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| Title: | Seclusion, protection and avoidance: exploring the 'metida' complex among the Datoga of northern Tanzania |
| Authors: | Blystad, Astrid Rekdal, Ole Bjørn Malleyeck, Herman |
| Year: | 2007 |
| Periodical: | Africa: Journal of the International African Institute |
| Volume: | 77 |
| Issue: | 3 |
| Pages: | 331-350 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Tanzania |
| Subjects: | Datoga popular beliefs rituals fertility |
| External links: | https://doi.org/10.3366/afr.2007.0045 http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/africa_the_journal_of_the_international_african_institute/v077/77.3blystad.pdf |
| Abstract: | This article deals with 'metida' avoidance practices as they emerge in daily and ritual practice among the agropastoral Datoga-speaking peoples of the Mbulu-Hanang districts of northern Tanzania. The elaboration of the avoidance practices varies starkly between and within Datoga segments, but these practices are commonly particularly elaborate in connection with death or death-like events, and with birth or birth-like events. In the study area women may spend years of their lives with severe restrictions on their conduct in terms of movement and socialization. The authors argue that in making sense of such avoidance phenomena the strong influence of Mary Douglas's 'dirt' and 'pollution' concepts has hindered an understanding of the fact that the 'metida' seclusion does not only isolate substances perceived to be dangerously contaminating, but in similar ways secludes fertile and vulnerable elements in order to protect them. A Strathern-inspired transition to a focus on bodies as open and dynamic systems that mingle with other bodies in intimate flows or exchanges of bodily fluids may be fruitful in this context. The authors indicate, however, that incautious substitution of a 'pollution' concept with the concept of 'flows' may lead to challenges not entirely dissimilar to those that attended the employment of Douglas's concepts. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in English and French. [Journal abstract] |
