Cogealing divinity: time, worship and kinship in South Indian Hinduism

Daily worship in Hindu temples is characterized by regular repetition. This article juxtaposes iconography and mythology; field data on worship in a Murukan temple in Kalugumalai, South India; and analytic concepts from western and Indian metaphysics, to examine what Gell termed the 'ritual manipulation of time'. In Hindu cosmology, the materialization of divinity – a prerequisite for worship – is inseparably linked not only to the emergence of time but also to the devolution of divinity into gendered forms. Because gender differences play a central role in iconography, mythology and worship, Hinduism provides a rich cultural resource for debating the morality and practice of human kinship, sexuality and procreation. Not only are there significant homologies between human and divine kinship behaviour, but human marriage patterns in South India display the same blend of repetitive yet changing oscillation as do daily and annual temple liturgies.     

A botanical perspective on the identity of soma (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Nelumbo nucifera</Emphasis> Gaertn.) based on scriptural and iconographic records

An examination of the mythic and artistic records of India and Southeast Asia indicates that the famous psychotropic of the ancient Aryans was the eastern lotus, Nelumbo nucifera. Vedic epithets, metaphors, and myths that describe the physical and behavioral characteristics of the ‘soma’ plant as a sun, serpent, golden eagle, arrow, lightning bolt, cloud, phallic pillar, womb, chariot, and immortal navel, relate individually or as a whole to the eastern lotus. Since most Hindu and Buddhist gods and goddesses trace their origins from the Vedas and have always shared close symbolic associations with Nelumbo, there is reason to believe the divine status of this symbolic plant derives from India’s prehistoric past.     

Hunter-Gatherers and the Origins of Religion

Recent studies of the evolution of religion have revealed the cognitive underpinnings of belief in supernatural agents, the role of ritual in promoting cooperation, and the contribution of morally punishing high gods to the growth and stabilization of human society. The universality of religion across human society points to a deep evolutionary past. However, specific traits of nascent religiosity, and the sequence in which they emerged, have remained unknown. Here we reconstruct the evolution of religious beliefs and behaviors in early modern humans using a global sample of hunter-gatherers and seven traits describing hunter-gatherer religiosity: animism, belief in an afterlife, shamanism, ancestor worship, high gods, and worship of ancestors or high gods who are active in human affairs. We reconstruct ancestral character states using a time-calibrated supertree based on published phylogenetic trees and linguistic classification and then test for correlated evolution between the characters and for the direction of cultural change. Results indicate that the oldest trait of religion, present in the most recent common ancestor of present-day hunter-gatherers, was animism, in agreement with long-standing beliefs about the fundamental role of this trait. Belief in an afterlife emerged, followed by shamanism and ancestor worship. Ancestor spirits or high gods who are active in human affairs were absent in early humans, suggesting a deep history for the egalitarian nature of hunter-gatherer societies. There is a significant positive relationship between most characters investigated, but the trait “high gods” stands apart, suggesting that belief in a single creator deity can emerge in a society regardless of other aspects of its religion.     

Status and Reproduction in Humans: New Evidence for the Validity of Evolutionary Explanations on Basis of a University Sample

A strong positive relationship between reproductive success (offspring count) and status (position in the institutional hierarchy) is demonstrated in a contemporary sample of male university employees (n = 2693). Male academics in leading positions have more children than do other male employees. In female university employees (n = 2073), a negative relationship between status and reproductive success was found, but only if childless women were included in the analysis. Although a positive relationship between male status and offspring count has been predicted by evolutionary theory and was found in animal species and ‘traditional’ human societies, in modern societies most of the studies found no or even a negative relationship between status and reproductive success in males. We suggest that status may be a more important dimension for particular subsamples of modern society than for samples representing entire societies, so that associations might actually differ among subsamples. We suggest that analyses on a small and rather uniform level using modern large‐scale hierarchical organizations (such as universities) are candidates for the investigation of appropriate ‘society subsets’. Our results may stress the importance of evolutionary predictions and may be of relevance for theoretical and empirical considerations at the levels of economics and administration.     

Using people

Debate over human embryo research often has centered around the embryo's human status, with the assumption that beings accorded full humanhood may not be used as means to an end for other humans. Britain's Warnock Committee, for example, concluded that since the early embryo was potentially, not actually, a full human being, it legitimately could be treated, albeit briefly, as a means to an end for research purposes. Coughlan discusses the "Warnock principle," which precludes the use of human beings, the broader "Pauline principle," (from St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans), which forbids the doing of evil to achieve good, and the principle of double effect, which sets down the conditions under which the occasioning of evil is justifiable. He concludes that the Warnock and Pauline principles are untenable if construed as exceptionless. Anscombe questions Coughlan's understanding of the principle of double effect, and Coughlan defends his arguments.     

Vulnerable minds,bodily thoughts,and sensory spirits: local theory of mind and spiritual experience in Ghana

This essay looks at the resonances between common cultural models of the mind in the central region of Ghana and patterns of spiritual experience among charismatic evangelical Christians and practitioners of southern Ghana's indigenous religion, known as traditionalists. In particular, I examine the resonance between the model of the mind that construes it as porous, as vulnerable to forcible take-over by hostile entities, and experiences of divine beings insistently pushing people to do their will. It is also relatively common for people in Ghana to report seeing the divine with their eyes and hearing it with their ears. I argue that this experience resonates with, and is perhaps facilitated by, a tendency of local models of mind in Ghana to blend sense and percept.     

Personal Categories for Japanese Sacred Places and Gods: Views Elicited from a Conjugal Pair

Polytheism is not likely to be understood fully until it has been investigated at individual and small group levels. In this study of Japanese religious belief, hierarchical clustering and multidimensional scaling, and interviewing, have been used to analyze pile sorts of the names of sacred places that a male informant could easily recall. The same procedures were then followed with the informant's gods, and by his wife for her sacred places and her gods. Particular attention was given to those sacred places and gods designated by the respondents as being especially meaningful or significant. The results are primarily person-centered, but when matched and combined they reveal an aspect of the conjugal pair's small group culture. The names given to the idiosyncratic clusters and dimensions, too, appear to have some ethnographic generality.     

Responsibilities in elderly care: Mr Powell's narrative of duty and relations

In Western countries a considerable number of older people move to a residential home when their health declines. Institutionalization often results in increased dependence, inactivity and loss of identity or self-worth (dignity). This raises the moral question as to how older, institutionalized people can remain autonomous as far as continuing to live in line with their own values is concerned. Following Walker's meta-ethical framework on the assignment of responsibilities, we suggest that instead of directing all older people towards more autonomy in terms of independence, professional caregivers should listen to the life narrative of older people and attempt to find out how their personal identity, relations and values in life can be continued in the new setting. If mutual normative expectations between caregivers and older people are not carefully negotiated, it creates tension. This tension is illustrated by the narrative of Mr Powell, a retired successful public servant now living in a residential home. The narrative describes his current life, his need for help, his independent frame of mind, and his encounters with institutional and professional policies. Mr Powell sees himself as a man who has always cared for himself and others, and who still feels that he has to fulfil certain duties in life. Mr Powell's story shows that he is not always understood well by caregivers who respond from a one-sided view of autonomy as independence. This leads to misunderstanding and an underestimation of his need to be noticed and involved in the residential community.     

Genomics and the Ark: an ecocentric perspective on human history

Views of ourselves in relationship to the rest of the biosphere are changing. Theocentric and anthropocentric perspectives are giving way to more ecocentric views on the history, present, and future of humankind. Novel sciences, such as genomics, have deepened and broadened our understanding of the process of anthropogenesis, the coming into being of humans. Genomics suggests that early human history must be regarded as a complex narrative of evolving ecosystems, in which human evolution both influenced and was influenced by the evolution of companion species. During the agricultural revolution, human beings designed small-scale artificial ecosystems or evolutionary "Arks," in which networks of plants, animals, and microorganisms coevolved. Currently, our attitude towards this process seems subject to a paradoxical reversal. The boundaries of the Ark have dramatically broadened, and genomics is not only being used to increase our understanding of our ecological past, but may also help us to conserve, reconstruct, or even revivify species and ecosystems to whose degradation or (near) extinction we have contributed. This article explores the role of genomics in the elaboration of a more ecocentric view of ourselves with the help of two examples, namely the renaissance of Paleolithic diets and of Pleistocene parks. It argues that an understanding of the world in ecocentric terms requires new partnerships and mutually beneficial forms of collaboration and convergence between life sciences, social sciences, and the humanities.     

Psychosocial and reproductive influences on plasma lipids, lipoproteins, and atherosclerosis in nonhuman primates

Until recently, research in experimental atherosclerosis focused primarily on nutritional influences on plasma lipids, lipoproteins, and atherosclerosis. We review here the results of recent studies of independent and interactive influences of psychosocial and reproductive influences on atherosclerosis in nonhuman primates. These studies have produced evidence that, as in human beings, individuals with certain personality characteristics who are frequently faced with stressful or challenging situations are at increased risk of coronary artery disease. Preliminary evidence suggests that this relationship may be mediated, in part, by heightened sympathetic arousal, i.e., cardiovascular hyperresponsiveness, to the environmental challenge. Also, as in human beings, evidence has been produced that certain negative behavioral and psychosocial variables can have a significant independent influence on plasma lipids. As regards reproductive influences, the cynomolgus macaque seems to share with premenopausal white women a relative protection against coronary artery atherosclerosis. This "female protection" against diet-induced atherosclerosis is abolished by ovariectomy, which also results in increased total plasma and low density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol concentrations. Subordinate social status also seems to abolish female protection in some individuals. Preliminary evidence suggests that subordinate females most liable to this loss of protection are those with apparent stress-induced chronic ovarian endocrine dysfunction, which, in turn, is associated with increased plasma LDL cholesterol and decreased plasma high density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol concentrations.     

Transformation in <Emphasis Type="Italic">Dang</Emphasis>-<Emphasis Type="Italic">ki</Emphasis> Healing: The Embodied Self and Perceived Legitimacy

Since spirit possession in mediumship and shamanism resembles psychotic symptoms, early researchers perceived spirit mediums and shamans as psychiatric patients whose psychopathology was culturally sanctioned. However, other researchers have not only challenged this assumption, but also proposed that spirit possession has transformative benefits. The idiom of spirit possession provides cultural meanings for spirit mediums and shamans to express and transform their personal experiences. The present case study focuses on dang-ki healing, a form of Chinese mediumship practiced in Singapore, in which a deity possesses a human (i.e., dang-ki) to offer aid to supplicants. This study seeks to explore whether involvement in dang-ki healing is transformative; and if so, how the dang-ki’s transformation is related to his self and the perceived legitimacy of his mediumship. At a shrine, I interviewed 20 participants, including a male dang-ki, 10 temple assistants, and nine clients. The results obtained were supportive of the therapeutic nature of spirit possession. First, there is a relationship between his self-transformation and the perceived legitimacy of his mediumship. As his clients and community have recognized his spirit possession as genuine, and the healing power of his possessing god, he is able to make use of mediumship as a means for spiritual development. Second, he has developed his spirituality by internalizing his god’s positive traits (e.g., compassion). Deities worshipped in dang-ki healing can be conceptualized as ideal selves who represent a wide range of positive traits and moral values of Chinese culture. Thus, the possession of a deity is the embodiment of an ideal self. Finally, the dang-ki’s transformation may run parallel to his god’s transformation. In Chinese religions, gods have to constantly develop their spirituality even though they are already gods. An understanding of the god’s spiritual development further sheds light on the dang-ki’s self-transformation.     

Anthropology in Disneyworld: Rapport,Gardner, and the ‘Discipline‘ of Social Anthropology

This article examines the response by Rapport to the critique made by Gardner of his book Transcendent Individual. Rapport eschews the idea of discipline in relation to anthropology. This is connected to his distaste for any hint of social determinism, and his eulogising of the essay format as the most suitable means of conveying human contrariety. His approach necessarily leads him to embellish his accounts of what the world is like with visions of what it should be like if only everyone adopted his literary and liberal stance. A contrary ‘manifesto’ is here presented: the job of social anthropology is to explain actual historical societies, and one cannot simply appropriate the subject so that it now becomes about a kind of never‐never land. Rapport's approach, far from leading to a glorification of individuality, leads only to a monochrome vision which paints all human beings as reductively ‘aesthetic’, ignoring, and rendering impossible the explanation of all institutionalised forms of belief and practice, not least those brutal forms which, says Rapport, inspire his work.     

The story catches you and you fall down: tragedy,ethnography, and "cultural competence"

Anne Fadiman's The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures (Noonday Press, 1997) is widely used in "cultural competence" efforts within U.S. medical school curricula. This article addresses the relationship between theory, narrative form, and teaching through a close critical reading of that book that is informed by theories of tragedy and ethnographies of medicine. I argue that The Spirit Catches You is so influential as ethnography because it is so moving as a story; it is so moving as a story because it works so well as tragedy; and it works so well as tragedy precisely because of the static, reified, essentialist understanding of "culture" from which it proceeds. If professional anthropologists wish our own best work to speak to "apparitions of culture" within medicine and other "cultures of no culture," I suggest that we must find compelling new narrative forms in which to convey more complex understandings of "culture."     

Beneath the master narrative: human trafficking, myths of sexual slavery and ethnographic realities

This paper explores the disconnections between anti-trafficking discourse and the local experience of responding to human trafficking as indicated in ethnographic data from Bosnia and Kazakhstan. Using the concept of “uptake,” I examine how anti-trafficking discourse operates as a master narrative, drawing on techniques of emotion and logic, as well as a specific type of victim story. I also consider how, despite an emerging counter discourse that questions the data and challenges current policy, human trafficking discourse continues to be retold in media and reproduced in popular culture, often in ways that actually diverge from the current version of the grand narrative. In contrast to these uncritical representations, ethnographic data from Bosnia suggest that the master narrative is selective in how it represents the history of the problem and that it does not “take up” important details about the context that fosters sexual exploitation, despite Bosnia’s compliance with US policy. Conversely, Kazakhstan suffers a liminal status regardless of local efforts to prevent the problem from happening within its borders as well as evidence that the crime is not widespread. While perhaps not mythical, I suggest that the master narrative contains the stuff of legend as it occupies the critical spaces of policy, activism and development, leaving open the question of how to address the nuances and needs of responding to victims of gender violence.     

Les anthropomorphes du mont Bego aux pieds tournés vers l'intérieur : une hypothèse

Three major figures from the Vallée des Merveilles have the feet turned inward. The extreme rarity of this posture in the plastic arts of all times and the fact it is attributed essentially to major figures indicate the particular significance of this stand for the authors of the engravings. de Lumley et al. (1995, 2003) interpret this feet position as a hieratic attitude, as the mark the figure belongs to the world of the gods. In this study another hypothesis, which doesn't necessarily exclude the first one, is proposed from an ethological point of view based on the reading of body language made by Wex (1993). She claims that the inward turning of the feet represents a protective reaction to a situation which put the person in a fragile or harmful position. This hypothesis, as well other characteristics, questions the divine or human nature of our three anthropomorphic figures. The shamanistic approach (Hedges, 1993; Whitley, 2001) is raised with respect to this issue and the inward feet position.     

Nationalism,nation and territory: Jacint Verdaguer and the Catalan Renaixença

This paper seeks to explain the historic importance to Catalan nationalism of the nineteenth-century poet and priest, Jacint Verdaguer. In order to do so, rather than focus on his contribution – and that of the wider cultural revival, the Renaixença – to the development of the Catalan language as the basis for national political mobilization, this paper argues that we cannot fully understand Verdaguer's importance without reference to his role in constructing a geographical narrative linking nation and territory. At the same time, given that national meanings are always contested, the paper proposes a dialectical approach to nationalism that situates the work of writers within the context of power struggles between social groups. Consequently, Veradguer's centrality to Catalan nationalism is ultimately explained by his role in producing a geographical narrative capable of attracting important sectors of rural Catalonia to the hegemonic project of the industrial bourgeoisie.     

On the origins of narrative

Stories consist largely of representations of the human social environment. These representations can be used to influence the behavior of others (consider, e.g., rumor, propaganda, public relations, advertising). Storytelling can thus be seen as a transaction in which the benefit to the listener is information about his or her environment, and the benefit to the storyteller is the elicitation of behavior from the listener that serves the former’s interests. However, because no two individuals have exactly the same fitness interests, we would expect different storytellers to have different narrative perspectives and priorities due to differences in sex, age, health, social status, marital status, number of offspring, and so on. Tellingly, the folklore record indicates that different storytellers within the same cultural group tell the same story differently. Furthermore, the historical and ethnographic records provide numerous examples of storytelling deliberately used as a means of political manipulation. This evidence suggests that storyteller bias is rooted in differences in individual fitness interests, and that storytelling may have originated as a means of promoting these interests.     

Anthropomorphism or sub-anthropomorphism? An anthropological approach to gods and robots

Since the 1980s, a new area of research entitled HRI (Human-Robot Interaction) has been emerging in the field of robotic studies. It focuses on the empirical study of the relationship between robots and human beings. This article aims to contrast the findings of roboticists concerning the interaction between humans and robots with anthropological studies which focus on the ritual interaction between gods and humans in specific religious contexts. This idea may seem provocative, but it is argued here that such a comparison can yield valuable insights both at a theoretical level and at an empirical one. This will be demonstrated with reference to ritual interactions between humans and gods in the Western Himalayas.  

Résumé

Depuis les années 1980, un nouveau domaine d'étude appelé HRI (Human-Robot Interaction) est apparu dans la recherche en robotique. Il s'agit d'une étude empirique des relations entre robots et êtres humains. Le présent article met en regard les observations de roboticiens sur les interactions entre humains et robots et les études anthropologiques consacrées à l'interaction entre dieux et humains dans des contextes religieux spécifiques. Pour provocatrice qu'elle puisse paraître, cette comparaison peut constituer une approche intéressante, du point de vue théorique aussi bien qu'empirique. L'auteur le démontre en référence à des interactions rituelles entre hommes et dieux dans les massifs occidentaux de l'Himalaya.