This post is basically a short essay that was submitted for the Ethnography course at TLU in Spring 2008.
This essay intends to provide some reflections on Pierre Clastres’ book. This is a very valuable book not only because it is an excellent piece of ethnographic research in which natives’ birth, death and habits, among other aspects, are referred to without breaking the continuity of the narration, but also because it provides a human vision of a nomad community experiencing change produced by a growing and unwilling interaction with white society. I will first point out some aspects on the structure of the book and the story told. Later on, I will mention why, to my point of view, this paper is a wonderful reference to future ethnographers. Finally, I will state some personal reflections on the text and connections to Western society.
To start with, the text begins with the narration of the birth of a new Guayaki, the ritual that follows and the importance of having a future hunter in the community. In this part of the text, as in the rest of it, there are careful explanations of the vocabulary and the logic of the language connected with the rituals performed. An example could be the way how ‘being born’ in Guayaki language is said in the same way as ‘to fall’ (waa), and how the ritual follows the logic of the action connected to the relations derived from it: the baby is left on the ground as “fallen” and the upiaregi – the one who lifts up - is ‘lifting it up’. Unlike Bateson’s book, the author makes references to ritual but feels that no explanation of it from philosophical or sociological theory is needed as our explanation of “ritual” can actually be different from the Indians’ understanding. The question that comes out of this omission is: Is it possible that, in usual ethnographies, the anthropologist interprets the situations in a way that is not necessarily the one shared by the natives? To my view, Clastres preferred to let us analyze first-hand the situation form the Indians’ perspective.
Clastres’ work is almost like a novel, a piece of writing telling the story of an old culture – already extinguished – from a human point of view, giving hints to the future ethnographer without leaving aside the common reader. There are no footnotes about or references to complex sociological or philosophical theories in the text, neither there is a formal conclusion summing up the main arguments “exposed” by the author from the ‘assertive’ anthropological perspective. The Indians’ beliefs are told, not in the light of the author’s theoretical standing point, but from the Indian’s mentality. It gives a picture of a cosmology so different from our understanding and so profound, involving care for nature, their children and those around them. In fact, the writing makes the reader feel sympathy for the Indians and the struggles they have to live, in such a way that, at the end, Clastres plays with the way to tell the story and let us confront the ‘horror’ of finding the natives being cannibals, almost like the tragic event that changes the whole development of the story and the image that the reader has made of the culture.
The book is also a wonderful piece of training for future ethnographers. There are plenty of examples of its pedagogical value: he provides very interesting insights on the limitations of anthropological analysis, for instance when he states that “the responsibility for determining the meaning of the world limits how far an anthropologist can go: we cannot know everything, there is always something irreducible, something that refuses to be domesticated, and the Indians are still aware enough of their thoughts to be able to seal up what they want to keep enigmatic.” (1998: 47); or when he highlights the usefulness of learning the language in advance (1998: 77), the best ways to improve language skills (1998: 146), and asking futile questions that could –eventually- lead to great discoveries (1998: 319). The importance of having different informant in order to contrast the different natives’ discourse is an important piece in his analysis (1998: 203) and what authentic contact with practices – participant observation - as much the natives allowed him to (1998: 238). Of particular interest are his reflections on the way how the anthropologist can be a disruptor of the natives’ habits –i.e. silence as a way of communication or the reproaches he made to the child who didn’t want to walk- in the sake of science or because of human solidarity (1998: 97). Finally, there are some comments on the misery of ethnocentric vision when referring to the first analysis made by British anthropologists in the XIX century (1998: 68).
A special note has to be commented on the proposal to have ‘meno’ with one of the women in the community. He might have had his reasons not to accept – I wouldn’t have – but it is interesting to ask ourselves: Would it have changed the structure or the focus of his research if he had accepted? Would there have been any kind of moral dilemmas afterwards when he was ‘invited’ to be ‘the second’ husband of this woman? We will never know; however, it is sure that his opinion would have been very useful for the text written by Markowitz and Ashkenazi “Sex, Sexuality, and the Anthropologist”[1].
To finish this essay, I would like to point out some of the thoughts that came to my mind when reading this book. To start with, it is interesting to see how communities which seem to be so different are in reality so similar. Continuity and tradition was part of Guayaki life style: when questioned about the sequence of events in a ritual or the reasons behind being cannibals they Guayaki just answered “that’s the way we are” (1998: 187) or “we do as our ancestors did” (198: 330). Is it the same logic behind Sorority organisations and folklore rituals that we all share? Do we carry them out because we are conscious that there is always a logic reason behind our practices, or just because we were taught to do so? When I arrived to Estonia, many people laughed at the way how I hold the fork and the knife (fork on right hand and knife on left one) while Estonians do it the other way round. When asked about the reasons to hold in that particular way, the answered: that’s the way we were taught! Are we that different from these “uncivilized” communities? At the end, most of us tend to give the same arguments they do when questioned about our habits.
Interesting to point out is the relation between the two groups, the Atchei and the Iroiangi and their perception that the only thing the other could offer was ignorance. It seems to be very similar to the way how, for instance, Russian-speakers and Estonians in Estonia think of each other. The latter call the former as drunkards, while formers have the idea of the latter as slow and lazy. At the end, it has been argued that the similarities in opinions about the future of the country and the feelings of belonging to it between the members of these two communities are very alike (Daatland et al. 2000: 266). Another example of ethnocentrism could be the way how our Western society shares the understanding of beauty. To the Atchei, thinness is horrible and a sign of bad health, for them “especially like their women to be nice and round” (1998: 186), in our modern society we find planty of examples of the value given to thinness (i.e. anorexic models and the promotion of confusing messages sent through the media to teenage girls in the sake of consuming).
One of the most shocking parts of the text was when Clastres found out that the indigenous had lied and they were cannibals as they seized on the meat of dead people to counteract the lack of food available for the community and get some “nice fat” – even though it was a common practice in old times, it also found its reasons in the growing presence of white settlers in the forest areas and the impossibility to periodically find game to eat. In a certain aspect, the logic of abortion in Liberal communities and the cannibal practices of children by the Atchei are related in the sense that both justify them as the children don’t have Ianve or soul (Leaving aside the argument that women in our society have the right to choose what to do in the case of abortion). Furthermore, the prohibition of and punishment to cannibal practices, as well as abortion in our society, have their roots in the logic of Catholic religion and, in the case of cannibalism, its support to the conquest and colonisation in XVI century. At the end, cannibalism served as the perfect excuse to enslave the Indians and provide the new settlers with cheap –if not free-of-charge- labour force.
To my point of view, when we compare cannibalism to our market economy and the need “to fit in” through the consumption of goods, there is not much difference. In fact, cases have shown that contradictory social demands are behind the reasons of youth suicides, homelessness, intra-familiar violence, and so on. Is it not another way of cannibalism? “The ends justify the means” seems to fit perfectly in our “surviving” logic. Countries are invaded and innocents are murdered so some other countries can get access to resources and achieve their own benefit. Is it not another way of cannibalism? The fact is that it works for some, and that’s why it is an active part of our societal development.
Finally, I would like to point out something which is very crucial in the text. Clastres provided us with an overview of a community experiencing change because of increasing contact with white people. For instance, mirrors given to the Indians started to develop the –until that moment unknown- ‘desire to hoard’ (1998: 133) already promoting an unconscious consuming model of society, base of our social organisation. Further examples are the rejection from Chachugi to get the scars necessary for the ritual of transition from childhood to womanhood, and the complaint from the old members of the community “Near the Beeru, the Atchei have ceased to be Atchei. What sadness!” (1998: 191). The idea behind Clastres’ text is that we are witnessing the homogenisation of culture, in which models and patterns repeat, priorities are set and interests created. It seems that we are all performing the Atchei’s view of beeru who destroys everything on his path and gives no space to difference. What sadness!
Bibliography
Daatland, C. C & Svege, H. P. (2000). Russian-speakers in Estonia. In: Politics and Citizenship on the Eastern Baltic Seaboard. The Structuring of Democratic Politics from North-West Russia to Poland. Aarebrot, F & Knutsen, T (ed.). Kristiansand: Hoyskoleforlaget, pp. 254-275.
Clastres, P. (1998). Chronicles of the Guayaki Indians. New York: Zone Books
Markowitz, F. and M. Ashkenazi (1999). Sex, Sexuality, and the Anthropologist. Illinois: University of Illinois Press
[1] Markowitz, F. and M. Ashkenazi (1999). Sex, Sexuality, and the Anthropologist. Illinois: University of Illinois Press
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