TOTEM AND TABOO

 

 TOTEM AND TABOO

Totem is the spirit or sacred object or symbol or emblem of a group of people such as family clan, lineage or tribe. Totem has a special significance in tribal life. Tribal people’s belief abut totemic character, signs, marks, letters, ideograms or any other identity serves as a reminder of the ancestory or mystical past of them.

It signifies spiritual, religious, social and cultural association between a clan or lineage and a bird, animal or natural phenomena. According to Emile Durkheim a renowned French Sociologist the word totem is originated from OJIVWE an ALGONQUIN tribe of North America and it refers to an object of an animal or a plant

G. Van. Der Leeuw the Dutch historian and philosopher of religion summarized the concept and definition of totem as

• group bears the name of the totem
• totem denotes its ancestor
• totem involves taboos such as
• prohibition against killing or eating the totem except in specific circumstances or under special conditions and
• prohibition against intermarriage within the same totem

The importance of totemism mostly came from its specific structure. In his book Totemism, famous 19^th century ethnographer James G.Frazer characterised totemism as a unique mixture of religion and social system. The religious aspect of totemism revealed itself in the belief that man is related to a supernatural animal protector (or plant); therefore, he cannot hunt it or eat it. the social character of totemism manifested itself in the fact that the symbol of this supernatural ancestor (the totem) was a signature of the clan recognized by its members. Totem also determined the social structure of a given tribe– the group gathered under one totem was exogamous.

Each totem of the tribal clans has distinct identity with regard to their habitat and physiology. Anthropologists categorizes them into different types such as

Land animal totem : otter, bear, fox, horse, cow, tiger, goat etc

Water animal totem: fish, turtle, seahorse, alligator, etc

Air animal totem: eagle, crow, hawk, dove etc

Insect totem: salamander, chameleon, mantis, dragonfly etc

Vegetable or plant totem  

SIGNIFICANCE OF TOTEM IN TRIBAL LIFE

There is no distinct or universally accepted theory to understand the origin of religion among the tribes across the world. But totemic belief, concept of taboo, the philosophy of rebirth and immortality of soul is whatever rudimentary forms that existed or prevails are common in all tribal religions all over the world. The primitive form of religion is observed in

Totemism

Mana

Animism

Taboo belief

Such forms of religion have dominant influence on tribal population . They find their origin mainly from animal and plants. 

TOTEM AND SPIRITUALITY

The tribal people believe that there is some supernatural and mystic relationship among the members of the same totem.

The animal totem are believed to be animal spirits by different clans of indigenous people living across the world

They thing that totem animals always stay with them for life both in physical and spiritual world

Many tribes believe that an offense against the totem can produce a corresponding decrease in the size of the clan

TOTEM AND CULTURE

Totem find specific significance in dance, drama, motifs, handicrafts, artifacts, paintings etc.

TOTEM AND RELIGION

• For every tribe totem is sacred
• A totem has religious significance in tribal life
• Many tribes inscribe the signs or figure of totem on some specific location of their body or on the wall of their home or prayer room
• It is perceived that blessings of the totem animals protect the tribal people in all difficult situation and at all hard times.
• It warns the members about the any possible danger and predicts about the future.

TOTEM AND TABOO

• • They do not kill their totem animal except on special occasion or sacred situation.
  • In certain tribes the prohibitions or taboos are sometimes cultivated to such an extreme degree that they believe eating, killing or destroying them may lead to occur unrecoverable loss to the clan
  • Its skin to worn out during important occasion and used with care
  • Some tribes take out funerals for the death of their totemic animals as mark of respect for the totem.

  TOTEM AND SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR

  ·         In sociological perspective the totem animal keep the tribal people in bonds of unity and brotherhood.

  ·         It brings social and community consciousness among the trial people.

  ·         They consider the totem protects the clan of the tribe in difficult times.

  ·         Mourning is observed on the death of totemic animal.

  INDIAN TRIBES AND TOTEMS

  • The Ho tribe of Jharkhand believes in the totemic significance in every walk of their life.
  • Every Killi means clan in their language bears a totemic object that is sacred to them.
  • They have more than 50 Killis that include Hansda ( a wild goose) Bagh (tiger) Jamuda (spring) and Tiyu (fox)
  • Out of more than 64 totem, the Munda tribe of Jharkhand and Odisha has some popular totemic objects like Sol-fish, Nag (serpent) Hassa (goose)
  • Similarly among the Santhals there are more than 100 items. It includes some popular totems like Murmu (a forest based wild cow) Chande (lizard) and Boyar (fish)
  • The totemic animals of Chota Nagpur region of Jharkand includes mainly of those animals that are found in the plateau.

The importance of totemism mostly came from its specific structure. In his book Totemism, famous 19^th century ethnographer James G.Frazer characterised totemism as a unique mixture of religion and social system the religious aspect of totemism revealed itself in the belief that man is related to a supernatural animal protector (or plant); therefore, he cannot hunt it or eat it. the social character of totemism manifested itself in the fact that the symbol of this supernatural ancestor (the totem) was a signature of the clan recognized by its members. Totem also determined the social structure of a given tribe– the group gathered under one totem was exogamous.

James G.Frazer ‘conceptional’ theory of totemism

Theory of totemism proposed by James G.Frazer. Frazer based on Baldwin Spencer’s and Francis Gillen’s book Native tribes of central Australia, especially their description of ʻtotem centres’– particular areas that aboriginal tribe Arunta thought were dominated by certain animal or plant spirit. Arunta believed that these spirits caused pregnancy. When female started to feel a child in her womb, she knew that spirit from the nearest totem centre impregnated her. Frazer was fascinated by the antiquity of the Arunta belief system and stated that it represents the most primal form of totemism. In Frazer’s interpretation, the origin of this belief came from the wrong interpretation of pregnancy itself. Because savages did not understand cause-effect relations, they were not able to accurately interpret any natural (and organic) phenomenon. In the end, Frazer creates ‘evolutionary scenario’ where a savage pregnant woman does not understand her condition and her ‘savage mind’ interprets it as a supernatural influence of spirits of nature. Eventually, she recognises an animal or plant that was nearest the place where she felt  a child in her womb as a child’s father. In this way, the tribe becomes convinced that animals are their ancestors and protective spirits.

The sociological approach of Émile Durkheim

The lives of Australian tribes are separated into two distinct stages. The first is the dispersing phase, in which people live individually in tiny autonomous groups and dedicate themselves to their own pursuits. Following that, the clan meets for holidays in the second phase. Because a member of a primitive community is easily moved by emotions, the occasion of such meetings is a tremendous stimulant for him. Because life during the first phase lacks such significant factors, emotions accompanying the congregation are so strong that they convince him of the existence of two realities, one with which he identifies feelings he experienced while in the group, and calm unremarkable everyday life. The first formed the sacrum, while the second became profane. Moreover, since during these gatherings, a man was surrounded by the emblem of his clan, he was finding the source of divine power in it in this way totem gained religious significance. Totem then became a physical expression of what connects society, of feelings that arose in the individual being part of the community. The choice of an animal or plant itself was not essential and probably depended on  the species that occurred in the vicinity near these gatherings

Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytical interpretation

The analysis of totemism, exogamy, the cult of the ancestors, and the totemic feast, according to Freud, leads to the following founding myth: in the beginning, there was a primitive horde in which there was one alpha male who controlled all the females and did not allow other males to approach them. His sons had mixed sentiments about him; on the one hand, they despised him as a rival, but on the other, they adored and idolized him. The boys decided to get together and topple their father one day, and as a consequence, they killed him. When they let their enmity go wild, they realized their love for the parent and wished to undo their deed. They attempted to do this by establishing two totemism-specific taboos: exogamy and the prohibition on murdering a totem. The totemic animal was given a prominent role because the primitive people's affections for their father were transferred to a totemic animal. The ban of incest is also an attempt at repentance, while practical considerations are also there.

TABOOS

Taboo is a term that originated in a very specific cultural context and has now become generalized in mainstream English. Popularly, it signifies forbidden and should be avoided—whether by habit, danger, broad supernatural sanction, or specific divine decree. However, it has a far more precise connotation in anthropology. Based on the universal belief that all things have an underlying magical power of some kind, taboo refers to the avoidance of a certain activity for fear of being harmed by a harmful power or being polluted by the intermixing of incompatible powers.

Captain James Cook popularized the term in Europe and America during his Polynesian expeditions and studies from 1768 to 1779. In the ninth edition of The Encyclopedia Britannica, 1875-1889, James George Frazer identified it as having universal connections. The term "forbidden" meant banned in Polynesian languages, as in a basic injunction, but it also meant sacred, and it entailed a ceremonial restriction imposed by a special type of divine sanction. It was characterized in Polynesia and Melanesia in terms of mana, a transferable power intrinsic in all things.

Taboos, according to Emile Durkheim, are part of a wider class of "interdictions" required to keep the holy and profane separate. In his famous Frazer Lecture on Taboo (1939), A. R. Radcliffe-Brown asserted that, as Frazer first observed, taboos provide supernatural enforcement for social rules, and that these social consequences of taboos "constitute their essential function and the ultimate reason for their existence." In his several efforts in the 1930s to demonstrate how patterns of social structure emerge from patterns of thought, Lucien Lévy-Bruhl provided similar views.

Frazer appears to have grasped the notion of supernatural danger early, and subsequent academics have realized its societal consequences. It was included into the title of Mary Douglas's magnificent masterpiece, Purity and Danger (1966).

The goal of a taboo is to keep destruction far away. Those who do not respect a culture's taboos compromise its existence, progress, and identity. As a result, breaking the taboos leads to self-destruction and/or disaster.

The functioning of taboos at an essential operational level necessitates the merging of the structuring of a secure social and individual environment based on highly rigorous regulations with a punishment system that encompasses both social and self-inflicted punishment.

SURVIVING TABOOS

Surviving taboos are the ones that assure a culture's existence. The survival of a civilization requires that all members share the false notions that have been implanted.

 

CONSERVATIVE TABOOS

Conservative taboos are the explicit and implicit prohibitions against dealing with issues that may upset the status quo. Conservative taboos are inherent in civilizations that are incapable of dealing with change.

COHABITION TABOOS

Every culture has its own set of rules around cohabitation. at certain cultures, sex, race, politics, and religion are not permitted to be addressed at social gatherings.