Both of them were women, one was a deaf-mute, and the other a victim of epileptic fits from childhood with the additional reputation of being a thief (132). Even these two women were once members of some oikos or the other.
Now, what is the basic structure of the family? It consists of a heterosexual couple, their children, the spirit beings, especially the ancestral spirits, the land and all the organisms that dwell therein. This definition is more comprehensive than the usual ones (Murstein, 17-19), which do not include either the spirits or the land. But these latter elements cannot be excluded, for, they are a vital part of all traditional families. In other words, the basic familial structure has to include what is usually called the nuclear family and the spirit beings and the land. If the nuclear family is postulated from an anthropocentric angle as the basic unit of society, the basic familial structure we have described here answers the need to view the family from an ecological angle.
In fact, the ecologically defined family is no different from the oikos itself. Further, conventional definitions of family formulated by scholars from the West are inadequate to describe the family in the East where society continues to be largely traditional in character despite pressures of modernization that tend to fragment the oikos (Everett 38).
The family/oikos has two basic dimensions – the inner (akam) and the outer (pur\am). If the inner dimension is accessible to the experience of a maximum of two persons who stand in an intimate relationship to each other, the outer is accessible to the experience of more than two persons. In a family we could speak of the spousal, parental, and spiritual experience as constituting the inner dimension. The inner life of the heterosexual couple alone does not make the inner aspect of a family, for, such a thing exists even before the spouses are united by marriage. The couple's inner life is fulfilled not merely in their sexual relationship, but also in their parental role (the bond between the father and child and also between the mother and the child) and in their relationship to the ancestral spirits or family deity.
Can the parents of the couple also be part of the nucleus, considering the fact that parental relationship is 'inner' in nature? It is true that the couple enjoyed an 'inner' relationship as children, as members of the family of their parents, when this relationship was mutual. But in the new family created by the couple, their parents do not stand in a mutual inner relationship with the 'outer' members like the children of the couple. Therefore, we may observe that the inner relationship has to be mutual among all members of the family.
All types of kinship (in a family) that are not 'inner' in nature constitute its ‘outer’ dimension. These will include the relationship each spouse enjoys with his/her parents, and other relatives, consanguine and connubial. These two dimensions are complementary though. What is called the nuclear family is the bare minimal form of the inner dimension excluding the outer.
While Western sociologists have defined the nuclear family as a social unit consisting of the couple and their children, in ancient Tamil society it included a latter wife (ka$makkil\atti), a foster mother and her daughter, and also attendants and servants (tolka$ppiyam). Though the nucleus of the Western and Eastern families is the heterosexual couple, the Western family is complete with this nucleus and their children, while the Eastern family is not without the other members also (Prabhu 217). Recent studies have shown that even the urban nuclear families in India created largely by forces of modernization are not purely nuclear in character, but marked by degrees of 'jointness' (Lal 17).
The complete family consisted of both the inner and the outer elements. Even as the human individual cannot exist alone, the nucleus (with or without children) also cannot. Therefore, the nucleus cannot be regarded as a type of family. At times Western scholars also affirm the need for the complete family. It is evident that when the outer familial elements are far removed from the inner, the emotional stress between the spouses builds up and the children become rebellious (Haralambos, Heald 335). The isolated nucleus is likened to 'an overloaded electrical circuit' about to blow its fuses (Haralambos, Heald 335). Edmund Leach who has studied small-scale pre-industrial societies argues that the ‘isolation and the close-knit nature of contemporary family life incubates hate which finds expression in conflict in the wider community’. Leach maintains that fear and violence result from the barriers people create between those who are like them and those who are unlike them. Individuals of nuclear families are more prone to erect such barriers (Haralambos, Heald 335). This is true because when the nucleus (which is marked by similarity) is severed from its outer aspect (which is marked by dissimilarity from the perspective of the nucleus), it becomes less and less tolerant of dissimilarity. In order to solve this problem Leach advocates breaking out of the prison of the nuclear family and rejoining one’s fellows. Leach’s purpose is best served by complementing the nucleus with the outer elements.
If this is so, then, what do sociologists mean when they say that the 'nuclear family' (not complemented by the outer elements) is a very ancient form of social group universally found throughout the world? (Haralambos, Heald 325). Engels popularized the theory that the monogamous nuclear family evolved from the original promiscuous horde at a stage when human individuals began to own property. This, according to him, coincided with the emergence of the state, which promulgated laws to safeguard private property and monogamous marriage (Engels 734-759). Engels's theory has been discredited by studies of primitive societies, which show that monogamous marriage and the nuclear family are not uncommon among the hunter-gatherers (Haralambos, Heald 340). This, however, needs some explanation. Even in the most ancient societies the nucleus, though an independent physical establishment, was not regarded as the entire family. The elements of the outer dimension were also necessary to complete the picture of the family. This might well be the case with several other primitive societies as well where the nuclear unit held a separate establishment.
However, some scholars challenge the universality of the nuclear family in the modern world by citing the prevalence of the matrilocal family (among the Blacks in the islands of the West Indies, in Guyana in Central America and also in the USA), and the type of family in the kibbutz in Israel (Haralambos, Heald 326-330). If the matrilocal family excludes the father (a vital member of the nuclear family), the members of the family of a kibbutz neither share a common residence nor cooperate for purposes of family economy (which are also features of the nuclear family). Does the occurrence of such groups disprove the universality of the nuclear unit? The matrilocal family derives ultimately from an original nuclear unit consisting of an adult male and female. In relation to this original nuclear unit, the matrilocal Black family is only an outer aspect and not the inner aspect of the family. The family of the kibbutz, on the other hand, has some evidence of the inner aspect, but not the outer. Here, the monogamous (heterosexual) couple shares a single bedroom cum living room and performs only the sexual and reproductive functions of a nuclear family, but not its economic and educative functions. These latter functions, which are outer in nature, are collectively performed by the kibbutz. Though the spouses of the kibbutz family share the intimacy of the inner life of a family, the inner life shared by the parent and child is absent, making this type of a social unit a partial nuclear unit. While the nuclear feature is totally absent in the matrilocal Black family, it is only partially present in the Israeli kibbutz.
Though the nuclear family (as defined by the Western sociologists) is a familial fragment, it is seen as the ideal type of social group for industrial societies. Talcott Parsons argues that the ‘isolated nuclear family is shaped to meet the requirements of the economic system of this society. A modern industrial system with specialized division of labour demands considerable geographical mobility from its labour force. Individuals with specialized skills are required to move to places where those skills are in demand. The isolated nuclear family is suited to the need for geographical mobility. It is not tied down by binding obligations to a wide range of kin…’ (Haralambos, Heald 344).
Now, it may be profitable to deliberate on Parson's 'society'. Obviously, it refers to the present day mainstream capitalistic society that excludes such social groups as the tribal groups, the poor and the nomadic people. The forces that sustain the mainstream society, namely, megatechnology, urbanization, exploitation of natural resources and desacralization (all in the name of development) are the ones that break up the oikos/ family. If there is a correlation between the type of family and the social order, then redefining the family from the Eastern perspective means redefining the social order also from that perspective. In order to redeem the complete family, as it is understood in the East, especially in India, we need to work towards reordering the society we live in so that it could accommodate the complete family and also nurture it.
The nuclear type of family bolsters the society based on the philosophy of individualism. When self-development is the ideal pursuit of people, a complete family as we have described it, will only be seen as a stultifying institution (Haralambos, Heald 337-339). Duties and obligations to several members of a kin group will be regarded as impediments to self-advancement. Individual expression may gain top priority. But when human identity is understood differently as in the East, the goal one sets for oneself is not self-development but self-effacement. True, a few Western thinkers have also felt the need to prioritize self-effacement rather than self-development. But such thinking has not effected any change in the redefinition of the family. Family has not come to be seen as a place where one sacrifices oneself, one's interests, wishes and dreams, and even, one's identity itself. This is the contribution of the East to the West. By setting a diametrically opposite goal for the members of the family, the Eastern tradition reformulates the very idea of family.
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tolka$ppiyam III. 4. 10,29,30.
*Revised version of the paper presented in a seminar at Service and Research Foundation of Asia on Family and Culture, Chennai, 18 August 2001.
