There are a number of very interesting and unique kinship systems within the various tribes included in the larger Aboriginal cultural group. One of the first kinship systems to explore in this research is the rules that allow cross-cousin marriages, where "cross-cousins are the children of opposite-sex siblings, such as the father's sister or the mother's brother," (Nowak & Laird 3
If two people who are not permitted to speak wanted to exchange information, they have to find a third person to pass on this information." (Flick, 2012) As seen from the description above, many kinship rules may seem strange and different to societies such as that in which we live, but they are in place in order to maintain order and, above all, as above-mentioned, respect
However, it is important to note that even with the differences; we still have some similarities as far as culture is concerned in Aboriginal Australia. When it comes to belief systems, Australian Aborigines base their spiritual values as well as oral traditions on the dreamtime belief which brings about a number of meanings that interlink in regard to the sources of spirits, nature of ancestral beings as well issues relating to moral order (Nowak and Laird, 2010)
While biological studies in kinship are important, anthropological and socio-cultural models help provide a more comprehensive model of kinship. These models provide interpretations of universals provided by biology (Parkins, 1997)
There is more to kinship than biology. The same is true of gender; people have a natural affinity for a sex because they are born into it, with certain genes influencing their preferences (Peletz, 1995)
This may include social roles, values played by different genders, and people's conceptions of the male and female and their sexual differences. These vary significantly from "culture-to-culture" (Stone, 2000)