Society Types

From KstructIB

[edit] Hunters and Gatherers

Hunters and Gatherers : (Aborigines and !Kung San Bushmen)

Band : A group of hunters

These are societies which depend on hunting, fishing, or the gathering of wild plants to provide their basic food needs. The hunting and gathering economy demands extensive land, and permanent settlements are rarely possible as people have to keep moving whenever the local food supply becomes depleted. Possessions are limited to what can be carried, and dwellings are very simple huts and tents.

• Everyone in the band has a role
• They are egalitarian
• Comprehensive knowledge (e.g. bugs to make poison)
• Children socialised in all roles; involved in everything (except making poison - this is taboo)
• Gathering is done more frequently/ hunting is sporadic (depends on availability of game)
• Sex-division of rituals (e.g. Menstruation- women only, or healing ceremony- male healer; men and women included).
• Environment- harsh, drought affects their hunting.
• Sex-division of labour: Men- hunting/scraping skins Women- Gathering/ child rearing /dancing
• Availability of game depends on: - Availability of grass - Seasons

- Urban areas + industry getting bigger

• The increase in size of urban areas and industry in the areas

where !Kung live also causes less space, pollution, new types of people, and tourism (causes change).

Social Organisation

• Headman has formal authority over the disposition of a band’s resources and movements but has limited political power; symbolic leadership
• Once married, a person may join the band of a spouse and enjoy equal rights
• Bands made up of families
• Each band has limited territory
• They are exogamous
• Husband works for wife, when first married.

In settled Hunter and Gatherer societies, houses become larger and more elaborate over time. Surplus products from each household are passed to the chieftain, who gives a large feast (potlatch) during which he distributes gifts to those who need them. This redistribution encourages the division of labour.

Two types of division of labour in two different hunting-gathering societies. The division of labour in these hunter-gatherer societies is well balanced, and is organised to suit the needs of all of the members of the society. Every member of these societies plays a contributes in some way to the community throughout their life.

The !Kung San Bushmen, Kalahari Desert, South Africa- Although a large group, it is divided into small bands, with each band being made up of between twenty and sixty people and having its own territory, within which the members of that band have rights to gather wild vegetable foods. However, hunters of larger animals may step into the territories of other bands quite freely if they are in the pursuit of game. The !Kung are almost entirely dependant upon hunting and gathering for their food supply. These people hunt and gather daily, and return in the evening to distribute all the food that has been collected equally among every single member of the band. The labour division of the !Kung San is by gender and age. The people in the 20-60 age group provide the food, while the younger children and adolescents are not expected to provide regular food until they are married (most commonly between the ages of fifteen and twenty for the females, and about five years later for the males years later), and instead have their older relatives provide food for them. The older members of the band are well respected and have a high position in this society, and their role is to be the leaders of the camps, and to carry out activities such as ritual curing and making decisions. For many years after they stop hunting and gathering, the aged are fed and cared for by their children and grandchildren. The women between the ages of 20-60 are responsible for the gathering, and work for two to three days a week each, whereas the men devote about twelve to nineteen hours a week to getting food. The food gathered by these women provides the bulk of the total !Kung San diet by weight. A woman gathers on one day enough food to feed her family, i.e. her elderly and younger relatives for three days, and spends the rest of her time resting in camp, doing embroidery, visiting other camps, or entertaining visitors from other camps.

The men of these bands also collect plants and smaller animals, but their main contribution is the hunting of wild animals. The hunters work is not regular; men can often hunt regularly for a week and then do nothing at all for even longer than a month if times are bad. During these periods, visiting, entertaining and especially dancing are the primary activities of men.

The Aborigines, Australia- were divided into two main groups. Ninety per cent of these people lived on the coast, the northern tropical forests, and the southern and eastern woodlands, while the remaining ten per cent lived in the interior desert. Also egalitarian, they shared equally the tasks of daily living, especially the collecting of food. In this society, labour was divided by gender; all men were hunters, on land or sea, and the women’s role was to collect plant foods, shellfish, small animals and insects.

Although meat was an important part of their diet, the foods gathered by the women provided the majority of their food supply. These women were very well educated about the local area, and knew how to find and use an enormous number of different plants, both for food and for other things such as medicine or making bags. They also had other skills; such as in the desert, they would collect the seeds of grasses and ground them into the floor to made a kind of bread. Their skills even extended to the making of tools for particular purposes, such as bark dishes for everything from seeds to babies, and grinding stones for grass seeds.

The men’s role was to hunt game. They too made their own tools and weapons; the spear was the weapon most frequently used, but axes, clubs and various kinds of throwing sticks were also implemented. Their methods of hunting were few but often worked well. One was for the men to surround the animals together, or to scare them toward other hunters who lay in hiding. The most common way, however, was for one or two men to stalk an animal. The Aborigine men also had good tracking skills. Hunters used disguises to get close to their prey; for instance, some men disguised themselves as trees by holding up branches, and some smeared themselves with earth to stop the animal from being able to catch his scent.

The hunters were also very patient, as they often had to sit and wait motionlessly in intense heat in order to capture their prey. They also were familiar with the behaviour and ‘the ways’ of their prey. An example of this was in the way they used to trap emus. Hunters would lie on their backs and wave their legs in the air to catch an inquisitive emu’s attention and lure it towards them. They also used dogs to hunt animals such as the wallaby, or other methods, such as smoking out wombats from their holes in the ground.

[edit] Tropical Horticulturalists (Tsembaga Maring and Trobrianders)

Horticulture- a method of subsistence based on growing crops with simple tools and technologies

Slash & burn- a form of horticulture in which a plot of land is cultivated for some years and then is cut, left to dry and then burned, providing a little fertilisation and clears the plot of weeds. It is returned to after a period of time.

Swidden- a garden cultivated by the slash and burn technique.

• They are gardeners/farmers; they cultivate the land and grow their crops in ‘gardens’
• They live in the tropics (equator), also found in South America, Asia and Africa.
• They have territory; which gives rise to hierarchy/ status/ power/control
• Domesticate and raise small-food animals (chickens, pigs etc.)
• Live in big groups
• No chemical fertilisers used/ shifting cultivation & slash and burn used.
• They are sedentary and work more than H & G
• They are not egalitarian and warfare is common between villages over territory.
• Aggressive/male dominated

[edit] Pastoralists – (Karimojong)

Pastoralists- those who practice a method of subsistence based on herd animals

Nomads- Pastoralists who travel constantly throughout the year within a large area, to provide their animals with grazing land.

• Not sedentary; nomadic (usually move with the changes of the seasons)
• Two types: Desert- Northern Africa, Middle East. Pasture- Mongolia, South America.
• Small and large food animals (e.g. horses, camels, chickens, cows)
• Caravans; animals such as horses and camels used for transport
• Food- cattle, goats etc
• They cultivate, they can be sedentary for up to 6 months.
• Nomadic groups are organised into the wider community; i.e. they form alliances with other groups
  • marriage
  • trade and exchange
  • cattle herding
• They are reasonably egalitarian but there is stratification (hierarchy)_ based on age, gender, knowledge.
• Kinship forms the basis of society
• Society is formed around cattle/animals- rituals, duties and roles all closely related to animal husbandry
• They have a comprehensive knowledge of animal husbandry and their surrounding environment.