What are clans and totems?
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A clan is a group of families who believe they share a common ancestor. A totem is an animal, plant or natural object that stands for a clan and is treated as its relative or emblem. Together they tell people who their relatives are, whom they may marry and what they must protect.
Clans are larger than families and smaller than a whole people. Membership usually passes through one parent: the mother in matrilineal societies, the father in patrilineal ones. Clan members treat each other as kin, even when they have never met.
Many clans are named after a totem, such as bear, crane, tortoise or a kind of tree. The clan may regard it as an ancestor or guardian. Members often avoid harming or eating their totem, which can help protect that species.
Clans commonly have a rule of exogamy: you must marry outside your own clan. This spreads family ties across the whole society, because every marriage links two clans. It also means a traveller can find relatives, and so food and shelter, in distant communities.
The word 'totem' comes from the Ojibwe language of North America. The tall carved poles of the Pacific Northwest Coast, called totem poles in English, display family crests and histories. They are not objects of worship, and the peoples who carve them have their own names for them.