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.241such methodical rules.The following remarks ought, therefore, to be treated indulgently, being only anunaided attempt to suggest certain important connections.They deserve indulgence also on account ofbeing the result of actual experiences and difficulties encountered in the field.If, in the account ofbeliefs given above, there is a certain lack of uniformity and smoothness; if, further, the observer's owndifficulties are somewhat brought into relief, this must be excused on the same account.I attempted toshow as plainly as possible the "social dimension" in the domain of belief, not to conceal the difficultieswhich result from the variety of native opinions, and also from the necessity of constantly holding inview both social institutions and native interpretation, as well as the behavior of the natives; of checkingsocial fact by psychological data, and vice versa.Now let us proceed to lay down the rules which allow us to reduce the multiplicity of the manifestationsof a belief to simpler data.Let us start with the statement made several times, namely, that the crude datapresent almost a chaos of diversity and multiplicity.Examples may be easily found among the materialpresented in this article, and they will allow the argument to be clear and concrete.Thus, let us take thehttp://www.sacred-texts.com/pac/baloma/bal08.htm (3 of 12)31/08/2005 17.57.18 Baloma; The Spirits of the Dead in the Trobriand Islands, by Bronislaw Malinowski: Chapter VIIIbeliefs corresponding to the question, "How do the natives imagine the return of the baloma?" I haveactually put this question, adequately formulated, to a series of informants.The answers were, in the firstplace, always fragmentary--a native will just tell you one aspect, very often an irrelevant one, accordingto what your question has suggested in his mind at the moment.Nor would an untrained "civilized man"do anything else.Besides being fragmentary, which could be partially remedied by repeating thequestion and using each informant to fill up the gaps, the answers were at times hopelessly inadequateand contradictory.Inadequate because some informants were unable even to grasp the question, at anyrate unable to describe such a complex fact as their own mental attitude, though others wereastonishingly clever, and almostp.242able to understand what the ethnological inquirer was driving at.What was I to do? To concoct a kind of "average" opinion? The degree of arbitrariness seemed much toogreat.Moreover, it was obvious that the opinions were only a small part of the information available.Allthe people, even those who were unable to state what they thought about the returning baloma and howthey felt towards them, none the less behaved in a certain manner towards those baloma, conforming tocertain customary rules and obeying certain canons of emotional reaction.Thus, in searching for an answer to the above question -or to any other question of belief and behavior--Iwas moved to look for the answer in the corresponding customs.The distinction between privateopinion, information gathered by asking the informants, and public ceremonial practices, had to be laiddown as a first principle.As the reader will remember, a number of dogmatic tenets have beenenumerated above, which I have found expressed in customary traditional acts.Thus the general beliefthat the baloma return is embodied in the broad fact of the milamala itself.Again, the display ofvaluables (ioiova), the erection of special platforms (tokaikaya), the display of food on the lalogua--allthis expresses the presence of the baloma in the village, the efforts to please them, to do something forthem.The food presents (silakutuva and bubualu'a) show an even more intimate participation in villagelife by the baloma.The dreams, which often preceded such offerings, are also customary features, just because they areassociated with, and sanctioned by, such customary offerings.They make the communion between thebaloma and the living, in a way, personal, and certainly more distinct.The reader will be able easily tomultiply these examples (connection between belief in Topileta and his fee, and the valuables laid roundthe body before burial; beliefs embodied in the ioba, etc.)Besides the beliefs expressed in the traditional ceremonies,p.243there are those embodied in magical formulae.http://www.sacred-texts.com/pac/baloma/bal08.htm (4 of 12)31/08/2005 17.57.18 Baloma; The Spirits of the Dead in the Trobriand Islands, by Bronislaw Malinowski: Chapter VIIIThese formulae are as definitely fixed by tradition as the customs.If anything, they are more precise asdocuments than the customs can be, since they do not allow of any variations.Only small fragments ofmagical formulae have been given above, yet even these serve to exemplify the fact that beliefs can beunmistakably expressed by spells, in which they are embedded.Any formula accompanied by a riteexpresses certain concrete, detailed, particular beliefs.Thus, when, in one of the above-named gardenrites, the magician puts a tuber on the stone in order to promote the growth of the crops, and the formulawhich he recites comments on this action and describes it, there are certain beliefs unmistakablydocumented by it: the belief in the sacredness of the particular grove (here our information iscorroborated by the taboos surrounding that grove); the belief in the connection between the tuber put onthe sacred stone and the tubers in the garden, etc
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Tematy
IndexStephen King Strefa Âœmierci (Martwa strefa) (The Dead Zone) 1979
Kelly Meding [Dreg City 02] As Lie The Dead (2)
Kelly Meding Dreg City 01 Three Days to Dead
Lesley Livingston Wondrous Strange 01 Wondrous Strange(eng)
Chris Dolley Medium Dead (retail) (epub)
Christopher G Nuttall The Living Will Envy the Dead (
Christos Tsiolkas Dead Europe (epub)
Chris Ewan Dead Line (epub)
Stephen King Dead Zone
Stephen King Book of the Dead