Citation
Maaker, E. de. (2006, March 30). Negotiating life: Garo death rituals and the transformation
of society. Retrieved from https://hdl.handle.net/1887/4544
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Publisher's Version
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Licence agreement concerning inclusion of doctoral thesis in the
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IXCONCLUSION
9.1 Introduction
I have shown how mortuary rituals are key events for Songsarek Garo. This particularly holds for the rituals that follow the death of a married person. Such a death poses a threat to the existence of the House that he or she belonged to, which can only be overcome if people who attend the mortuary ritual manage to replace the deceased. Whether a deceased person is replaced or not depends to an important extent on the commitment that the people who attend the mortuary ritual express towards him or her.
In the closeness or distance of the relationship that people trace to someone who died, they express how they rate the House that the deceased belonged to. This rating is also of consequence for the relationships that the distinct Houses that attend maintain among each other.
Below, I consider the transformation of the relationship between a deceased person and the House that he or she has belonged to during life. In a next section, I turn to the relevance of the dead for the relationships that are main-tained among Houses. I end with an attempt to look beyond the confines of the present study by outlining important changes that are imminent in the field-work area, and formulate some of the questions which these give rise to. 9.2 The implications of death for the deceased person
As long as the survivors remember the one who died, what might be called the person’s ‘social image’ continues to be acknowledged (§ 5.1). The ‘social image’ centers on the soul of a deceased person (§ 4.2). Such a soul manifests itself primarily in relation to objects that are associated with the deceased person.
The ‘social image’ of a deceased person is most marked at the time of the mortuary ritual. Initially, it depends to a large extent on his or her corpse. Following its disposal people create a wooden effigy, which in certain respects substitutes the corpse, and comes to be regarded as a bodily representation of the deceased (§7.6). In addition, the House in which the deceased person lived, as well as other Houses in whose courtyard cows are slaughtered for the deceased person, can erect wooden poles. These poles relate to the deceased person as well. A person who has died is also manifest in his or her personal possessions, such as clothes, bedding and non-heirloom jewelry.
eventually they vanish as well. While the representations of the deceased person lose their definition, the ‘social image’ of a deceased person becomes less clear. Eventually he or she is likely to be forgotten.
Following death, people need to induce the separation of the deceased person from the House that he or she belonged to. They should act in ways that are conducive to the installation of the deceased in the afterworld. Once established in the afterworld the deceased transforms into an ancestor, and has attained distance from his or her previous earthly existence. This allows him or her to be engaged by the House which he or she belonged to during life, as well as by other Houses.
The repositioning of a deceased person requires the involvement of various categories of people. Representatives of the House in which the death occurred have to induce the separation of the deceased from that House. Men who are not close relatives of the one who died, but live by marriage in the village of the deceased person, should arrange for the disposal of the corpse. Other people of designated categories can engage in specific ritual tasks as well. Certain men can hack the altars and the house, and certain women can cook a meal for the deceased person, and the dead who are about to guide him or her to the after-world (§ 5.5). The representatives of each House that attends a mortuary ritual are obliged to offer gifts to the deceased person. These gifts vary from symbolic amounts of rice and cotton, to valuable ones such as a cow, or a large sum of money. Particularly the valuable gifts are believed to determine the posi-tion which the deceased assumes in the afterworld.
In the ritual acts that people engage in, and the gifts that are in name of their House offered to the deceased person, they indicate the kind of relation-ship that they trace to him or her. It can indicate whether people position as a matrilineal relative or as an affine. The nature of the gifts that people offer reveals whether they regard the deceased as a close relative or a more distant one.
The gifts that people offer to the deceased person are at the same time meant for the House that he or she belonged to. Such a House depends on these gifts, the cows and the money in particular, to comply with the ritual obligations that the mortuary ritual imposes. A House in which a death occurs has to provide a lavish meal of beef curry and rice to all the people who attend. As significantly, it should offer gifts to them as representatives of the House to which they belong. Many of these gifts are made up of money and meat that the House of the deceased has received from the Houses that attend the mortuary ritual. If the deceased person was married, it is particularly important that gifts are offered to Houses of his or her kin group. Unless these Houses receive those gifts, they are unlikely to make an effort to replace the deceased person.
heirlooms (particularly brass gongs). These heirlooms are very important assets. They symbolize the bones of the person who died (§ 6.3.3). Given this relation-ship to the deceased, they can be considered as what Mauss (1966:8) has called “spirited gifts.” Such an heirloom embodies the relationship between the deceased person and the House that receives it. Most heirlooms are given to Houses that relate to the deceased person as that of a close mother. The more often a House receives in this capacity an heirloom at a mortuary ritual, the more often it is recognized as a close mother to someone who has died. The larger the number of heirlooms that a House is believed to own, the greater the apicality that is attributed to it. So, the apicality that is attributed to a House derives from the relationships that it maintains with distinct dead.
The status of a mortuary ritual depends on the number of people who attend, the cows that are slaughtered, and the number and kind of heirlooms that are offered. A mortuary ritual should be performed at a scale appropriate to the status of the deceased. The slaughter of two cows is substantial at the funeral of a child, but if a senior person has died it is not a lot. A mortuary ritual that is too concise is detrimental for the reputation of the deceased, as well as for the status of the House in which the death has occurred. A mortuary ritual that exceeds expectations boosts the reputations at stake.
Death transforms a person into an ancestor who can provide meat, money, as well as prestige. A deceased person becomes a “resource” (Bloch and Parry 1982:7). The capacity that the deceased person has in this respect is by far the greatest at the time of the mortuary ritual. In the weeks, months and years that follow this capacity gradually reduces, but it does not completely end until the social image of the deceased person has faded away.
9.3 Negotiating relationships among Houses
Hertz’s (1960:80) conclusion that the performance of a mortuary ritual inevi-tably results in “society” to “triumph over death” suggests that social order can be restored. I have shown that among Songsarek Garo death makes a reassess-ment or even “reordening” (Huntington & Metcalf 1999:6) of social relation-ships inevitable. Rather than encompassing procedures to neutralize death, Garo mortuary rituals emerge as major arena’s to redefine the relationships that structure society.
When Hertz (1960:29) proposed a processual approach to death, he referred to societies where great importance was given to second mortuary rituals. The temporality that determines the mortuary rituals of Songsarek Garo is much more encompassing, as it extends to successive mortuary rituals that are held by distinct Houses. Among the Garo, Houses relate to each other through deaths that occur years, or even decades apart.
effigy of the deceased person. In addition to caring for its own dead, a House can commit to the dead of other Houses. If a House offers a cow for a dead person of another House, it acquires the capacity to feed and engage with that particular deceased person. If the House slaughters such a cow in its own courtyard, it can plant a wooden pole, which relates to the deceased as well. Such a pole warrants the engagement of the deceased person on a more perma-nent basis.
A House that receives cows or large sums of money from other Houses when it is confronted with a death earns prestige, but is at the same time bur-dened with the obligation to repay these gifts to the Houses that offer them (§ 6.2). The cows and money are “gifts that oblige” (Bourdieu 2002:6). A House that receives a cow has to reciprocate it whenever a mortuary ritual takes place in the House from which it derives. Similarly, any substantial sums of money that a House receives from a House that does not belong to the kin group of the deceased person has to be reciprocated whenever such a House is con-fronted with a death itself. Money that is offered by a House that belongs to the kin group of the deceased should be reciprocated at the mortuary ritual at which it is received, while a House will also be expected to make a substantial gift towards the House that offers it at a subsequent mortuary ritual that is held there.
Given these obligations to reciprocate, a House that faces a death can ex-pect cows and large sums of money from Houses to whom it has made such offerings in the past. The commitment that people express towards a deceased person of another House, should result in the acknowledgement of the dead of the own House.
Each time that people come to know about a death that has occurred in another House, they have to assess the relationship that they trace to the deceased person, as well as to the House that he or she belonged to. If they decide to attend the mortuary ritual, they indicate the distance or closeness of this relationship in the kind of gifts that they offer. A close relationship reflects in the offering of a cow or a large sum of money.
If people face an obligation to reciprocate gifts to a House, they have to decide whether to comply with it or not. Rather than full compliance, people can do so partially. This implies offering money ‘to help,’ but a smaller amount than they are expected to. Instead, they can also decide to neglect an obligation altogether. If people partially or completely fail an obligation, that indicates that their assessment of the House in which the death has occurred has changed for the worse. Alternatively, if people offer gifts of greater value than expected, that indicates that they have began to give more importance to the House which the deceased person belonged to.
ritual how it assesses the latter’s relationship to the deceased person. Regarding the value of these counter gifts, its representatives are guided by what a House which such a gift is presented to has offered. The gift of a cow must be answered by a valuable counter gift (an heirloom, or a large sum of money), but such is not required towards Houses that have only offered a little money. The extent to which people engage in ritual acts that express commitment to the deceased person, such as the arrangement of a kram-drum, or the hacking of the altars and the house, influences the value of the counter gifts that need to be made as well.
The counter gifts that are offered by a House in which a death has occurred belong to two categories: ma•gual (§ 6.3.3-§ 6.3.5) and ukam (§ 6.4.1-§ 6.4.3). Ma•gual gifts can only be given to matrilineal relatives of the deceased; ukam gifts are not tied to a specific kinship designation. Whether a House qualifies for ma•gual or not is defined by genealogy, and will seldom be an issue. But the relative value of the ma•gual and ukam that are offered to distinct Houses, as well as the order in which Houses are served offers scope for interpretation. In the choices that the representatives of the House in which the death has occurred make, they express their assessment of the relationship that a parti-cular House traces to the deceased (§ 6.3.4).
A person who is offered a counter gift by a representative of the House of the deceased person may, or may not accept it. If a gift consists of money, people can reject it completely, or accept a smaller amount than that which is presented to them. An heirloom can only be accepted or refused. If people regard the value of the counter gift that is offered to them too little in comparison to the importance that they attach to the deceased person, their refusal will be a concealed demand for a more valuable gift. Alternatively, the rejection of a counter gift can indicate that people rate their relationship to the dead man or woman so distant that its acceptance is absolutely unwarranted.
The implications of the acceptance or refusal of a counter gift vary, depend-ing on the category that it belongs to. Nevertheless, on the whole, the closeness of the relationship that a House traces to a deceased person, and to the House that he or she belonged to, is negotiated between the gifts that are offered to the deceased, the counter gifts provided by the House in which the death has occurred, and their acceptance or refusal by the first House.
unable to answer these in one way or the other. Such an inapt utilization of resources would pose a threat to the ability of a House to perform up to expec-tations in relation to its own or other dead in future. However, the reciprocation of any gift at a subsequent mortuary ritual remains necessarily uncertain until such a death does actually occur, which can take years or even decades. Advancing gifts that create an obligation with other Houses is one thing, whether such debts will eventually be acknowledged another.
Houses that belong to a single matrilineage trace hierarchical relationships, that are modeled on mother-daughter ties. Genealogical lines are relatively unequivocal as long as they relate to the last one or two generations, but as soon as they are traced further back competing interpretations are likely to exist. A House that claims an apical position in relation to other Houses is likely to be acknowledged as such, as long as it is able to act up to its roles. However, if it becomes unable to do so (for instance because it is impoverished), and a death occurs in the apical House, that may lead subsidiary Houses to fulfill their obligations only in part, if they do not neglect them altogether. If the apical House is unable to hold a mortuary ritual that meets the expectations, such results in further damage to its reputation. This may lead people of subsidiary Houses to reassess their tie to it, and shift their prime loyalty to another House that they regard apical to theirs. The redefinition of ties among Houses implies a reinterpretation of the mother-daughter relationships which these are modeled on.
Kinship can only act as a viable model for relationships among people if it is at par with the way in which ritual, social and economic responsibilities are distributed. Among Songsarek Garo the reassessment and reinterpretation of House relationships is primarily accomplished by means of gift exchange in relation to the dead. These exchanges can be so authoritative, because the dead are subsumed in the most important of the gifts. Relationships among Houses are negotiated in the commitments that Houses make to each other’s dead. Only in relation to the dead, can people create and sustain relationships among Houses.
meaningful? What do the different kinds of food refer to? To explore aspects of funerals such as these, additional research is required.
9.4 Change and continuity
In this study I have focused on the performance of funerals in villages of West Garo Hills that are dominated by Songsareks. In these villages swidden culti-vation is very important as a means of subsistence. Throughout the hills swidden cultivation is believed to have been the only kind of agriculture that was practiced until in recent decades paddy rice fields and small-scale planta-tions gained prominence. Preceding the advent of Christianity, most Garo were Songsareks. The combination of animism and swidden cultivation, in the villages where I have worked, led Garo from elsewhere to regard these as “traditional.”
At the time of the fieldwork (the last part of which was done in 2003), significant changes were imminent in Sadolpara and surrounding villages, that had already taken place elsewhere in the Garo Hills. The extent of these changes differs throughout the Garo Hills. Significant disparities exist between villages in the hills, the plain regions at its fringes, and the semi-urbanized Tura area.
In many parts of the Garo Hills people have come to depend primarily on sedentary agriculture, with individual Houses obtaining inalienable rights to the land that these fields are located on (de facto, if not de jure). This has reduced people’s dependence on the titles to a•king land held by Houses that are attributed significant apicality.
In the parts of the Garo Hills with a Christian majority the significance of the apical Houses is also likely to have been reduced due to the adoption of that faith. Christianity has between the 1970’s and the 1990’s become the dominant religion throughout most of the Garo Hills (Burling 1997a, M.S. Sangma 1992). The abandoning of the Songsarek faith has meant that the religious responsibilities of Houses that are attributed considerable apicality have been negated. In Christian villages priests are usually people who are more literate than others. The position of such a person does not depend on membership of a certain House.
To what extent have these changes with regard to means of subsistence and religion resulted in a redefinition of the role of the House? In what respects have complementary or competing models of social organization gained promi-nence? And in what ways has people’s perception of the dead changed, and subsequently the significance of the dead for the living?
clothes and personal possessions of deceased persons continue to be disposed of with the corpse. These are still regarded as property of the dead. Never-theless, Christians tend to accord less prominence to funerals than Songsareks. They certainly do not practice the very extensive gift exchange that is central to Songsarek mortuary rituals.
According to my peripheral observations, among Christian Garo the impor-tance of Houses may have become less, but kinship continues to be at the heart of social organization. If mortuary rituals have lost at least some of their signifi-cance, how do people bring kin ties in balance with religious, economic and political concerns? It appears that at least in the semi-urbanized areas marriage rituals have attained a much greater prominence than they have in villages with a Songsarek majority. In the semi-urban areas marriages have come to include the offering of pigs under reciprocal arrangements. In relation to important people, this can involve several dozens of animals. This suggests a shift in the reassessment and reinterpretation of kin ties from funerals to marriages. However, the transformations that are taking place and the implications that they have for the constitution of Garo society are little understood so far.
