To Sing with Pigs Is Human by Jane C. Goodale

Author:Jane C. Goodale [Goodale, Jane C.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Anthropology, Cultural & Social, Sociology, General
ISBN: 9780295801599
Google: eaYpDAAAQBAJ
Publisher: University of Washington Press
Published: 2017-05-01T05:49:27+00:00

EGIT, TOOTH-BLACKENING

Manganese oxide (in Kaulong, egit), a mineral found sporadically throughout the region, is traded widely to locations that do not have a local source. It is an essential part of the ritual celebration of young adulthood. Although it was (in the past) universally applied to young men with a few exceptions, I know of a few cases where young women received egit. I do not believe, however, it was ever a universal ritual for women.

The mineral is chewed together with powdered lime, and then placed along the inside of a six-inch piece of bark from a twig no more than an inch or so in diameter. The treated bark is then placed inside the young man’s mouth so that the egit is held firmly against the outside enamel of his teeth. For a week the boy lies in the hamlet mang, is allowed to eat nothing, and can drink little. Water must be poured down his throat so as not to touch his teeth. Informants told me that the mineral burned their gums and the inside of their cheeks and mouth, and that they were so weak that when they went to relieve themselves outside, someone had to help them.

During the time the boy “sleeps with egit,” as the Kaulong say, the sponsor of the youth arranges nightly rituals in which members of the host’s hamlet and those in related hamlets sing sasungin songs appropriate to the occasion, as they circle around the central clearing. Following the final night of singing, a pig is sacrificed and the pork distributed to visiting pork partners, and the young lad is released from phase one of the ritual.

By hosting the event, the sponsor gains prestige. Most frequently a father hosts his son’s sasungin, but it was a common alternative to have a mother’s brother “pull” his sister’s son to his (MB) and his sister’s (MBZ) natal hamlet in order to gain prestige through hosting the ceremony. This may well be the first obvious effort to influence a youth to switch allegiance from his father to his mother’s brother. As I shall discuss in following chapters, having children is a gravely dangerous activity because of ideas about pollution, but it is also necessary in order to have a senis, a replacement. If a man can “pull” his sister’s son to become his senis, living in his hamlet, in order to bury him when he dies, the mother’s brother accomplishes reproduction of a replacement without the danger of sexual intercourse (see chapter 7).

At the end of a week, a curved boar’s tusk would be put in the boy’s mouth and pulled strongly against the teeth. If the egit stayed on the teeth, he could then go on to the next phase. This second phase lasted from one to three months during which time the young man would live in the bush, accompanied by his own friends. They would hunt and the young man would give his food to his parents. He could eat no warm or hot food.

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