Endogamous marriages in Africa and Madagascar.

The author seeks to verify the validity of the model that he has worked out to account for endogamous agnatic practices among the Fulani by using a va st set: of comparative data on Africa and Madagascar. In all the examples t aken under consideration, this analysis shows that the marriage between pat rilateral parallel cousins reflects not an "endogamous preference" but rath er the avoidance of a marriage with uterines. The way this model can be ext ended to other types of marital systems is investigated. In this case, it w ould provide an alternative to anthropological analyses of marriage systems based on alliance or descent group theories.