A summary of the literature on the beginnings of agriculture in Europe in general, and Great Britain in particular, provides a theoretical background to the discussion. Models of relationships between hunter-gatherers and farmers are further investigated by a survey of the relevant anthropological literature. Chapter 3 explores the nature of radiocarbon dating, and using a catalogue of relevant dates from Great Britain, assesses what interpretations can be drawn. There is also a brief discussion of Irish dates as these influence interpretations of the British data. The chapter concludes that there is no radiocarbon dating evidence for Neolithic-type cultures in Britain (and possibly not in Ireland) before the middle of the fourth millennium bc, but that the significance of this in relation to the beginnings of agriculture is unclear. The poor quality of the dates, and scarcity of late Mesolithic dates severely hinder clear conclusions. The palaeoenvironmental evidence is then studied, with particular concentration on palynology. The nature of woodland disturbances and relevance of the elm decline to early agriculture are discussed. Early Neolithic agricultural practices, and the evidence for them are investigated, and the interpretational problems associated with finds of early cereal-type pollen grains are assessed. The relationship of late Mesolithic and early Neolithic site distributions to each other and the landscape is discussed, with the conclusion that while some trends can be identified taphonomic processes largely obscure any original patterns. The nature of site distribution patterns and their change over the Transition is further explored in chapter 6 by a case study of the Dee Valley, Grampian. This involved the testing of known distribution patterns by fieldwalking and an analysis of lithic scatters to assess the problems of recognising scatters of specific periods.

The aim of this thesis is to explore the form which time takes for the inhabitants of an ex-mining village in the Central Lowlands of Scotland. It constitutes an ethnography of a community in an area of Britain which, in the past, has been largely ignored by social anthropologists. This study of an economically depressed industrial community located in a rural environment allows for the investigation of a range of issues which are especially relevent in terms of current high unemployment throughout much of the U.K. Throughout the thesis comparisons are made with other studies of working-class culture in Britain. It is based on data gathered during almost four years of fieldwork (1982-86), using participant-observation, questionnaires, interviews and a time and money budget survey (all of which are described in Chapter 2). The collection and analysis of data was informed largely by four types of literature (reviewed in Chapter 2). This deals with the nature of the phenomenon of time, time as represented in various societies, the nature of communities, and the relationship between time, work and leisure. Part 2 of the thesis focusses on time in Western society, examining the historical development of our representation and evaluation of time, and the ways in which we organise social time in particular (Chapter 3). Part 3 deals with "Cauldmoss" itself and time in this community. The general ethnography of the village in Chapter 4 describes the historical development of the settlement, and then the current situation. The latter includes examination of: employment and unemployment in the village; images inhabitants hold of the community; the importance of convention; the role of the family and peer groups in inculcating values; attitudes towards alternative value-systems (including those presented by mass media); different social groups and institutions in Cauldmoss; kinship, marriage and sexual morality, and education, religion and politics in the village. Chapter 5 explores the relationship between linearity and cyclicity in villagers' approach to time, and the stress laid on regularity. It is noted that time is experienced as embedded in activities, rather than in an abstract form, although some villagers demonstrate an awareness of time as a thing in itself. Their beliefs about fate and luck are discussed, with superstition being seen as an attempt to order and control events. Chapter 6 deals with particular aspects of time important in family life and work in Cauldmoss. It considers ways in which the past enters into the present, principally through storytelling and photography. Life-cycle ordering in Cauldmoss is examined, especially attitudes towards the young and the elderly, and analysed as a rite of passage. Chapter 6 also discusses the extent of routine (and routinised variation) in this community, looking both at informant's behaviour and their experiences. It considers the extent to which villagers plan ahead, or concentrate on the immediate, and the degree to which they value an imposed time structure, such as that provided by work. The juxta-position of work and leisure is explored, as is the experience of time among the unemployed in Cauldmoss. A detailed case-study is presented as an appendix. The central theme of the thesis is time seen as an ordering principle. Meaning depends on the relationship which exists between discrete items of experience, and time emerges in Cauldmoss as a rule-governed phenomenon which creates boundaries around events and activities and provides a medium in which they may be inter-related.

Irula people of the Nilgiri Mountains in southern India live in partial seclusion in the forest, and have been classified as <i>adivasis</i> or 'Scheduled Tribals'. Though they are often described as hunter-gatherers, for at least the last hundred years their modes of livelihood have predominantly been subsistence horticulture, plantation labour, and marketing of garden and forest products. One-day village-based festivals are among their most significant cultural activities, involving collective excursions into the forest to worship deities and ancestors. The dialectical interplay between scripted ritualism and <i>ad hoc</i> improvisation in these festivals gives rise to numerous contradictions in meaning, making them highly entertaining events. Analysis therefore emphasises the playful nature of Hindu festivity, and reference is made to comparable practices of Hindus on the plains. Within the Irula festival, there is invariably a lengthy se*ance at which participants communicate with dieties, ancestors, and a variety of spirits, through entranced human mediums. Transcribed recordings of these se*ance-dramas are discussed, with detailed analysis of authorship, visible and invisible participants, content, and style. The language of the se*ance, like the encompassing festival, oscillates between predictable, scripted ritualism and unpredictable improvisation; this ethnography therefore challenges assumptions about ritual entelechy, since Irula rites are celebrations of both order and chaos. This feature echoes the combination, in Irula society, of formal, role-centred hierocracy and informal, person-centred adhocracy. A variety of interpretations of the social role of heteroglossia are offered. The metaphorical construction and social uses of divinity are dominating concerns throughout. The anaytical importance of non-belief is emphasised, and this is linked to the role of skepticism, whereby counter-rational faith is subverted within religious behaviour by irony and parody. The concept of metahoric <i>resonance</i> is offered as an aid to the analysis of ritual, enabling us to recognise the mobility and elusiveness of ritual metaphor. Four 'levels' at which ritual metaphors have meaning are distinguished: <i>instrumental, expressive, aesthetic</i>, and <i>metacommunicative.</i>

The thesis is based on a research that was carried out among some groups of people in Ewe-dome of Ghana. Ewe-dome is a sub-group of a larger ethnic group, the Ewe. The Ewe-dome, indeed, like many other African people, believe that the world is made up not only of the physical things that we perceive but also that the world has a spiritual dimension to it. Human persons in particular, are perceived as comprising flesh as well as <I>gbogbo</I> (spiritual breath of life), received from <I>Mawu</I> (the ultimate creator God of the universe). The physio-spiritual life of a person is also perceived as going through various stages of existence. There is the stage of birth, the stage of puberty, marriage stage, the stage of death, and the stage of ancestorhood. These stages are found to be crucial in a person's life and are, therefore, marked in various rites. The rites that are performed at the various stages are transpersonal, in other words, members of the community need to know about the various stages that a person has entered and participants in the activities that are associated with them. Although the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Ghana, the dominant Church in the area, has permitted Christina women to undergo the rite of initiation into womanhood, some Christian young women, in these days (around the 1990s) are refusing to perform the rite. To such Christians, the rite is unchristian. It is also clear that some Christians are unwilling to perform some aspects of the birth rite which to them are considered unchristian. The non-performance of the rites by some members of the community is creating various difficulties of conscience for individuals as well as for whole groups of people in Ewe-dome society. What is unchristian about the rites? is the question that some have been asking. For some Christians and traditional religious believers, the refusal to perform the rite of initiation into womanhood is simply a deliberate show of disrespect for a cultural institution that has been found to be essential to the social health of Ewe-dome society. We want to study in this thesis, what exactly are the rites of birth and initiation into womanhood (among the Ewe-dome of Ghana). We want to find out among other things, the basis for the performance of the rites; the impact of the Christian faith and other forms of modernity on the traditional rites; whether the rites have any positive values and whether they are relevant in contemporary Ewe-dome society; and how far the individual in Ewe-dome can claim to have rights of his or her own in the traditional understanding of society. In the final analysis, we shall assess how far a resolution is possible, where there is a clash between the traditional practices and the Christian faith as well as what form a resolution might take where there is a clash of the traditional practices with the moral and ethical issues that are raised by internationally recognised conventions like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

In 1974, Tanzania experienced a massive villagisation programme, unprecedented on the African continent. This study is about some of the specific ways in which the lives of people, especially women, have been affected by this experience. Taking as its primary focus the activities, decision making and ideas informing the events surrounding birth in the village of Fulwe, it opens out to consider issues concerning the relationship between experience, knowledge and power. Particular emphasis is placed on recognising the fieldwork encounter as the locus for ethnographic production. The question of the role of the traditional midwife as an agent of change is identified as an important reason for the initial creation of the project. However fieldwork experiences suggested the need for further exploration of gender, age and kinship relationships, all of which find expression in the idiom of birth, when considered as a cultural construction. Senior women gain a sense of identity and power from their practice of ritual preparation of the female initiand and the guidance to delivery of their younger kinswomen. Influences, such as formal school education and the choice of hospital delivery, are contentious issues which threaten the traditional routes to power for older women. In contrast to government controlled formal education, knowledge within the traditional paradigm is embodied, and conditional upon practice and actual experience. Using Bourdieu's idea of symbolic capital, I examine how some midwives attempt to harness the power implicit in hospital practices, for their own interests. In Fulwe, it is not possible to define a single gender ideology. Nor is it possible to discuss the unique status of women. The textual analysis of fertility and birthing activities alone, reveals several, sometimes contradictory, ideological views. These inform the self images of women at different stages of their lives, and give shape to their relationships with other women and men.

No description available.

The prime aim of this thesis has been to use the folklore of north east Scotland to attempt some degree of reconstruction of our rural past. 3his has been done by consulting collections of folk song and folklore, and then using these to understand rural society. Such a process is of a necessity two way; the folklore illuminates and enhances our understanding of the society and vice versa. Basically, the thesis consists of an examination of siAch folkloric phenomena as the big ballads, the bothy ballads, the horseman's word, the folklore of women especially with regard to reproduction, the bawdy tradition, and the effect on the folk tradition of such 'alien features' as professionalism and prints. I have used these artifacts in a manner which tries to relate folklore and changes in folklore to social structure and development. I have attempted to unearth some of the feeling of the past, trying to find out how folklore provided support, solace and advice to ordinary folk, and how it often relayed opposition to the domineering influences of official society. In effect I have tried to move away from the text and origin dominated approach of most folklorists to a more 'folklore in society' approach, I have also stressed the essentially pre-capitalist nature of the sociel structures where folklore plays such a vibrant role. Implicit in this is a belief in capitalism's destructive effect on the old culture. However I end on a fairly optimistic note, pointing out some folklore forms still survive.

The present study analyses the work of Flemish Franciscan missionary fray Pedro de Gante (1480-1572) against the background of the early stages of the evangelization in New Spain, modern-day Mexico. By means of his works the Catecismo en Pictogramas [ca.1527], the Doctrina Christiana en Lengua Mexicana [1547] and the Cartilla para enseñar a leer [1569] Gante played a fundamental role in the processes of transculturation playing out between European missionaries and the Nahua populations of the Valley of Mexico. The role of Gante as a transcendental figure of cultural contact has been often neglected; previous studies on the subject have only focused on general aspects of Gante’s biography. A thorough, comparative study of Gante’s works that ingrains them in the wider context of the early years of the evangelization (1524-1572) has never been done before. The present work aims to fill this void. The important role Gante and his works played in the process of transculturation is demonstrated through an interdisciplinary contextual framework that employs agency theory, New Philology, Colonial semiosis and annales theory. This study shows that Gante’s works represent the initial stages of a translation process in which Christian doctrine was converted into Nahuatl. This process was by no means straightforward and involved the translation of an entire set of cultural and cosmological referents from one system of beliefs to another. Gante’s works are at the forefront of this development and this research demonstrates clearly how Gante developed, drawing on his unique cultural and social background, novel evangelical strategies which involved the active participation of both missionaries and the Nahuas themselves. The significance of this, cannot be overlooked, with the translation Gante started an open-dialogue with the Nahuas. Showing that the evangelization of Mexico was not a simple process of imposition, but a complex process in which the different elements of society had a voice and accommodated and negated the influence of the other while constructing new cultural categories.

No description available.

No description available.