From the publisher: A fond indentification with a certain place, close ties with people, a shared history of experiences and values–these are elements commonly associated with the southern Appalachians. Despite dramatic social and economic changes in recent decades, this sense of belonging together, of community, still constitutes a moral system that comes into poignant focus in times of local crisis. This book explores several aspects of the social organization and system of values that make up this sense of community. Specific social ties, based primarily on kinship, give form and substance to the concept. Kin ties provide potential networks of association, and kinship also provides an idiom for the way in which people should behave toward one another. Kin ties give community residents personal identity through the expression of common roots, shared experiences, and shared values. Kinship, Beaver argues, is thus more than simple genealogical relationship; it is a cultural idea through which relationships are expressed and from which community homogeneity is derived.