The Perception Of Totem And Taboos
Essay Preview: The Perception Of Totem And Taboos
Report this essay
Totem and Taboos have been the ideal notion of understanding the psychological
analysis on how civilization began. A book translated by James Strachey includes Sigmund Freuds written essays that addressed the idea of the differential entity from the totemic/exogamy systems and taboos. The names of the essays that address the concepts are: “The Horror of Incest”, “Taboo and Emotional Ambivalence”, “Animism, Magic and the Omnipotence of Thoughts”, and “The return of Totemism in Childhood”. In each essay includes the teachings and beliefs of which Sigmund Freud hypothesized. Totem is a rule of an animal (or human) and more unlikely a plant which is related to the whole clan. The word taboo derives from the Polynesians with two different meanings. To most of us, it means sacred and on the other hand, it means strange, treacherous, or dirty. In Polynesian terms, the word taboo (noa) is rather contradicting meaning general or common. Sigmund Freud explains these two ideas and theorized that society and humanitys individual emotional being are in relation to totem and taboo. People who have read Freuds work would believe his ideas are preposterous but I get to differ. Although Freuds ideas may be uniquely questionable I have slowly accept his ideas, on the other hand I do believe that society would spurn Sigmund Freuds ideas due to its sole difference upon civilization today.
In the first essay, “Horror of Incest” explains tribal fear of incest. In this fear derives the concept of the totem system, which regulates the avoidance of committing incest. He explains the life of tribes in Australia (known for being drastically uncivilized) and how the totem clans have produced systems in which incest would be prevented through strict rules. This system would involve group marriages where people would call each other brother and sister regardless of immediate relation, and children calling their parents mother and father while referring to their parents friends as aunt and uncle. It was subdivided into groups or clans who would be named after its totem. Clansmen were obligated not to harm their totem and to avoid eating them. At times, the tribal people would perform tribal ceremonies to celebrate their totems.
The totem person was native through their individual given class. It would be inherited by either their mother or father. The totem was the foundation of their social status and was obligated to stay faithful to it. If a person was caught having relations with another person of a different clan they would be severely punished. This would relate to another term called exogamy, which involves marriage restriction and incest. Although exogamy is far from having the same meaning of totemism, it has eventually connected itself to it. Totemism and exogamy was related in a way that it would restrict a man from having sexual relations with not only his real family but of those women who were in his clan, which he referred to as blood-relatives.
This would also prevent group or clan incest. The whole idea of totemism and exogamy was to prevent incest. This would later lead to something that would attract the attention of all psychoanalysts.
Psychoanalysts have then inferred as Sigmund Freud did that incest is highly related to the mentality of neurotic patients. They believe that incest was a big impact on the way people experience neurotic behavior (anxiety). The savages who formed this totemism were highly uncivilized yet they were able to come up with a system that would avoid incest. This is proof that the clans system derived from the temptation of committing incest in the first place. If there was no temptation of pursuing it there would have been no restrictions made to prevent it. Somehow these savages had some emotional guilt that led them to interpreting incest as something of an abomination. However this principal is currently shammed by most people who would likely be skeptical of being unconsciously similar to the savages. This is probably because society has grown since the days of the Australian tribal totemism systems and is far passed thinking of incestuous urges consciously. Society has grown so civilized that it may not be able to accept that the root of neurotic is the cause of unconsciously desiring incestuous relations.
Consequently I believe that society will never be able to accept this theory.
The taboo on the other hand is a little different. A taboo can refer to a man or idea, since a man is highly capable of violating a taboo, which would consequently make him a taboo. He would be referred to as a taboo for his actions would influence others to do the same. On the other hand a person who does not violate a taboo may be a taboo himself or herself because they too can influence others to be defiant and feel ambivalent. There are three ideas of taboos in which Freud explained in his second essay “Taboo and Emotional Ambivalence”. The first one is the treatment of enemies; the second is the taboo upon rulers, and taboo upon the dead. These three include restrictions for people to follow. In relation to mourning people were restricted to uttering the dead peoples names. A tribe from Africa called the Masai would change the name of the dead person immediately after death. The tribe would also perform ceremonies to keep the spirit of the dead away or keep them under control. Although they performed special ceremonies it was if they were treating the dead