Pioneers in the Tropics by Philip Staniford

Author:Philip Staniford [Staniford, Philip]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Political Science, Public Policy, Immigration, Social Science, Anthropology, General, Emigration & Immigration, Sociology, Rural
ISBN: 9781000324600
Google: Lq0PEAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2020-12-17T05:05:48+00:00

To be sure, there is some commitment to close kin and neighbours, but, as has been indicated, this need not necessarily be the case. I estimate that fifteen per cent of the households that have close kinsmen in the community do not maintain any tie of mutual aid and dependence with them and another fifteen per cent do not maintain close ties. Roughly twenty-three per cent of the households do not maintain close ties with any of their close neighbours.

Further evidence of household self-interest is that those who fail to maintain exchanges endanger the relationships of their households with others, regardless of kinship or neighbour position. Of course, this is so everywhere, if obligations are blatantly ignored. However, there appears to be more room for leeway and manoeuvre in Tome Açu. Such an orientation is consistent with the focus on differential and changing upward mobility. One makes loans, not gifts; one does not 'carry' others unnecessarily; reciprocity is expected. If credit lapses too badly and exchanges become unbalanced, a household will be unable to muster support in times of need.6

Obviously, dyadic relationships between households in Tome Açu are not completely different in nature from those in communities where ascribed structural relationships receive greater stress. But household self-interest as a guiding principle appears to be manifested in such a way as to allow for greater flexibility in actively choosing those with whom close dyadicties are established. In this respect, the Tome Açu immigrants resemble those American frontiersmen who have been characterized by some historians as 'individualistic' (Turner 1920:30; Billington 1967:745).

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