ABSTRACT
The classification of kinship systems according to specific types, based on rules of incest, descent, inheritance, marriage and residence has given preference to formalistic explanations and descriptions of relationships of biology and affinity. Island SoutheastAsia, in particular from Southern Sumatra to the Malay Peninsula, Indonesia West of the Torres Straits, and the Southern Philippines, seems to replicate this pattern of social grouping. In mainland Southeast Asia, where Confucianist ideology served to impose more gender hierarchies upon local cultures, women were still capable of managing farms and trade entirely on their own. Tension and resistance over the dominance of male representations of the' self against the female 'other' in revivalist movements are significant in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and the Philippines, and one has only to look at the weekly forums, seminars and workshops on women's issues held by public institutions and non-govemmental commissions to realise this.
