This detailed study maps the variations in family systems throughout the world, focusing on the ways families interact with their societies.

Preface -- Credits -- Concepts and Methods -- Introduction -- Describing Variation: The Family Developmental Cycle -- Explaining Family Variation -- The B-Cluster: Nomadic Foraging Bands -- Prelude: Children in an Mbuti Camp -- Band Societies: The Family and the Larger Community -- The Developmental Cycle of the Family in Band Societies -- The A-Cluster: Family Systems of Sub-Saharan Africa -- Prelude: Sebei Elders Discuss Cattle Claims -- The Logic of African Social Organization -- Family Activities in Sub-Saharan Africa -- Conceptualizing the Structure of African Families -- African Developmental Cycles: Part One -- African Developmental Cycles: Part Two -- The O-Cluster: Islands of Micronesia and Polynesia -- Prelude: An Argument Over Teen Sexuality -- The Nature of Oceanic Societies -- Making a Living and Making a Name on an Island -- Oceanic Family Structure -- The N-Cluster: Societies of the Northwest Coast of North America -- Prelude: Growing Up in a Kwakiutl House -- The Logic of Social Organization on the Northwest Coast -- Family Activities in Northwest Coast Societies: Similarities and Generalities -- Family Structure on the Northwest Coast -- The C-Cluster: Premodern, Complex Societies -- Prelude: Dowry Negotiations in Lahore, 1925 -- Introduction to the Family in C-Cluster Societies -- A Tour of C-Cluster Family Systems: Part One -- A Tour of C-Cluster Family Systems: Part Two -- Explaining Variation in C-Cluster Systems -- The M-Cluster: Families in Modern Society -- Prelude: The Debate About the Family -- Modernity and the Embattled Family -- What Families Do and Don't Do Anymore in Modern Societies -- Modern Family Process -- Modernity and Critiques of the Family -- Conclusion