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Omaha kinship is the kinship of terms and relationships used to define family in Omaha people tribal culture. Identified by Lewis Henry Morgan in his 1871 work Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family, the Omaha system is one of the six major kinship systems (Eskimo kinship, Hawaiian kinship, Iroquois kinship, Crow kinship, Omaha, and Sudanese kinship) which he identified internationally.
In this system, relatives are sorted according to their descent and their gender. Ego's father and his brothers are merged and addressed by a single term, and a similar pattern is seen for Ego's mother and her sisters. (Marriages take place among people of different gentes or clans in the tribe.)
Like most other kinship systems, Omaha kinship distinguishes between parallel and cross-cousins. While parallel cousins are merged by term and addressed the same as Ego's siblings, cross-cousins are differentiated by generational divisions. On the maternal side, cross-cousins are raised a generation (making them Ego's Mother's Brother and Ego's Mother), while those on the paternal side are lowered a generation (making them the generational equivalent of Ego's Children).
The system is similar to that of Iroquois kinship. It uses bifurcate merging, but only the Iroquois system uses bifurcate merging as a label. In addition, Iroquois kinship is a matrilineal system.
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