However a more common use of the term aja' is to refer to an
affinal relationship.
The changing importance given to children's well-being and responsible parenthood also altered the division of domestic work within
affinal homes.
For countless generations rotating matches with
affinal lines occurred as well.
Anthropological theory distinguishes between family membership that is
affinal, kinship through spousal ties, and consanguinal, kinship that is biologically based on blood ties (Fox, 1967).
Women maintain natal clan affiliation and can draw on
affinal kinship networks throughout their lives.
Where the female is generalized and the male is specified in brackets, it is as a spouse to an informant, tacitly generalized as male: "The informant's spouse may not be available to speak about her (or his) own cognates; or certain
affinal links, e.g.
Moreover, married noble women often wielded power as intermediaries during disputes over patrimony because they were considered to be full members of both their natal and
affinal families.
Affinal relationships, including adoptive relationships, are considered every bit as "real" as blood relationships for kinship purposes.
It is almost as if they form a unified
affinal structure, at least as far as the wife/daughter-in-law is concerned.
*
affinal, marital and financial relationships between policyholders and claimants;
Now we can see that Watut societies had perfectly good structures deriving from deep genealogy, matrilateral and
affinal kin connections.