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out of the family." She goes on to contend, however, that in every other conceivable circumstance a village couple without sons must utilize their property to secure sacrificial offerings for themselves. A man with an only daughter, for example, in some regions of China may contract an uxorilocal marriage for her. At the heart of this arrangement is an agreement that one or more of the sons born to this union will continue their maternal grandfather's lineage by assuming both his name and property. In so doing, of course, they also acquire an obligation to see to his needs after death — an obligation that instantly ceases if for some reason the property should be withheld." In contrast, a man without natural heirs may adopt one of his collateral kin, or someone completely outside his clan; alternatively, he may effect a transfer of property to a kinsman or stranger without resort to adoption. In either event, the outcome will be the same: “just as property inheritance accompanied by descent entails the obligation to worship, so also may property inheritance in the absence of descent require worship."2 Indeed, the link between property and the cult of the dead is so strong in Ch'i-nan that one can acquire responsibility for the spiritual well-being of a deceased person merely by making use of his property, while a father who disinherits one of his sons for any reason thereby absolves him of all responsibility for his maintenance in the afterlife.63
Ahern's interpretation of the role of property in uxorilocal marriage has been confirmed by Arthur Wolf in his own field work. One of his informants in San-hsia acknowledged the obligation that the arrangement creates with the matter-of-fact comment that "you have to worship your mother's father because he gave you his property.'64 The rest of her findings, however, have generated considerable controversy. Steven Harrell has countered with an argument that property does not play even a marginal role in fixing responsibility for the dead in the village that he investigated. Most villagers, he says, readily admit their obligation to care for everyone in their primary line of descent.“ Arthur Wolf has further complicated matters. Working in a village not more than a mile away from Ch'i-nan, his research has induced him partially to agree with both of his colleagues, thereby generating a third point of view! He has concluded that “both descent and inheritance create an absolute obligation to the dead.”