Re: NYTimes.com Article: Iraqi Family Ties Complicate American

Dear Charles,

Your missive is very thorough and informative. Thank you.

Extended family units and tribalism may indeed inhibit national
democratic institutions rapidly evolving out of the fiefdoms
and religious states evident in Afghanistan or where no
strongman like Saddam Hussein brutally suppressed their
expression as in Iraq. The US may well have bitten off more
than it can chew claiming the goal of democratizing Iraq.

But the creation of democracy as a motive for invasion
is just a smoke screen for Bush's (and America's) lust for oil
and regional hegemony. As long as terrorists can blow up
pipelines America's stuck on an Iraqi tar-baby. It's a little late
to wake-up to the other "complications," or is it justification
for the neocons looting even more of the treasury to finance
Halliburtons and Bechtel's repair of a decade's worth of
US sanctions on Iraq?

Tim Jones


At 8:05 PM -0700 9/29/03, Charles Jannuzi wrote:
> FYI:
>
> 1. Consanguineous marriage and/or breeding is very
> common, even in societies where people tend not to be
> so aware of it--including the US, where the laws
> attempt to prevent marriage of first cousins of
> reproductive age.  Consanguineous marriage and/or
> breeding of some sort might be related to things like
> lines of descent and inheritance of property, but it
> also can reflect the isolation of a minority--such as
> the gypsies or triracial isolates in the
> Appalachians--or the desire to remain distinct, such
> as with the Amish.   
> 2. Consanguineous marriage of patrilateral first
> cousins is reported to be quite common in Saudi
> Arabia, Kuwait and Jordan; you could even say a
> dominant pattern to marriage in those countries. It's
> reported as common among Kurds, even higher than among
> Shia in other places in the ME. For Iraq, however, the
> official information I've got is that it is, overall,
> lower there than for much of the other Arab world
> (S.A., Kuwait, Jordan). For example,
> http://208.48.48.190/Publications/EMRO%20PUB-TPS-GEN-PRT2-CHPT5-5.2.HTM
>
>
> 3. It's a topic Stanley Kurtz at National Review has
> latched on to, so beware. NR, NYT, it makes little
> difference to me. It appears earliest as one of those
> 'trends in analysis' pieces here in this American
> Conservative article. The wretchedness of the NYT
> knows no limits now apparently. In fact, the hard
> facts that the NYT article cites appears to come
> straight out of this piece of trash:
>
> "Cousin Marriage Conundrum: The ancient practice
> discourages democratic
> nation-building"
> by Steve Sailer
> The American Conservative,
> Jan. 13, 2003, pp. 20-22 (not online)
>
> snip snip>>Many prominent neoconservatives are calling
> on America not only to conquer Iraq (and perhaps more
> Muslim nations after that), but also to rebuild Iraqi
> society in order to jumpstart the democratization of
> the Middle East. Yet, Americans know so little about
> the Middle East that few of us are even aware of one
> of one of the building blocks of Arab Muslim cultures
> -- cousin marriage. Not surprisingly, we are almost
> utterly innocent of any understanding of how much the
> high degree of inbreeding in Iraq could interfere with
> our nation building ambitions.<<snip snip wash hands.
>
> 5. Other reading (recommended)  
> http://www.genesage.com/professionals/geneletter/archives/issue2/kissingcousins.html
>
> Middle East (especially Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and
> Jordan)  Over half of all marriages are
> consanguineous.The most common type of consanguineous
> marriage is that of patrilateral first-cousins.
>
> Syria, Israel (Arab community), Algeria, Lebanon,
> Egypt, Pakistan  More than one in four marriages are
> consanguineous
>
> [so far, the information that I've found puts Iraq
> more in line with these countries, and if you subtract
> the Kurds, the % goes down - CJ]
>
> http://www.consang.net/global_prevalence/tables/Minorities.pdf
>
> http://www.emro.who.int/Publications/EMHJ/0202/19.htm
>
> While a-thalassaemia has never been a health problem
> in Iraq, b-thalassaemia in its homozygous state is
> [5]. It is the authors' opinion that the high
> prevalence rate of heterozygous b-thalassaemia, and
> that of consanguineous marriages in the community, in
> addition to high morbidity and mortality rates, and
> the heavy burden imposed on the health services in
> association with homozygous thalassaemia, should
> prompt the health authorities to establish an
> effective prenatal diagnostic programme. Such a
> programme could only be possible by initiating
> research programmes to determine the molecular
> pathology of this type of thalassaemia in Iraq.
> Moreover, further studies to estimate the prevalence
> of thalassaemia in other regions of the country,
> utilizing a similar approach as in the current study,
> is of prime importance in order to establish a
> comprehensive national programme to combat this
> important health problem.
>
> http://208.48.48.190/Publications/EMRO%20PUB-TPS-GEN-PRT2-CHPT5-5.2.HTM
>
> 5.2 Frequency and types of consanguineous marriage
>
> The term consanguineous literally means related by
> blood, so consanguineous marriages are defined as
> marriages between blood relatives. For practical
> purposes, geneticists usually classify unions between
> second cousins or closer as consanguineous, because
> the genetic risk for less closely related couples
> differs only marginally from that in
> non-consanguineous unions.
>
> Consanguineous marriage is strongly favoured in many
> large human populations. Figure 5.1 is based on 98
> local, regional, and national studies conducted during
> the last two generations, sample size varying from 252
> to 893 941 [121,148]. In the mainly Muslim countries
> of the Eastern Mediterranean Region, and in most parts
> of south Asia, consanguineous marriage accounts for
> from 20% to over 50% of the total in the present
> generation. No account has been taken of major
> populations (e.g. of China and Indonesia) for which
> there is little current information on prevalence of
> consanguineous marriage, although anthropological
> sources indicate that first cousin marriage used to be
> traditional in at least a part of the population
> [149]. The numerically significant communities of
> Asian or African origin now resident in Western
> Europe, North America and Oceania are also omitted.
>
> In 1994, the combined population of countries where
> consanguineous marriage is known to be customary was
> 732 million, and a further 1468 million live in
> countries where 1% to 10% of marriages are
> consanguineous.
>
> The specific types of consanguineous marriage favoured
> can vary quite widely between and within countries,
> and religious and cultural factors play a major part
> in determining social attitudes and legal frameworks
> at local and national levels. For example, in Lebanon
> consanguineous marriages are reported to be more
> prevalent within the Druze community than among Shi'a
> Muslims, and less again among Sunni Muslims [150].
>
> First cousins inherit one quarter of their genes from
> each of their common grandparents, and one eighth of
> their genes are identical by inheritance. The children
> of first cousin parents inherit identical gene copies
> from each parent at one sixteenth (6.25%) of all gene
> loci, over and above the baseline level of
> homozygosity in the general population.6 This degree
> of homozygosity by descent (or, more correctly,
> autozygosity) is expressed as a coefficient of
> inbreeding (F) of 0.0625.
>
> Double first cousin marriages, where the spouses have
> both sets of grandparents in common, also occur. Here
> 12.5% of children's gene pairs are identical by
> descent, i.e. F = 0.125.
>
> In the countries of the Eastern Mediterranean Region
> the preference for consanguineous marriage is by no
> means restricted to Islamic communities; first cousin
> marriage is also common in some Christian and Jewish
> communities and among Zoroastrians and Parsis.
> Uncle-niece and very occasionally aunt-nephew unions
> have been reported among Sephardi Jewish migrant
> communities in Israel [151,152]. Double first cousin
> and uncle-niece marriage involve the same coefficient
> of inbreeding in the children (F = 0.125), but as
> uncle-niece marriage is prohibited in the Koran, it is
> unknown in the predominantly Muslim countries of the
> Region.
>
> Data on the prevalence and types of consanguineous
> unions reported for the Eastern Mediterranean Region
> are presented in Table 5.1. The categories reported
> are:
>
> ? D1C, double first cousin (F = 0.125)
>
> ? 1C, first cousin (F = 0.0625)
>
> ? 1?C, first cousin once removed (F = 0.0313)
>
> ? 2C, second cousin (F = 0.0156)
>
> ? non-consanguineous (F = 0)
>
> The figures in Table 5.1 refer to the present
> generation only. Since the parents or more distant
> ancestors of many consanguineous couples were also
> consanguineous, the average coefficient of inbreeding
> calculated for each locality (F or a = S piFi) is a
> minimal estimate.7
>
> TABLE 5.1 Parental consanguinity studies in some
> countries of the Eastern Mediterranean Region
>
> Country   First cousins (%) Total consanguineous
> marriages (%) F References
> Bahrain ? 39.4*     [153]
>   ? 39*   0.0145 [154]
> Egypt          
>     20.6 29.3 0.015 [155]
>     11.4 29 0.01 [156]
>   Urban 8.3 20.4   [25]
>   Rural 17.2 36.2   [25]
>   All country 12.4 27.7**   [25]
> Iran, Islamic Republic of          
>   Urban ? 37.3   [157]
>   Rural 30 46.9   [157]
>   Tribal 10.2 18.4   [157]
>   Qashquais 52.4 73.5   [157]
> Iraq   29.2 57.9** 0.0225 [158]
> Jordan          
>   All country 32 50** 0.0225 [159]
>   Urban 29.8 ?   [159]
>   Rural 37.9 ?   [159]
>   Muslim 33.1 ?   [159]
>   Christian 23.5 ?   [159]
> Kuwait   30.2 54.3**   [160]
> Lebanon          
>   Muslim 17.3 29.6*   [161]
>   Christian 7.9 16.5*   [161]
> Pakistan   37.1 50.3   [162]
> Saudi Arabia   31.4 54.3*   [163]
> United Arab Emirates   30 54   [33]
>
> * Details of beyond first cousin marriages not
> specified.
> ** Total consanguinity rate includes beyond second
> cousins matings.
> F: Average inbreeding coefficient
> ?: Data not available
>
> a) Genetic and social bonds for the woman at the start
> of a non-consanguineous marriage
>
> b) Genetic and social bonds for the woman at the start
> of a consanguineous marriage
>
> There is good agreement between estimates for
> prevalence of consanguineous marriage in some
> countries of the Region, e.g. Pakistan, but in others
> significantly different frequencies have been
> reported. This may be partly explained by regional or
> ethnic variations in marriage patterns, or by
> variations in the survey method, e.g. household survey
> or survey among obstetric inpatients. In some earlier
> studies, the small numbers interviewed and data
> collection only on first cousin unions could have
> given less reliable results. In general, since most of
> the data were collected in urban settings and
> consanguineous marriage is most prevalent in rural
> areas, the figures in Table 5.1 can best be regarded
> as minimal estimates of the current levels of close
> kin marriage in the Eastern Mediterranean Region.
>
> Since in this Region consanguineous marriage usually
> involves marrying a cousin of some kind, the popular
> term "cousin marriage" is also used in this report
> when it seems appropriate.
>
> 6 In certain types of first cousin union, such as
> mother's brother's daughter (MBD), the coefficient of
> inbreeding at X chromosome loci (F x) may exceed the
> equivalent autosomal value. For MDB progeny F x =
> 0.125
>
> 7 a is the sum of the proportion of couples (P i) in
> each specific consanguinity class (F i)
>
>
> http://www.consang.net/bibliographies/demography/Demography%20Asia%20West.pdf
>
>
> http://www.iranica.com/articles/v9f1/v9f104.html
>
> Many groups have terms that translate easily as tribe
> (^l), section (taa@—efa) and subsection (t^ra), and
> patrilineal ties are always privileged in theory,
> though not reliably in practice. In this connection
> ethnographers have sought to document marriage choice
> in order to fuel the larger anthropological discussion
> of the structural implications of particular marriage
> preferences, in this case for marriage with the
> patrilateral parallel cousin, or father's brother's
> daughter, whether first cousin or more distant
> collateral. But in general the data show simply a
> preference for marriage with any collateral,
> matrilateral or patrilateral, close or relatively
> distant. It is perhaps not surprising that the most
> conspicuous events in the life of nomadic communities
> are weddings. The reinforcement of existing
> relationships through marriage, and the forging of new
> relationships, are the most crucial social concerns in
> any community. The appropriate symbolization of
> weddings, as well as financial investment in them, are
> guarantees of social stability. This is perhaps the
> most important structural feature of Iranian society
> in general, but it is most crucial in nomadic
> situations where herding futures are at stake, and
> property is volatile. It is well documented in most of
> the sources (see especially Beck, Bradburd, N.
> Tapper). There is, however, also always the
> possibility of individual romance taking precedence
> over careful political arrangement, and occasional
> elopement is also documented (Beck).
>
> -----
> posted by Charles Jannuzi
> Fukui, Japan
>
>
>
> =====
> http://www.literacyacrosscultures.org
>
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/literacyacrosscultures
>
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