Compostura In Context Prehispanic Agrarian Ritual In The Naco Valley
As much as the contemporary Lenca are historically constructed, the case of the compostura and its possible historical antecedents suggest that world-view and economy have been closely intertwined since at least the sixteenth century. In this section, we consider the possibility that environmental worldview was expressed in agrarian ritual in prehispanic times and that this practice had potentially significant consequences for human landscape dynamics. To do so, we examine archaeological data...
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Fig. 8. Plan View of Moundville, Alabama after Knight amp Steponaitis, 1998, more subsumed within ritual and social action. Thus far, microcosmic case studies for small-scale societies are available in the ethnographic literature rather than through archaeology. Ethnographically, as with more complex societies, microcosms are ways of expressing social units within communal centers, such that their identity is not subsumed by the whole. Warren DeBoer, 1997 DeBoer amp Blitz, 1991 Fig. 10 has...
Cususa For The Ancestors
The Lenca are the largest indigenous group in Honduras and cover the widest geographical area, encompassing most of the western and southwestern highlands around Mount Celaque, stretching east through La Esperanza, and including the departments of Intibuca, Lempira, La Paz, Comayagua, Santa Barbara, Valle, and Francisco Morazan. Lenca culture patterns are known primarily through contemporary ethnography Castegnaro de Foletti, 1989 Chapman, 1985 and historical treatments Black, 1985, 1997...
Katherine A Spielmann
The archaeological record of small-scale societies is replete with examples ofpeople expending considerable labor to craft both places and objects for communal rituals. Archaeologists often infer these efforts to have been the product of aspiring elites. This chapter focuses instead on the larger community responsible for the construction of places and objects, through a ritual economy analysis of the social logic people use to organize the production of ritual places and paraphernalia. A...
REFERENCES Qaj
Appadurai, A. Ed. 1986 . The social life of things Commodities in cultural perspective. Cambridge, UK Cambridge University Press. Arri la de Geng, O. 1991 . Los tejedores en Guatemala y la influencia espa ola en el traje ind gena. Guatemala City Litograf as Modernas, S.A. Asturias de Barrios, L. 1996 . Woman's costume as a code in Comalapa, Guatemala. In M. B. Schevill, J. C. Berlo amp E. B. Dwyer Eds , Textile traditions of Mesoamerica and the Andes An anthology pp. 127-142 . Austin University...
Ethnographic Ritual Production Mortuary Ceremonies
Given that mortuary ceremonialism is present in both of the archaeological cases, a perusal of ethnographic information on crafting for communal mortuary ceremonies provides parallel and contrasting scenarios with the archaeological records just presented. Gearing up for communal rituals is a several month-long process, which includes both exchange for and the production of items for use in ritual or to be given away at mortuary ceremonies. This preparation is common throughout the ethnographic...
Historia Tencoa Honduras
Anderson, K. 1994 . Geoarchaeological investigations. In E. M. Schortman amp P. A. Urban Eds , Sociopolitical hierarchy and craft production The economic bases of elite power in a Late Classic southeastern polity, part III pp. 89-151 . Tegucigalpa, Honduras Instituto Hondureno de Antropolog a e Historia. Andrade, E. Z. 1990 . Los modalidades de la lluvia en Honduras. Tegucigalpa, Honduras Editorial Guaymuras. Appadurai, A. Ed. . 1986 . Introduction Commodities and the politics of value. In The...
Ritual Kinship Practical Kinship And Gifting The Children
In Latin America, and other parts of the Spanish speaking world, compadrazgo or godparenthood literally means ritual co-parenthood or ritual co-paternity. Godparents, or ritual kin, are chosen carefully by parents as citizens or relatives in good standing who might be called upon to fill in for or replace parents in the event of the parents' death, or in circumstances where the parents cannot accommodate the needs of the children. Ritual kinship creates bonds between parents and godparents, as...
Lively Markets And The Wellbeing Of Widows And Orphans
Kamboty mievina, ka afa-drofin-tenany ihany. An orphan sneezes, he has only himself to say ''bless you.'' Houlder, 1960, p. 164 According to the royal oral traditions, markets in the highland interior were originally called fihaonana, a term that translates as ''meetings'' or ''crossroads.'' With increased demand for slaves in the eighteenth century, one did not travel long distances to markets because to be caught en route at night was to risk capture and bondage. Many highland markets became...
Money And Markets Today
Tovolahy miantsena be sitrapo, fa tsy ampy fanaovana. Like a young male at the market so many desires, so little means. Veyrieres amp Meritens, 1967, p. 175 The Merina and the Betsileo, their close neighbors to the south who were incorporated early into the Merina state and who now become our ethnographic focus see Fig. 2 , were always involved in petty commerce and markets. Such commerce was not antithetical to social relations, rather such commerce created social relations between demes or...
Clarisse Rasoamampionona
We would like to thank Christian Wells and Patricia McAnany for the invitation to think about our research and data within the framework of a new paradigm. We would also like to thank the Cotsen Institute for the invitation to Kus to participate in the seminar leading up to this publication. Numerous individuals in Madagascar have helped us in the field and helped us with the final revising of the chapter. In particular we would like to thank Mpanandro Rakotomalala, Mpikabary Charles Ralaivao,...
By Way Of Conclusion Historical Precedence Cultural Continuity And Resistance
It may seem somewhat presumptuous to ascribe so much meaning and important to these commemorative looms. Perhaps it is however, there is some historical precedence here. Rosemary Joyce 2000 , among other archaeologists, has noted the gendered representations and representations of gender in Mesoamerican public monumental architecture and art. In pre-Columbian Maya society, women and cloth are well represented and an integrated part of economic, political, and sacred life. Vestiges of this can...
Expectation Of Imerina
Ny antsika vimbinina, fa ny an'ny andriana lolohavina. Our possessions we carry in our hands, the sovereign's possessions are carried on the head. Houlder, 1960, p. 117 The Merina polity of the seventeenth through the nineteenth century was engaged, as were all early states, in giving conceptual form to new rules and understandings of social operations as they moved from ''kinship'' to ''kingship'' . These are rules that displace or that trump social and economic organizational principles of...
ABSTRACT Btc
In the first millennium AD when international trade brought silver coins to Madagascar, they were melted down for jewelry or cut into pieces to meet the needs of small-scale local trade. The Merina culture of the highland interior saw in the original uncut silver coin an image ofcompleteness and perfection. Such coins became obligatory ritual offerings acknowledging the sanctity of the sovereign. ''Ritual economy'' is brought into fine grain relief when pieces of''all-purpose money'' are used...
The Nahua And Pantheistic Religion
The Nahua, who are the subjects of my study, are slash-and-burn horticulturalists who live in remote villages in the tropical forests of northern Veracruz on the Gulf Coast of Mexico. They are generally far removed from urban influences and before the arrival of large numbers of Protestant missionaries in the 1980s, the overwhelming majority practiced a religion that is firmly rooted in the pre-Hispanic era. Nahua ritual practices are very colorful and they often require an enormous investment...
Ritual Exchange
To summarize and set forth the problem of ritual economy among the Nahua, the cut-paper figures materialize an abstract pantheistic religion, and rituals enact a form of social transaction by which people dedicate offerings to spirit entities, who, in turn, provide the basic benefits that make life possible. Spirits, for the Nahua - closely associated with what Euro-Americans would call crucial natural processes - are social beings who respond to the normal exchanges that lie at the heart of...
Abstract
This chapter uses ideas from the ritual economy approach to discuss the political ecology of ritual feasting among Lisu highlanders and Shan lowlanders of northern Southeast Asia and medieval Icelanders. The audience for Lisu feasts is fellow villagers all of whom are engaged in limited competition for prestige to insure equality among households. These reciprocal feasts use a considerable portion of the annual value of each household's production. Among Shan the audience is non-reciprocating...
Acknowledgments 1
The University of South Florida's Palmarejo Community Archaeological Project is carried out with the permission and support of the Instituto Hondureno de Antropolog a e Historia. We thank Dar o Euraque Gerente , Eva Mart nez Subgerente de Patrimonio , and Aldo Zelaya Director Regional del Norte for their invaluable assistance and direction. The Project is funded by the National Geographic Society's Committee for Research and Exploration, the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican...
Patricia A McAnany and E Christian Wells
Ritual economy is a theoretical approach for understanding and explaining the ways in which worldview, economy, power, and human agency interlink in society and social change. Defined as the ''process of provisioning and consuming that materializes and substantiates worldview for managing meaning and shaping interpretation,'' this approach forefronts the study of human engagement with social, material, and cognitive realms of human experience. This chapter explores the theoretical roots of...
Ritual Economy
At the outset we must recognize that the concept of ritual economy'' is itself problematic and steeped in controversy. Anthropologists cannot seem to agree on a precise definition of ritual see Bell, 1992 for an analysis of the problem of ritual . Is the concept a product of a Euro-American obsession with scientific analysis and one that has little or no meaning to the world's people Isn't there a ritual aspect found in any repeated action in which people engage And doesn't religion permeate...
References 1
Durrenberger, E. P. 1976 . The economy of a Lisu village. American Ethnologist, 3, 633-644. Durrenberger, E. P. 1978 . Agricultural production and household budgets in a Shan peasant village in northwestern Thailand A quantitative description. Athens, OH Ohio Center for International Studies. Durrenberger, E. P. 1980a . Annual non-Buddhist religious observances of Maehongson Shan. Journal of the Siam Society, 68, 48-56. Durrenberger, E. P. 1980b . Belief and the logic of Lisu spirits. Bijdragen...
Political Appropriation Of Symbols A Tale Of A Branch Bamboo And Honey
There is more than one epiphanic tale in the collected oral histories of the sovereigns of Madagascar Callet, 1981 that reveals Andrianampoinimer-ina's destiny to rule a united Imerina. We will briefly recount one to illustrate how widely shared symbols of local systems of knowledge can be put into the service of the state Callet, 1981, pp. 407-409 . Several generations previous to Andrianampoinimerina's reunification of Imerina, the sovereign who originally united the polity could not decide...
Social Difference Embodied
Hierarchizing forces often are materialized through a visual aesthetic of power that emphasizes youth, beauty, and vitality while disparaging decrepitude. In an essay entitled The Social Skin,'' Terence Turner 1980, p. 130 argues convincingly that ''wealth and beauty are closely connected notions among the Kayapo, and both refer to aspects of the person coded by items of prestigious ritual dress.'' In effect, beauty extends out from the social skin and is materialized in costuming and dance....
REFERENCES Vgr
Appadurai, A. 2001 . Globalization. Durham, NC Duke University Press. Bourdieu, P. 1977 . Outline of a theory of practice. Cambridge, UK Cambridge University Press. Braudel, F. 1975 . Capitalism and material life, 1400-1800. New York Harper and Row. Braudel, F. 1985 . Civilization and capitalism, 15th-18th centuries. New York Harper and Collins. Carrier, J. G. 1995 . Gifts and commodities Exchange and western capitalism since 1700. London Routledge. Carrier, J. G. 1997 . Meanings of the market...
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Fig. 2. Plans of British Causewayed Enclosures A Offham, B Orsett, C Windmill Hill, and D Crickley Hill after Harding, 1998, Fig. 1 . One of the most widespread social valuables produced and circulated during the Neolithic are ground stone axes. Richard Bradley and Mark Edmonds 1993 note that some causewayed enclosures have produced unusually high concentrations of axes, as well as decorated pottery and other exotics. Axes are also frequently found as offerings in pits just outside the...
Conclusion About Ofw
Ultimately, gifting is a form of prevention for children living in poverty -preventing children from growing up in jail. If children are contained in school, and provided with the skills they need to give back to the community in whatever form that takes , they will not be in the wrong place at the wrong time, picked up by the cops at age 15 for writing graffiti or just hanging out, only to exit jail as adults at the age of 25. Spending adolescence in jail does not produce good citizens....
Environmental Worldview And Ritual Economy
Our core assumptions are two-fold. First, there exists an essential link between our outlook on the natural world - our environmental worldview -and how we behave. By environmental worldview, we refer to how individuals think the world works, what they think their role in the world should be, and what they believe is right and wrong environmental behavior'' Miller, 2000, p. 28 . Second, that outlook differentially enables and constrains our behavior through ritual economy, the materialization...
Ritual Specialists Philosophy And Bricolage
Among the Betsileo, there is a variety of ritual specialists. In some of their practices they bring to light and to life the symbolic force of pieces of money no longer in circulation for sale in the market place or that have been kept as family heirlooms. One instance involves the ritual performed by a mpikabary the individual who speaks for a family during engagement negotiations, weddings, funerals, and so on when he most often a male first publicly assumes this role. A mixture of certain...
Notes 1
1. The artist, Daniela Razafindrakoto, has symbolically conceptualized Andria-nampoinimerina in his painting, Ombalahibemaso. Ombalahibemaso, which can be translated as the ''Big-eyed Bull'' or the ''Bull with many eyes,'' was the name that Andrianampoinimerina carried as a young warrior before he ascended to power, first at the regional capital of Ambohimanga, and then over Imerina. Among the images found in this painting are those of material wealth in cattle and coins though Razafindrakoto...
Artisanship
Although Maya royal courts were quite different from those of the Minoan Mycenaean world, both were organized according to principles constitutive of a palace economy. The economic arrangements of such an entity include local production and consumption, centrifugal transfer of artisan production from the palace in the form of gift-giving alliance-building, tribute, and trade , and vertical and centripetal transfers to the palace from satellite domestic units as well as from other fiefdoms that...
REFERENCES Bnl
Berg, G. 1985 . The sacred musket, tactics, technology, and power in eighteenth-century Madagascar. Comparative Studies in Society and History, 27, 261-279. Berg, G. 1988 . Sacred acquisition Andrianampoinimerina at Ambohimanga, 1777-1790. Journal of African History, 19, 191-211. Biersack, A. 1996 . Word made flesh Religion, the economy, and the body in the Papua New Guinea Highlands. History of Religions, 36, 85-111. Bloch, M. 1983 . La separation du pouvoir et du rang comme processus d...
Anthropology Abstract
This chapter examines the historical relationship between Honduran Lenca worldview and how ecological resources are managed through ritual practice. The way in which the Lenca conceive of the biophysical environment is an active process of meaning-making that takes place through their interaction with the environment. The Lenca codify this relationship in the compostura, a complex set of ceremonial performances linked to economic practices that mediate human needs and desires with those of the...