Kinship is also a social organization, in which each society decides how it will be organized, what aspects of the 'human experiences' will be emphasized and which will not. Because each society uses different terms to refer to people they recognize as kin, anthropologists have found six major patterns of kinship terminology. These six patterns are based on how people refer to their cousins. These criteria include generation, sex, affinity, collaterality, bifurcation, relative age, and sex of linking relative.

Generation refers to the kin terms that distinguish relatives according to the generation to which the relatives belong. Sex is used to differentiate kin such as in Spanish, primo refers to a male cousin and prima is a female cousin. Affinity is the distinction mad on the basis of connection through marriage. Collaterality is the distinction made between kin who are believed to be in a direct lin

Jatis are distinguished by their occupations as well as by the foods they eat. These features affect how members of different jati interact with one another. In Hindu belief, certain foods and occupations are classed as pure and others as polluting. Jatis are ranked in the same manner, purest to most polluted. Ranked highest are the brahmins because they are vegetarians, they are consider so pure that they would be allowed to approach the gods. Next are the kshatriyas, who are also, vegetarians. After them are those who eat 'clean' or 'pure' meat, such as sheep, goats, chickens and fish. Those that eat 'unclean' meat, beef (the cow is sacred in Hindu religion) and pork are ranked lowest. Occupations involving the slaughtering of animals or touching polluted things are themselves polluting. Even the acceptance of food from different jatis is a strict practice. Members of a lower-ranking jati may accept food prepared by higher-ranking jatis. Higher-ranking jati may only accept certain food prepared by lower-ranking jatis. They are also not allowed to eat together.

There are few caste or castelike systems left because they are incompatible with modernization. The word caste comes from the Portuguese word casta. It was the Portuguese explorers' translation of the Hindi word jati. The word means "a category of men thought to be related, to occupy a particular position within a hierarchy of jatis, to marry among themselves and to follow particular practices and occupations" (textbook).

The difference between kinship and stratification is that kinship involves individuals related through blood or marriage. Stratification involves groups of individuals that are related through similar economic, political or racial/ethnic positions. The roles that individuals play in these organizations are different. Kinship roles are more personal rather than by association.

In some ways the Marghi caste system is similar to that of the Indian system. The Marghi or ngkyagu do not intermarry (endogamous) and will not share the same food. They also have rules about which they can accept beer from, as did the Indians. Ngkyagu can drink beer brewed from Marghi women as long as they have their own drinking vessel; Marghi will not drink beer from ngkyagu women.

Kinship and stratification are similar in that there are different types of kinship relationships and stratified societies. There are three kinds of kinship relationships: affinal (by marriage), consanguineal (by birth) and fictive (by adoption, godparenthood, or blood brother rites). It can be further broken down by six major patterns of kinship. The different types of stratified societies are slavery, feudalism, castes, and classes. Slavery was practiced in Africa, and in earlier civilizations of Greece and Rome. Feudalism was a rigid division between the mobility and the peasantry. It was based on their access to control over land. This form of stratification dominated in medieval Europe for centuries, but existed in other parts of the world.

These main four castes are divided into thousands of subcastes also called jati. They

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