Thursday, March 31, 2011

Ethnography

[comments in brackets explain the thinking behind decisions made outside of group discussion]

Setting--subtropical area

  • seasonal changes in day length and weather [support festivals celebrating these changes, for example longer days at sowing time, shorter at harvest]
  • plenty of rivers and streams provide water--don't have to search for water, no intensive irrigation needed

Social—Largely egalitarian society

  • Elders giving deference, but no more power than any other individuals
  • Gender equality
    • Men and women share tasks and responsibilities, and receive wealth and prestige equally
    • Gender differentiation of roles only for certain rituals
  • No class system
  • Members live in small village—maintain ties to other villages with trade, marriage, and hosting ritual events [We’re “hosting” people with our ritual, so I thought it would make sense to include a precedent for that.]
  • Kinship
    • Bilineal kinship reckoning (determine kinship through both the lines of both parents)
    • Marriages exogamous from lineage
      • May marry individual from own or other village, as long as outside of kinship group
      • Neolocal—married couples start own household
    • Elders are taken care of by their children and entire village
    • Decisions which affect the family made via discussion with all (adult) members

Political—No formal leadership

  • Decisions which affect the entire village are made by all adults together
    • Meetings—various options are debated
      • All village members have a chance to speak
      • Elders maintain order
    • Decisions made when all are in agreement
  • Major conflicts solved by community in above manner
    • When agreement is not attained/minority is very unsatisfied, dissenters free to leave and join another village or form a new one and maintain friendly relations

Cultural

  • Animistic belief system with emphasis on the importance of Light [I capitalized it because of the importance of it to agriculture and the idea of being one with it…sort of like it’s a spirit or personified a little?]
    • World full of spirits, working in harmony
    • Light is of central importance because of its central role in agriculture
      • Like shiny objects that reflect/create Light
      • With age, an individual becomes closer to joining/returning to/becoming the Light [wasn’t sure exactly what the concept was there, thought it was one of the three, or maybe all three]
      • Death joins the individual to the Light and the continuous cycle of the world
        • The dead are buried with seeds as a way to maintain the circle of life, with new life coming from death [going off our burial discussion in the stairwell]
        • Ancestral spirits are reincarnated in new babies and continue on the path to enLightenment [We talked about reincarnation, and I put in the path to enlightenment thing as a way to explain or expand it...the only other explanation I could come up with was a fixed number of souls in the universe, which seems a little less like our hippy-ish society. ]
  • Music
    • Bells and chimes are sacred instruments
      • Reflect Light using sound [this came up in discussion once, and I liked it a lot]
      • Used to accompany actions in some rituals
    • Other instruments and voice—used for entertainment, both at work and leisure
  • Dance—used for ritual and entertainment [kinda made it up, but figured we should talk about it, since it’s in the ritual]
    • Specific dances used in ritual activities, often as a way to teach younger members
    • Villagers often enjoy dancing to music at celebratory gatherings
  • Visual art forms—often incorporate abstract designs
    • Body adornment (discussed below)
    • Ceramics
    • Metalwork
    • Basketry

Economic—Primary means of production is agriculture, with some trading

  • Communal fields where crops are grown
    • Ritually planted by women and harvested by the men
    • Tended by children and young adults
  • Basketry, Ceramics, metalwork, and trading
    • Begin training part-time upon marriage, leave the fields after birth of first child
    • Exports surplus crops, ceramics, metal crafts
    • Import crops if needed, other regional styles of ceramics, raw metals, and mirrors
  • Child care and resource distribution by the elders
    • After the birth of first grandchild
    • Watch small children in the village
    • Supervise work in the fields—organize efforts so the entire field is taken care of
    • Organize collection of crops and trade goods as well as redistribution
      • Food and trade goods distributed evenly among villagers
  • Wealth—mirrors and metal ornaments convey the idea of Light and wealth
      • Because these items are distributed among all villagers every time they are brought to the village, individuals acquire wealth over time.

1 comment:

  1. (Comment to parts in entry)
    --> With age, an individual becomes closer to joining/returning to/becoming the Light [wasn’t sure exactly what the concept was there, thought it was one of the three, or maybe all three] (Yeah, light is analogous to Nirvana in Buddhism here, if you will.)

    -->Wealth—mirrors and metal ornaments convey the idea of Light and wealth
    Because these items are distributed among all villagers every time they are brought to the village, individuals acquire wealth over time. (Aside from age, wealth is the only other possible thing that can grade our society. We should mention that the wealth is for your personal closeness with Light and isn't really used to exert superiority over other individuals.)

    It's really thorough, and I like your ideas. Other than those two comments, keep everything else!

    ReplyDelete