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We follow a patrilineal system in our community. By this, what is meant is that the girls who get married into other families go away into the other families as do the girls who get married into our family get to be members of our families. We call this system the Gothra system and I have written about this elsewhere in my blog in a different context.
I have recently been studying a new field called memetics, new of me that is, and in the course of learning about this field and its allied field of genetics, some thoughts came to me which show an intriguing pattern.
My paternal grandfather had two brothers and only one of them produced a son who is my father’s cousin. He has been a steadfast bachelor and has no children. In effect, my great grandfather’s offspring, produced direct male descendants only through my grandfather.
My father had three brothers. One of them produced four sons, one did not produce any children at all, my father produced three sons and the last brother produced two sons. In effect, my grandfather directly produced nine grandsons to carry the Gothra.
Out of these nine male descendants, six males have been produced in my son’s generation.
Out of these six males, one has produced two sons and I have just learnt that my nephew in the USA has just become a father to a son. Unless the one remaining nephew of mine who is shortly to get married produces a male offspring, the three grand sons in my generation are all that will be left from my grandfather’s line. We have simply been producing less children in each succeeding generation and that has also affected the number of male progeny in the Gothra.
What could be the factors in our genes, or more likely memes, that the selection process has produced this result I wonder!
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