Maasai Culture

ENVIORMENT & ADAPTATIONS

The Maasai people of East Africa live in southern Kenya and northern Tanzania along the Great Rift Valley on semi-arid and arid lands with a population of one half million people. Maasai live in a rural setting but are very dependent on one another, for the Maasai people are split up into several groups that surround each other. Many animals graze the land in which the Maasai people live which includes elephants, lions, giraffes, leopards, hippos, and crocodiles. Long strands of yellow long weeds, patchy grass, and tall trees make up the vegetation that dominates the land of the southern part of Kenya where this culture lives. The average rainfall of the land is 500mm a year, with short rainfall November-December and long rainfall March –April. Cold months are June- July dipping as low as 13 degrees Celsius, with hot months October- November reaching 30 degrees Celsius. A major stressor that makes it hard for the population to live are droughts or the late timing of rain. The Maasai are so dependent of rainfalls that without it, a number of things are affected, making it hard to survive. To adapt to this environmental stressor the Maasai people have migrate to new land where they can come back to homeostasis.

Due to the temperature, the Maasai have a high melatonin in their skin, which over a long period of time has developed and helped them adapt. Another long term adaptation the Maasai culture has developed is their diet. A diet consisting of mostly meat and then milk and other nutrients has shaped them into being naturally thin individuals because of the mothers and fathers genes that have been develpod over generations of time. Weapons have become a big adaptation in attaining food, along with houses that are made out of resources that accommodate their living environment because of heat and another cultural adaptation would be items made by the Maasai women like baskets, or bowls that would help perform tasks such as catching water when they travel long distances to get it.

LANGUAGE & GENDER ROLES

The language of the Maasai culture is called Maa, also referred to as Olma. What is unique about the Maasai culture is that the Maa language is spoken from the South to the Southeast end of Lake Baringo. Different cultures within this area share the same language even though they have many cultural differences. There are a few written versions of this language for example the Maasai Bible and dictionary. What I can infer about the Maasai culture by analyzing their language is that they are very traditional. Since there wasn’t much written forms of this language, how to speak and write it was passed down from generation to generation.

There are only two specific genders in the Maasai culture which are men and women. The women in the Maasai culture fetch water, cook, collect fire wood, garden, herd small animals, and even construct houses. Men go through the process of being a warrior where they are in charge of herding large cattle and protecting the village. Roles in the Maasai culture are very distinct, although the women have attained more and more roles over time, they cannot perform and take on the roles of a warrior or vice versa. There are no negative repercussions for one gender performing the role of another but socially it might not be accepted because men are very dominant in their roles. Being a warrior, a man is very prideful of his role, therefore if a woman were to perform it, it will negatively be looked upon. In contrast if a man were to perform a role of women she might be looked upon as degrading. For the men roles, boys are raised from the beginning of boyhood, and put through a serious of test so one can become a warrior. If the father were to die, the eldest son would take on his role, so his mother would not. Women pass down knowledge and skills to their daughter as they progress with learning more roles over time. I believe the Maasai would accept the protagonist in the article "The Blessed Curse" because the Maasai culture believes in a God that is neither a woman nor a man. Translating this to the intersexed protagonist in the story, the Maasai would accept her if she were to choose which role she was going to play in their culture, and stick to it.

ECONOMY & CULTURE

The Maasai do not produce any kind of food surplus because they only attain as much as they need. Killing more cattle or using them excessively would have a negative impact later when they do need it. Cattle are a big source of currency, for the Maasai trade them for other goods they do not have or goods that they need. By trading for other food or goods, the Maasai are able to survive without going to extreme means, putting their life at danger. Goods and Wealth are not distributed, for they are always used up within the culture. Labor is split up within the culture, but collectively the Maasai come together in unison, performing tasks in order to live.

The main food that makes up the Maasai cultures diet is cattle which consist mainly of goat, cows,sheep. They also drink milk from these animals and their blood on special occasions, which serves as great nutritional health. Meat serves as good nutrition to this culture, but as animals move to find their own food and water based on the seasons, the Maasai people have to travel and rotate as the animals do to hunt .As the Massai people trade more with different cultures that surround them, their diets and general nutritional intake expands. Maize meal, rice, potatoes, and cabbage are some examples of types of nutrition they have become dependent on by other people. Because the Massai people do trade, these items are available when they do need it. Massai people that live near crop farmers have also engaged in cultivation which now stands as a main subsistence for their culture. Cultivation has created an unfortunate situation for the Maasai people because once they use the land for farming; animals can no longer graze for food.  The Maasai look upon this as cultivation as a crime against nature and would rather stick to their more traditional ways, than progress into cropping. Labor is split up between men and women but women take on different levels of responsibility. Growing boys are in charge of herding the livestock, women take on the responsibility of milking the cattle, men warriors protect and trade and elders watch over everyone as they complete their duties. Age divides this culture in many ways but only making a positive impact because subsistence patterns are taken on by boys as they herd cattle before they start their training in becoming a warrior.

Kinship & Marriage

Marriage patterns are not polygamous, and are very organized and planned. Sometimes marriages are planned even before the girl is born or when she is young. Marriage for the women is scheduled soon after she hits puberty.  Although men cannot marry until their late twenties when they have finished stages in becoming a warrior. In trade for marriage a man will give his future wife a brideswealth which consist of money, livestock, and services. Clearly women have more cultural pressures of importance in getting married. Both sexes have to collectively work together to have children or the marriage is seen as incomplete. Men have the most power between the two and linages are traced through their side of the family. The rules in marriage are very strict for boys and girls, for they have to go through important stages in their life before marriage can actually take place. Girls must learn how to be a wife and are taught this for several years and boys are gone away from home while they train to become a warrior and protect the village.

 Elders possess the most authority within the family of the Massai culture. Elders watch over everyone and give out daily tasks and orders for people to perform. The longer you have lived the more wisdom one is viewed to have. A grandmother or grandfather would be an example of kinship authority in the Maasai culture. Elders arrange marriages without the bride or mothers consent.  A herd of cattle is given to the bride by the father. When the mother or father passes, the eldest son will take on his father’s cattle and the youngest son will take on his mothers. Daughters do not inherit anything. Although kinship terminology is broadly of the Omaha type, there is a general preference to address others by the use of teknonyms or, among close kin, to establish gift terms that emphasize mutual respect. The Maasai are a patrilineal people, with shallow dispersed lineages that extend for only one or two generations beyond the oldest living elders.

RELIGION & ART

The Maasai believe in a God called Ngai also spelled 'Ngai, En-kai, Enkai, Engai, and Eng-ai. Ngai is neither male nor female but the Maasai interpret their God as two different forms. One being dark and benevolent and the other bring red and angry. The Maasai worship this both Gods for what they represent. The Maasai believe these Gods are responsible for all life and death on earth but the black God is seen in thunder and rain, which brings grass to the cattle and prosperity to the Massai; the red God is expressed in violent lightning, which can strike and kill, and the extreme dry season, which brings famine and death. The story of how the Gods the Ngai worship was once said that the sky and earth once separated but Ngai sent down cattle  so they could graze on the land by means of the aerial roots of the sacred wild fig tree, and told them to look after them. The Maasai culture practices some rituals such as ceremonies, wedding ceremonies, and the earlobe ritual.  These ceremonies or rituals are performed to make a new stage in a man or women’s life.  A ritual in the Maasai culture is seen as a new start in whatever stage they feel is important in someone’s life. These stages are known, and not random, therefore performing and receiving these sometimes painful rituals become very traditional. Because these rituals make up this culture and play such a big role in everyones life, I believe the Maasai culture could not function without out it.  These rituals are signifying a separation in class and without separation there could be more violence along with other problems in the culture.

Visual arts among the Maasai focus predominantly on body decoration and on the beaded ornaments that are displayed by warriors and complemented by the beaded ornaments of girls and young women. The Maasai culture is known gathering in circles, dancing, and singing using their voices as a beat to dance to. Seen in this picture the Maasai people jump high with one another performing during times of celebration for example someone’s marriage. Beading and clothing is a huge form of religious art, as they create elaborate gowns, necklaced, bracelets and other jewelry for these religious rituals. Maasai women thrive on coming together and making these forms of art. This beautiful beading that the culture wears also stands as religious art because it has become a tradition, forever being passed down from generations.

SOCIAL & POLITICAL

The stratification of status within the Maasai culture is age. Depending on the age in which the person is, they are put through a labeled stage that establishes their status for example a senior warrior. The longer one lives (longevity), the more power they have, hence the reason why elders watch of the village community every day. Elders determine how people are punished in the culture. There are no prison systems within the culture therefore sometimes depending on the crime committed, elders determine how much cattle is a way in trade for what they have done.

Within the culture there is little to no violence because of the strong kinship between everyone. Warriors that protect the village act in violence in order to protect themselves along with the rest of the Maasai people when encountering Non-Maasai. In recent years, violence in the Maasai culture has occurred because of the lack of natural resources. Because different Maasai neighbors that live upstream are progressing in ways to produce more food through irrigation are cutting the Maasai people short of water that would natural flow downstream to them. This deprives them of the water they would be using for their own crops and cattle. It was written that the Maasai people were carrying guns with them; in result police shot two men down and killed them. The effects of violence have little effect on this culture. Their bond is too strong for violence to tear them apart. What this culture does to resolve violence when it does outbreak is hold peace meetings or trade cattle in order to compensate families. This is a positive thing because

CONCLUSION

The Maasai culture is healthy and thriving. They work with what they have to survive. They stay true to there beliefs and grow together as a culture more while sticking to traditional ways. Maasai people stay isolated in some ways but as time goes on they become more custome to the people that live around them, engaging in trade. Trading with different cultures that live around them and growing in different ways, opens many oportunities for the Maasai culture to have a impact on the modern world. Because the Maasai are so traditional in their everday lifestyle and customes, they are constantly being taken advantage of by people that live close to them that are progressing with the current time.

• http://www.go2africa.com/kenya/masai-mara/african-safari-guide/wildlife-guide
• http://www.maasai-association.org/maasai.html
• http://www.kenya-advisor.com/masai-culture.html
• http://www.helium.com/items/713314-the-maasai-community-living-in-the-past
• http://www.bluegecko.org/kenya/tribes/maasai/beliefs.htm
• http://www.bluegecko.org/kenya/tribes/maasai/music.htm
• http://maasaicpp.org/

• http://voices.yahoo.com/the-kaguru-east-africa-marriage-kinship-descent-446754.html

Art & Culture

a.       I believe the cave artist were trying to say how much they appreciate the horses, bulls, unicorns, and other animals by drawling them all over the place.
b.      I believe there are so many animals rather than people in the painting because animals played such a huge role in their culture. Not only did they provide food and things like that but also clothing. The animals were something interesting and intriguing, I mean humans were too but these animals they drew everywhere were a different kind of species.
c.       The cave painting can tell me that the Paleolithic people were very creative and imaginative. The cave dwellers aspects of life could be seen as being adventurous, and centering their life on hunting.
d.      Some difficulties the Paleolithic people might have went through to paint these pictures was the space in which they chose to paint the pictures. In different little corners there was pictures of different animals tucked down in dark holes. Also inside these caves were bears and lions so these early humans were also putting their life at risk by going inside.
e.      Art can serve as many different purposes but to the early humans I believed they first served as just art. It was a way to decorate the cave and just make it interesting. Men were the predominant artist, so maybe they used this as a way to come together and bond as men. Another purpose the animals on the wall served as was a way to obtain protection by dangerous creators on the wall or even a way of taking on their ferociousness and skill to increase human hunting success. Another possible function this art could have served as  would be a journal, to remember the animals they have seen so they would not be forgotten over time or even severing a purpose of communication.

 

2. I believe the obvious commonality is expression.  I don’t believe that someone would dedicate that much time paintings without wanting to express their fear, happiness, excitement, or whatever emotion they are feeling at the time.  In modern day art expression through paintings serve the same purpose. Every artist has some kind emotion they would like to portray when they are painting.
3. Interior design serves as art and most of the time a functional space of living. A interior designer would be trying to communicate different elements of comfort with beauty and harmony. The place someone goes to relax and find peace is in their own home, therefore interior designers try to capture a sense of relaxation.

 
4. I believe Interior design is being artistc and creative when designing a room or area in someones house to live in. Yes there is a culture of interior design. For example, going off to college this fall, and I will be able to come together and make friends who share the same major and intrest I do, when it comes to interior design.  A feature I admire in interior design is being imaginative, creating something that has not been created before. Also dedication because almost everyone can be imaginative but actually executing ideas and making them come to life is something that not everyone has inside of them. Interior design and its culture benefits society by providing a b-e-a-uuutiful atmosphere/ living environment in a bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, even hotel room, the list can go on. Interior design is also functional and can provide organization and homeostasis in a home which someone lives. For example, there was a TV show back in the day called Clean Sweep, and someone would come clean out your house and decorate it, providing a upbeat, happy, positive enviorment. There are no real detrimental effects of interior design, maybe debt by spending too much money on décor because sometimes that can get a little addictive!

Yanomamo

For the Yanomamo culture, when one wishes to break the rules they will do so if it interest them.  Some consequences are shouting matches, chest pounding duels, side slapping duels, club fights, fights with axes and machetes, and shooting with bows and arrows with the intent to kill with other men. The Yanomamo depend on themselves and their closes kin to help them out when dealing with these consequences. The Yanomamo also have no written language, precise number system, formal laws, or institutionalized adjudicators such as chiefs or judges which explains why their culture is the way it is. Western cultures differ from the Yanomamo culture because we are the exact opposite for the most part. In Western cultures we do have people that rebel and don’t care about any sort of consequences but for the most part, society abides by the rules and followes them. Written language, laws, judges, jails, etc; are all examples of systems the western culture has instilled into our society to prevent the lifestyle the Yanomamo live.

The process of revenge killing has a lot of factors behind it. Revenge is heavily based of gains and losses which a person in the Yanomamo culture heavily holds their decision on. In the Yanomamo population section is describes how the population is broken up into 12 villages where the men killed amongst each other. Recruitment to the Yanomamo status is on a self- selective bias. Being a non-unokais is not as respected as being a unokais because you have not killed and performed the ceremony. A man would rather be a unokais because other men do not go after them, the article states that out of the 282 violent deaths there are 153 living unokais. Unokais also may be given marital and reproductive benefits. It may be by force but there are higher reproductive rates within the unokais which is a direct relationship with revenge killings because that is how they attained their status in the first place.When a Yanomamo member kills, the tribe and surrounding tribes are aware of it and who they killed. Becoming a  unokais adds to one’s status make them more known. Because of violent killings, many people in the Yanomamo culture can relate to each other due to the loss of a mother or sibling. In addition the bigger the kinship bond is, the more likely the group is to take big risks such as raids.   

We need laws against killings because even though it is universally seen to be a bad thing that no one wants to do, there are people out in the world that do have psychological problems and will kill even though it is not an act out of defense. The article states that one must understand the complexity of kinship relationship and the role they play in their culture. I believe that statement was saying, you don’t know how you will act out because you are not in the Yanomamo shoes.A person not living in the Yanomamo culture cannot say "i would never act like that, i would never kill someone" because what you say and what you do is completly different when actually being in the situation. Laws provide protection that basically makes someone think twice before they act out in violence and kill.

Week 5

My interviewee was my mother, Renee Cooper-Wright. Born and raised in San Bernardino California, my mom is the second oldest out of her 5 brothers and held a close relationship with everyone in her family. My mother’s ethnic background is Africa American, and growing up she attended a Christian church every Sunday. Growing up my mom also had a step father who played an important role in raising my mom. My mother was very active in high school cheerleading, and playing softball also graduating a year early continuing her education into college. Till this day my mom still communicates with her family on the regular basis, having a strong relationship by making sure they are always updated with what’s going on in each other’s life. When I asked my mother who she communicated with the most she said everyone. She states that she talks to her mom and brothers equally. If she needed to turn to someone for help she would go to her mom and her brother Taylor. She would go to her mom because she has always been supportive, and she would turn to her younger brother Taylor because they are close in age, having a little bit of a stronger connection. My mom states that she didn’t really get to interact with her biological father’s side of the family once she grew older even though she held a healthy and strong relationship with her dad  as if her parents we never seperated. My mother’s family has stayed in the same area geographically, because her family likes to stay together. She quotes that they like to be no more than driving distance away.

Post interview:

I didn’t really experience any discomfort or awkwardness when interviewing my mom, but when I challenged some of her answers in why she would turn to the people she would for help she struggled to find a reason. Even my mom joked during the interview that these questions were a little personal; therefore interviewing someone not related to me would be a little weird. Although being an anthropologist you’re going to have to talk to people and ask individuals personal questions not knowing them sometimes even having that language barrier, making it more difficult.

For the most part my family’s closeness is very equal, having the exception that I and my family are a little close to my Uncle Taylors family. There is not a big age difference between me and my siblings so we all socialize on the same level and have the same attitudes towards each other. A commonality we share as a family is athletics that bringing us even closer together. The trend I see are small families but what one considers a small family might be a large one to someone else. There are no major ethnic difference in my family that would impact how we socialize or interact with each other.

I am very close with relatives on my mother’s side, but as years go by I grow farther apart from relatives on my father’s side. Although this is mainly due to the fact that my parents are separated and I live with my mom.  Connecting the dots, I am the closest to my uncle Taylor and his children (which are my cousins) and socialize with them the most out of anyone outside my actual family. I believe my mom has the most influence on decisions made within the family. She has the most influence because she is the mom; she pays the bills, cooks, etc. My mom has the most responsibilities and takes care of everyone therefore she has the say in what goes.  I would say family members that are married into the family are not treated differently, but if a family member has a girlfriend or boyfriend that we don’t necessarily like, they will most likely get treated differently. There is are different attitudes in my family based upon gender, for example, my brother a lot of the time gets special treatment because he is “the only boy” in the family. I’ve learned from this exercise is that the way we interact and come close to some family members or relatives than others is hard to explain. It’s easy to say “it’s just the way it is” and it’s hard to go back and find substantial reasons on why I might be closer to my brother than my sister or closer to one cousin than the other.

Subsistence & Economy

1 )Benefit of hunter gatherers: Hunter gathers are able to independently make choices for themselves. They are able to choose the conditions in which they hunt and the time when they hunt. This brought a separation of roles in the community while men hunted and women collected plant food. Hunter gatherers hunted in small groups and in result of performing such a physically demanding task most hunter gathers were in good shape. With such small groups, it was beneficial for hunter gathers to share their food and not waste it. Benefit of agriculture: agriculture was beneficial because the community is able to grow in surplus and have an abundance of what they wanted. Because of occasional abundance in food, trade became part of the agriculture culture. Agriculture meant many people hard to work together to keep whatever they were growing healthy and alive, this resulted in more jobs and responsibilities. Crops meant settling in one place unlike the hunter gathers that were always on the go. Agriculture was beneficial for the entire tribe or community as a whole rather than a small group like the hunter gathers.

2)Disadvantages of hunter gathers: The constant moving to hunt and feel a hierarchy of needs (thirst and hunger).  Every day is a hunt, so hunter gathers don’t have much time to put their time and efforts into other things. The search for food can become scare at times due to weather conditions, so there is always a small population that is constantly traveling because hunter gathers cannot feed a lot of people. Hunting animals can be dangerous, so hunter gathers are also putting their life at risk. Disadvantages of agriculture are solely relying on the environment to provide good soil. With a bad drought an entire crop can be ruined. This can result in an un-balanced diet, searching for other means of food. Harvesting also means taking up natural land and using it to grow crops therefore there is less land for the population to live on. With agriculture it is shown that there are more sicknesses and illness within the population because of the diet, lack of nutrition, etc. Also different forms of chemicals are used to kill pesticides that can become harmful to the population due to run offs.

3&4) Reading an article titled “Grain, disease, and innovation,” writer Razib Khan makes a statement that agriculture did result in the deteriorating of health. This deteriorating health was caused in an increase in infectious and dental disease and a rise in nutritional deficiencies. I believe some cultures made the transition into agriculture because it presented a better lifestyle for a family. Agriculturally, people were able to settle down and raise children and not be on the constant move like hunter gathers. Everyone lived in reliable circumstances with food, and now trade which helped the population economically.

1)      The direct relationship on the availability of surplus and the ability to trade is that the population has the capability to produce an abundance of something on purpose because they have the ability to trade. Basically saying that the population has to feed themselves but because they have the availability to produce more than what they need, they will do so because they have the ability to trade it and benefit from the trade.

2)      One benefit from trading would be building a relationship with whoever you are trading with, bringing people closer together. Another benefit would be an increase in money, or what you receive in return for the trade. 

 

3)      One negative of trading would be a separation in classes. Trading can become political singling other farmers out. Another negative would be clash in farmers with trade. Trading amongst different farmers can see it as loyalty and once that is broken I can cause tension.

4)      The development of agriculture brings a homeostasis to farmers are they can rely on other farmers when they are lacking different things such as tools. The relationship between the two is that they are meant to help out the population as a whole and benefit them in a positive way.