
142 PEOPLES OF THE PHILIPPINES 
Filipinos, and of a thoroughly different kind from the 
Australian and American groups to which the word 
clan is usually applied. 
Even if we had no farther evidence, it would be 
obvious from the general Filipino attitude as to kin- 
ship that the native could not well have developed a 
clan system without reconstituting his society. He 
reckons relationship and descent equally through the 
male and female lines: which plan and clan organization 
are in the nature of things mutually exclusive. 
The Filipino, in these matters of social constitution, , 
aligns himself with all the nations related to him through 
the whole of the East Indies, Polynesia, and Micronesia 
—in other words, those parts of Oceania inhabited by 
brown peoples. Throughout these regions the clan 
idea is very little developed, and where it has taken root 
at all has normally proved abortive. It is only in the 
tracts inhabited by the black Australians, Papuans, and 
Melanesians, that there is found a luxuriance of the 
clan or vertical classification of society, as it might be 
called in distinction from the horizontal one of levels. 
And even among the blacks the concept of rank takes 
precedence in those very districts which are known to 
have been subjected to Malaysian or Polynesian ‘influ- 
ence, namely, the greater part of Melanesia and the coast 
of New Guinea. The generic plan of social institu- 
tions among the Filipinos: is therefore undoubtedly a 
very old one, inherited jointly by them and the adjacent — 
brown-skinned nations from the time of their original 
community. 
The Sexes. The place of woman in Filipino society 
is a high one. Even where Islam has been accepted, 
she retains many of her old privileges, and the typical 
Mohammedan practices of seclusion, veiling, and sub- 
jection to her father or husband have made only little 
