ian williams
matriarchal societies, where women are at the head of families and power structures, fail for reasons set out by susanna viljanen where large numbers of single-parent families (headed by women) raise families and the boys have no father figures to socialise them.
however, matrilineal societies can be quite stable - although cross culturally and across the world, they are quite rare.
matrilineal societies are derived from the idea that you never can be 100 percent sure who your father is, but you always know for sure who your mother is.
matrilineal societies base property ownership via the female line. this leads to a very different social structure than is common across most of the world. men are still in charge of things but there is more of a sense of equality.

在母系社会中，女性处于家庭和权力结构的领导者，由于苏珊娜·维亚宁提出的原因，大量的单亲家庭(由女性领导)抚养家庭，男孩没有父亲的角色来和他们进行社交活动。
然而，母系社会可以相当稳定——尽管在跨文化和世界的情况下，它们相当罕见。
母系社会源于这样一种观念：你永远不可能百分之百确定你的父亲是谁，但你总是确定你的母亲是谁。
母系社会以母系为基础建立财产所有权。这导致了一种与世界上大多数国家不同的社会结构。男人仍然负责事务，但更多的是平等感。

women in the trobriand islands - a matrilineal society - traditionally wear these grass mini-skirts, which are now famous.
a well-researched example of a matrilineal society is in the trobriand islands, a cluster of small coral islands off the north-east coast of papua new guinea, the islands have long fascinated both anthropologists and travel writers.



在特罗布里恩群岛——一个母系社会——女性传统上穿这种草做的迷你裙，现在已经很有名了。
关于母系社会，特罗布里恩群岛是一个经过充分研究的例子，它是巴布亚新几内亚东北海岸外的一群小珊瑚岛。这些岛屿长期以来一直吸引着人类学家和旅行作家。

while the women do marry and have husbands, extra-marital affairs are common. most villages have a special hut called a bukumatula which is used for extramarital encounters. virginity is not prized. a school teacher on the islands once told me that you could never guarantee a girl was a virgin if she was over the age of nine.
babies are thought to be the result of magic with no lix between sex and pregnancy. if a girl gets pregnant, her family keeps the baby, because, according to the local beliefs, men just help to open up the woman to pregnancy - the real father is a baloma or spirit. this is despite the fact they do understand biology - for example, they understand that pigs won’t get pregnant unless they are mated.
magic has been very important in this traditional society. polish anthropologist bronislaw malinowski, in the early 1900s recorded countless spells performed by a towosi, or professional gardening magician. most trobriand gardeners still engage in garden magic.

虽然这些女性确实结婚并有了丈夫，但婚外情很常见。大多数村庄都有一个叫做bukumatula的特殊小屋，用于婚外情。童贞并不被珍视。岛上的一位老师曾经告诉我，如果一个女孩超过9岁，你就无法保证她是处女。
婴儿被认为是魔法的结果，且性和怀孕之间没有联系。如果一个女孩怀孕了，她的家人会留下孩子，因为根据当地的信仰，男人只是帮助女人怀孕-真正的父亲是巴洛马（已故血统成员的精神）或灵魂。尽管他们确实了解生物学——例如，他们知道猪除非交配，否则不会怀孕。
在这个传统社会中，魔法一直很重要。波兰人类学家布罗尼斯瓦夫·马林诺夫斯基在20世纪初记录了由托沃西或专业园艺魔术师表演的无数咒语。大多数特罗布里恩的园丁仍在从事园艺魔术。

the islanders have a complex social structure. the father-figure for boys is often the woman’s uncle - which makes for very different relationships to what is “normal” in the west.
although land ownership in the trobriand islands follows the matriline, married women often live with their husbands—meaning few people live on land that belongs to them. rather, they obtain the right to live on, and cultivate, someone else’s land, as long as they’re on decent terms with the village elder. but to remain in the good graces of the village elder, villagers must pay in yams (as a form of rent)—or else get kicked out.
sadly, the social structure is now under threat. particularly bad droughts hit in 2009, 2010, and 2016, and, amidst these poor growing conditions, the islands’ population spiked.
more hamlets have sprung up, leaving less arable land to go around. over-farming has drained the soil of important nutrients. yams, once harvested in surplus, are growing scarce—threatening to unravel the social and political fabric of the islands.

岛民有一个复杂的社会结构。男孩的父亲形象通常是女人的叔叔——这与西方的“正常”关系非常不同。
虽然特罗布里恩群岛的土地所有权遵循母系制，但已婚妇女通常与丈夫住在一起，这意味着很少有人住在属于她们的土地上。相反，他们获得了在别人的土地上生活和耕种的权利，只要他们与村里的长老关系良好。但是为了保持村长的好感，村民们必须用山药（块茎富含淀粉，可被人食用）(作为租金的一种形式)来支付，否则就会被赶出去。
可悲的是，这种社会结构现在正受到威胁。2009年、2010年和2016年发生了特别严重的干旱，在这些恶劣的生长条件下，岛上的人口激增。
越来越多的小村庄拔地而起，可耕种的土地越来越少。过度耕种耗尽了土壤中的重要养分。曾经收获过剩的山药，现在却越来越稀缺——这可能会破坏这个岛屿的社会和政治结构。

addendum:
some of the comments express concern about how men may “suffer” with poverty and hardship in this matrilineal system.
well gentlemen, if you want to get rich in this trobriand society the answer is simple: have lots of wives. there’s no rule about having only one wife.
when i visited the islands a great many years ago, i met the “king” a man in his late 60s or perhaps in his 70s. he had 11 wives. while some of the wives were young and attractive (and substantially younger than him), this was not his motivation. all the wives’ relatives were obligated to keep his gigantic yam house full.

附录:
一些评论表达了对男性在这种母系制度下如何“遭受”贫穷和困难的担忧。
先生们，如果你们想在特罗布里安社会发财答案很简单:娶很多老婆。没有规定只能有一个妻子。
许多年前，当我访问这些岛屿时，我遇到了“国王”，一个60多岁或70多岁的男人。他有11个妻子。虽然有些妻子年轻迷人(比他年轻得多)，但这不是他的动机。所有妻子的亲戚都有义务把他巨大的山药屋装满。

this is a standard size yarm house. a full yam house is a sign of prestige and power. the king’s yam house was about three times as tall.
across much of papua new guinea, wives are sexted not because of good looks, but their ability to work hard in the gardens. toughness and fitness is the attraction. looking good is very much less important.
in the new guinea highlands, the way for a man to get rich is to have more wives. more wives mean bigger gardens. bride price is paid to the wife’s relatives, essentially, to compensate her family for losing a good worker. (men work in the gardens too - they don’t just sit around and relax.)

这是一个标准大小的院子。满满一屋的山药是威望和权力的象征。国王的山药屋大约是它的三倍高。
在巴布亚新几内亚的大部分地区，挑选妻子不是因为漂亮，而是因为她们在花园（农作物园）里辛勤工作的能力。坚韧和健康是吸引人的地方。外表好看就没那么重要了。
在新几内亚高地，男人致富的方法就是娶更多的妻子。妻子越多，花园就越大。彩礼是付给妻子的亲戚，本质上是为了补偿她的家庭失去了一个好工人。(男人也在花园里工作——他们不只是坐在那里放松。)