Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
clan, village, age-set, name-group, substance-group, etc. Each individual is thus
necessarily assigned to one or the other of every two groupings - either male or
female, married or unmarried, young or old, initiated or not, and so on, according
to culturally and historically specific recruitment principles.
8
Each one of these
pairs or moities forms a
unit
. Without the woman, for instance, the man is nothing
but
half
of a unit, because man and woman together form the fundamental binary
unitary value.
Dualism is also an important structuring resource for Xavante daily practices
and activities, as expressed in the group's bimodal economic pattern. This pattern
is characterized by an alternation between the practice of slash-and-burn agriculture
around a large base village, supplemented by hunting and gathering done on
a predominantly individual basis. The village can also disperse into hunting and
trekking bands for part of every year. The treks are always organized on the basis
of collective male groups, according to the composition of every household, age-set
membership, and so forth (Maybury-Lewis 1979).
Figure 5.6. Xavante woman carrying flowers and fruits from the savannah to the Idzô'uhu
Village, 2002.
It thus makes sense that dualism should also be the main feature of the Xavante
socionumerical
system. It is socionumerical because numbers are named after
social relationships. Number names follow the dialectical organizing principle,
expressing a fundamental difference between odd and even numbers. The Xavante
socionumerical system traditionally extended itself up to 6, perhaps up to 8, and after
that it was
ahödi
or many.
