I read Turnbull's book back in the mid eighties, so may be remembering
incorrectly. But I don't think that the horrendous situation in Iraq
can be compared to the dissolution of Ik society. The Ik were forcibly
resettled from their mountain home by Idi Amin to a place God forgot.
As a mountain people, they had had a rich heritage of mythology and
ritual, but it was too connected to their mountain home to follow them
when they were relocated. Turnbull attempts to record exactly what the
Ik lost and to account for the seeming ease with which they let it go.
With mounting horror, he describes a descent into a hell where familial
co-operation proved counter productive, where friendship was dispensable
and where, finally, the only respite from loneliness was a silent
sitting together, punctuated with argument and derisive laughter.
Turnbull makes a valiant effort to remain a neutral observer, but his
horror and anguish are visible on every page. He dedicates the book to
the Ik whom, he says, he learned not to hate. It was the best he could
do, he says.
"They have made of a world that was alive, a world that is dead, a cold,
dispassionate world that is without ugliness because it is without
beauty, without hate because it is without love, and is without any
realization of truth even because it simply is."
Ashley Montagu, on the back cover, ventures to write, "An important
book, for it represents an anthropological field study of a unique
people -- a people who are dying because they have abandoned their
humanity." But it seemed to me that it was precisely Turnbull's point
that they have abandoned their humanity because, as a people, they are
dying.
I don't think what the Iraqis are suffering, while also horrific, is
similar. Family and community bonds seem strong. Mythology still serves.
My two cents, Ursula
Andy Amago wrote:
Serious question. How, if at all, would the current situation in Iraq compare to the Ik? (I know nothing of the Ik.) Iraq is pulled into many directions, Sunni/Baathists, Shiia with their Irainian connection, the foreign fighters streaming in from everywhere, the criminals. Civilians are targeted and killed regularly. Is there anthropological precedent for this? The USSR under Stalin had to be an anthropological oddity as well, for which they are now paying the price. I wonder if there's any comparison.
Andy
[Original Message] From: John McCreery <mccreery@xxxxxxx> To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Date: 8/5/2005 11:18:08 PM Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Inner Moral :Law
On 2005/08/05, at 18:12, JimKandJulieB@xxxxxxx wrote:
Okay. I give. I plead extreme stress as cause of my recent accident and my Mother's cancer. I cannot for the life of me imagine or think what "lk" is. Exactly *how* ignorant that is, I don't know yet. Some kind soul clue me in?"Ik" is the name of an African people studied by the anthropologist Colin Turnbull. His study _The Mountain People_ depicts one of the world's most dysfunctional societies, one which is very close indeed to Hobbes' war of all against all.
John McCreery
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