Week 6 Blog Post
1) If a death happens within a village, the village will separate within itself and the ensuing kins will do revenge raids on each other. There are no laws in regards to killing, per se, in which there is a trial and a sentencing if the perpetrator is found guilty, but rather a revenge killing is acted out against the tribe that committed the killing.
2) A raid party of 10 to 20 men are gathered and they travel to the enemy's village, which can be a 4 to 5 days trip on foot. When dawn arises, the raiders will try to seek out the person they want to kill the most but usually will kill the first person(s) they come across via an ambush. After the attack, the raiders will retreat as fast as they can to create distance from themselves and the enemy tribe before the victim is discovered.
3) One advantage of being an unokais is having a reputation among your tribe and neighboring/rival tribes. The higher number of kills an unokais has, the less likely a raid will be attempted on his tribe and the respect earned among fellow tribesmen. Non-unokais have a harder time obtaining a wife or political gain, often having to resort to using force to get what they want. Being an unokais is a means of gaining status and access to many wives, even obtaining the title of patas (Big Ones) as a political leader for his tribe.
4) There are strong relationships between deaths within tribes and the desire for revenge killing. It doesn't even have to be a direct killing from another tribe for this to be triggered. A person can die from natural causes and the Yanomamo would think it was from some sort of sorcery/witchcraft performed by another tribe.
4A) Political structure is based on several patas who are political leaders for their descendent group. The largest group in the tribe will have the ultimate ruler known as a Headsman. If a tribe has two descent groups of the same size, it will have to or more leaders due to past marriages between their groups.
4B) The Yanomamo are a collective. Kin groups pool their resources and reallocate them to the most needy. Because of the potential for violence, they cooperate for mutual protection and act accordingly when necessary.
4C) Yanomamo have several patrilineal descent groups; males and females of all ages are related to their male line of descent.
4D) Reciprocal marriage between descent groups happen over several generations, causing one descent group to have close relatives from another descent group. Headmen practice polygynous, usually having no more than six wives at a time but can have dozens of wives over his lifetime.
5) It is important to have laws in place to deter killings from happening and to punish those who commit killings because of the implications of things escalating to chaos. These tribes are spread out over vast distances and seem to be isolated. If this system of revenge killing were to take place in a city, then murders would be rampant and constantly happening. What would happen if an innocent bystander was killed by a stray bullet? Now that family has to get involved and avenge their fallen kin, adding more violence and the potential of innocent people getting killed, rinse and repeat.
1. " There are no laws in regards to killing, per se, in which there is a trial and a sentencing"
ReplyDeleteDo you recognize that you are exhibiting ethnocentrism here? The rules and standards practiced by the Yanomamo don't (in your mind) qualify as "laws" because they aren't like our laws? Careful!
The cultural practice of revenge killings is a complex system comprised of specific rules that outline when killing is or is not acceptable within the Yanomamo. You can't kill someone because they trod on your foot or kicked your dog, correct? They take into consideration cause and motive as well when they decide when killing is acceptable, it just happens to be different from what we consider to be acceptable.
Perhaps one key difference is that Western society has taken the "revenge" factor away from the process of punishing crime. Yanomamo allow kin to exact punishment for the death of one of their family members. Western society puts the responsibility for determining guilt and punishment onto the state.
2. Okay, but what practices occur after the raid? And how are women involved?
3. You explain the benefits of being a unokais, but the prompt asks you to explain why men might opt to be a NON-unokais. Missing that.
4. The question in this prompts states: "Identify and describe the relationship between revenge killings and these aspects of the Yanomamo culture." You describe each cultural factor but you don't make the required connection with revenge killings.
Political structure: The question here is how revenge killings impact their political structure. You describe the structure but don't draw that important connection. Who is likely to be a headman, a unokais or a non-unokais?
Social status/organization: Again, missing the connection between revenge killings and social status. How can men (and women) increase their social status through the system of revenge killings?
Kinship: Missing the connection with revenge killings.
Marriage and reproduction: Missing the connection with revenge killings.
5. You aren't actually answering the key question here: If killing is recognized to be socially/morally bad, why do we need laws against it? Shouldn't people just not kill? The point here is to recognize that there is killing in all cultures, including both the Yanomamo and Western societies. Both cultures have systems of dealing with it. But the question remains... why do people kill if this behavior is so universally recognized as "bad"?
Both Western cultures and the Yanomamo have laws against these behaviors, not because they are bad but because people may gain some benefit from engaging in those laws to the detriment of those around them.
We are creatures of biology, regardless of how "civilized" we might want to think we are. Killing can benefit an organism if they gain resources or a mate or defend their offspring in the process, correct? So that benefit is still there in humans, whether we like it or not. Killing is an instinctive, biological reaction to a threat of some sort, to our lives, to our family (genes) or to our resources, but it can also be a strategy to advance your survival, such as (for example) killing off a rival. Understand that this isn't excusing the behavior. It just explains it. But we need laws against this behavior, not because no one wants to do it but because sometimes people can benefit from this behavior... i.e., they DO want to kill because it benefits them. Laws protect us from selfish actions of others, acting to their own benefit and the harm of others.
Hey Aaron!
ReplyDeleteYou had some great points in your post and maybe a bit more information could have been nice to backup the points you made, but overall you did great! I found it interesting how the Yanomamo people have their own way of dealing with conflict within their and surrounding villages and would have loved to have more information on how they view their political system. I know we got some insight into this but just like how you mentioned how non-unokais have it harder, it would have been nice to read their thoughts on the issue.
Hi Aaron!
ReplyDeleteI agree with some of the great arguments you made. I do think laws are important but I also think this discussion is so interesting because it still begs the question in our society of why people still commit murder when we have laws to deter it. You can use the Purge movies as an satire example of how they deter some crime but if laws should deter crime successfully, why do we still have criminals and what does that say about us as human being? I just find this discussion so interesting.