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2010 (Anthropology notes) |
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2010,
8 September. Village festas. For the village it is all an exercise in
anthropology. It really wants to say ‘this is our territory and we are in
festa, we are not sad or down under, and we want to show it to the whole
world’. So it is done with the loud pealing of bells, the letting off of
petards and by delimiting territory by way of putting up huge posters at the
entry roads to the village indicating that the parish is en fete, with
commercial ads included. Yet the message is always one of announcing to the
world that ‘it is il-festa tagћna,
we are in feastly mood, in our patch of land, so please, allow us to enjoy
it’. 2010,
16 August. Fireworks tragedy. Yet another fireworks explosion took place
on August 13, 2010 in the dead afternoon heat when fireworks were being
transported from the factory. Questions have been raised: it was the safest
factory and so nobody knows how it really happened except perhaps for the
sole victim; fireworks were being transported in full daylight among ordinary
traffic; whole areas were sealed off to put up the street traffic, thus
disrupting street traffic for two days. The most blaring incongruity occurred
on the same day when the parish priest was photographed complacently looking
at the petards, possibly at the factory itself, very neatly packed and each
one bearing a picture of Holy Mary. If anything, this was a very clear
connivance of the RC church with such activities. One possible raison d’etre
for fireworks is that firewroks are linked with the concept of political and
religious freedom and shows clearly that dominating the dark skies with
sparkling brightness is a human feat of anthropological and historical
proportions notwithstanding the dangers involved. 2010,
8 June. Heels. Why do women wear heels? It may be a matter of
elegance, or inferiority complex, or keeping standards. A tall woman wearing
heels is after elegance and femininity, while a short woman may be after reaching
height. Be is as it may, if both were to follow the dictats of elegance, the
shorter feminine would never appear to be any taller and the unnaturally
taller one would outdo all other persons, including males, in their natural
stature. 2010,
8 June. Colour language. Much is said by expressing colours in language –
see anthropolgy of linguistices and linguistic anthropology. In 2010,
8 June. Sign of authority. A teenage girl was allowed for the first time to
do her shopping putting her money in a purse instead of keeping the not or
coins in her hand or pocket as she usually did. She like the idea not so much
for its practicality, but rather more because it now gave her the opportunity
to display what she termed as having a “sign of authority”. I recall hard
times in my place where women used to go shopping holding purses in their
hands. I now realise that this was not only a practical means of keeping
money readily available, but also a public show of possession and, somewhat,
also of authority. 2010,
14 April. Buttoning up jackets. Men in high positions are frequently seen
buttoning up their jackets when they stand from a sitting position, usually
before shaking hands with a peer. The signal given is that of putting on
one’s full integrity and protecting oneself (covering chest) from peer who
may, in international relations, be an opponent. Recently, in a nuclear
disarmament conferrence, a woman wearing a jacket stood at the same time as
President Obama and was also seen buttoning up her jacket as he was doing,
both smiling at the procedure. Madeleine Albright was once also seen smiling
and passing a comment to President Putin while waiting for him to button up
his jacket before shaking hands. This smiling and joking is a frequent
occurrence signalling a weary procedure of politeness. 2010,
13 April. Celebrating a football win. I passed by a bar today,
decorated with festoons and baloons, where several males were gathered around
drinking beer from bottles and chanting rhythmic bawdy songs. No females were
seen around. The songs referred to sexual activities and female organs as
attributed to their opponents. It was all very macho and the males were
expecting their team to make a sure win, which they actually later did. This
lewd representation preceded watching the match. 2010,
10 April. Joined hands behind the back. Males, mostly, often walk
with their hands joined behind their back, signalling integrity, attention
and inactiveness. It can also be due to simply feeling relaxed and not
needing to talk, showing that at the time it is the mind that is taking
control over the body. Observations: A carefree lawyer has been seen to
change his attitude once he was called to the bench: when not carrying
anything in his hands, he dossed sombre clothes and
assumed a slow, pedantic gait with hands joined behind his back denoting a
pensive mood, self-control and tight-lipped observation of the world’s
goings-on, avoiding to be embroiled in disputations. The only place where he
can now enjoy his freedom of speech is from the bench, where a totally
different character emerges. A man, bent-over with
hands joined behind his back, was once seen trailing two upright talkative
women proceeding to some place unknown to the observer. Given the women’s
attitude, they must have been leading to an occasion which was rather
pleasing to them but for which the male (possibly the husband of one of them)
had also to attend. The male also felt uncomfortable joining the two women,
with one of whom he might not have possibly been closely (intimately)
related. He might also have been purposely left out and not invited to join
in by his closer partner either out of jealousy or knowing his lack of
attraction to the other women. 2010,
10 April. Crossed arms. They are
a signal that a person is holding himself still so that he can pay greater
attention to another person who is more important than himself. This is
usually seen while being addressed by a speaker, especially of highter rank
than oneself, or in situations where one is in a known, although unexpressed
minority. Such posture was once seen in a World Women’ Day, in a conference,
addressed by the Prime Minister, mostly made up of women but for two men who
were also present. The two men sat still, with crossed arms over their chest,
in a sign of utmost attention to the speaker and in defence of the majority of
women surrounding them who that day were in
possession. Two
tourists, a man and a woman, were seen moving uphill in an easygoing manner,
watching life around. The man had his hands, rather fingers, in his jeans
pocket in a sign of inactivity, while the woman was moving on with crossed
arms in a defensive position against the unkown. Other than giving out the
usual signs of inactivity, both might have also been finding some solace
(warming up) in their posture given their slow movement uphill. A woman
is known to be usually accompanied by other woman companions on her daily
evening visit to church and back home. One evening she was seen
unaccompanied, slowly returning home with crossed arms. This may have well
been a defensive position against any imaginary aggressor given that she was
usually accompanied. A sign of surrender to life events is also not
excluded. 2010,
28 March. Integrity postures. Often enough, high levels of integrity,
and even temporary glimpses of it intended to impress targeted persons, lead
to visible and identifiable common postures. The male person of integrity
normally adopts a slow and serene walk with joined hands behind the back and
a judgmental look, denoting crass physical inactivity but heavy mental
judiciousness much like that of a judge. Neck and other body twitches, both
male and female, similarly denote propriety, or an “as it should be”
attitude. These integrity twitches give out a sign of bodily discomfort and,
while not pining out for help, they transmit a sign of physical discomfort
and anxiety expecting to be accompanied with respect towards the
uncomfortable person sending them out. Integrity is also expressed in
dressing or standing and putting one’s ware in order. It is usally seen in
precise finger movements indicating exactness and propriety, such as in the
case of moving the flaps of a jacket close to each other without actually
buttoning them up. Usually, the small finger sticks out in these movements,
denoting delicateness and propriety. A person who had just been
appointed head of an institution was seen moving down the street leading to
the offices somewhat carefree, but was seen to do an integrity twitch and to
arrange his jacket as soon as he was past the first door to the building,
denoting a marked change of attitude. 2010,
7 March. Shrouding the dead. The best, most simple (colour and style)
clothes owned by the deceased are normally used for shrouding. A linen sheet
is otherwise used when certain parts of the body are disfigured and cannot be
fitted well with clothing. Religious habits are also used in syntony with
belief in afterlife and the heavenly abode the deceased is now heading for,
where, above all, he ought to distinguish his faith status. Averting the
visual cruelty of death is nowadays also practised by putting cosmetics on
the deceased’s face with non glamorous make-up to make the deceased look more
like still being alive and to enhance belief in afterlife. 2010,
7 March. Wayside memorials. They consist in squarish tablets put up by family
members in spots along the road where a fatal accident has occurred. Like
tombstones, these marble slabs signify conjoint durability (afterlife) and
coldness (death), display a photograph of the
deceased and give personal details such as name, town of residence and age.
They are usually adorned with flowers and cleaned regularly by close
relatives. The point of sudden death is considered to be the axis mundi for that person, or a point
of connection between heaven and earth. The memorial also signifies that it
was a human being (with immortal soul) who lost his life at that place, not a
stray, (inanimate) animal as often seen along the road. A wayside memorial, fixed
to a wall at a height of about 2 metres, was seen to attract attention on two
different occasions. Once, around the time of the anniversary of the demise,
two girls were seen sitting on a low wall some 3 metres opposite the slab,
praying the rosary. A couple of weeks later, two men, apparently incognizant
of the slab and unrelated to the case, turning around a nearby corner came at
near visual level with the memorial. Being of short stature, they saw it our
of the corner of their eye, immediately stopped in front of it, joined their
hands behind their back and, slightly lifting up their gaze, read its
contents in awe. Their instant identical motion, without mutual suggestion,
signified an innate human action of immediate submission and termination of
activity. This was demonstrated by the withdrawal of their hands from a front
(active) position to a backside (inactive) position, coupled with the
clasping of both hands together on their back in self-control against
undertaking any unnecessary activity. |