Totems

Among the schools of thought on religion that have developed within the purview of sociology, functionalism has been associated with Emile Durkheim. It describes religion with regard to the requirements of the society and the role it plays in their fulfillment. Religion is a dichotomous concept and tends to rely on the differentiation between two categories of the sacred and the profane. The system of mystical attachment with an object whether animate or inanimate, is actually the veneration of the society itself. Totemism finds its expression amidst the Australian Aborigines and the tribal in India. Shared core principles and value consensus are essential for the existence of the society in its cohesive form.  While religion reinforces the interdependence of individual entities within a society and has exhibited unifying characteristics, it also has been a source of division and a cause of friction.  Despite what may seem sometimes to be a dysfunctional role, religion and the functional status ascribed to it  continues to be relevant especially, in simpler or even in modern contexts and provides a basis for further comprehension.

The riddle is one of the least studied genres of oral literature and with this book I bring to your desk a recording of riddle act with active audiences. By focusing on the performer of the riddle, this study departs from earlier studies that presented riddles as short alphabetized lists of questions-and-answers.

In all of the primitive societies Totem means the sacred animal, which is believed that the community has derived from it. This believing, is named as Totemism, has become a system of belief in Central America and South Africa. According to Totemism someone is not able to injure any sacred animal, not able to kill animal without making required ritual, and not able to benefit from any of an animal. This animal, is consecrated, saves people and lives for their goodness as well. It is shown a great effort to continue the growth and generation of sacred animals in communities where Totemism understanding. There are religious beliefs and magical practices in essence behavior of making Totem, has become social trend in recent times. Public beliefs, developing and growing as good-luck and bad-luck and their accompanying practices around Turkish culture, have undergoing a transformation structural and functional maintenance in the form of retention behavior of Totem and making Totem. In this study it will be examined human beliefs, is transformed to good-luck and bad-luck in postmodern times, as examples in football matches. It will be studied the similarities and differences between belief of Totem and making Totem in point of view of players and supporters. It will be discussed magical connection, is set up between the attitude of making Totem and the result of matches in those examples that were mentioned. 
Keywords: Totemism, Totem, Making Totem, Good-luck, Bad-luck Football

Totem es una palabra de origen indio americano que nos significa un objeto de la naturaleza generalmente un animal, que en la mitología de algunos tribus salvajes se toma como emblema protector de la tribu y o del individuo, y a veces como ascendiente o progenitor. Para nuestra idiosincrasia mexicana, donde de acuerdo a la descripción que de un tótem tenemos, nos dice la tradición que: lo traemos y llevamos dentro, en lo que denominamos como nahual. Si, el nahual es ese maravilloso animal que habita en nuestro ser, que verdaderamente nos invade desde nuestra infancia y que nos lleva por una serie interesante de estados de humor, de diferentes personalidades, de extrañas actuaciones e inclusive, se aparece hasta en ese traicionero gallo que nos aflora al cantar haciéndonos pasar una gran vergüenza. Éste tema del nahual que tanto aprecio, ya ha sido tratado por mi en diversos artículos.

ÖZ
Tarih boyunca bütün toplumlarda kurban, insanın tanrıya yakınlaşmak için veya onunla bir şekilde iletişime geçmek için tercih ettiği yollardan biri olmuştur. Kurbana dair uygulamalar toplumdan topluma değişse de öz olarak aynı kalmıştır. Türklerin Müslüman olmadan önceki kurban anlayışı ve uygulaması ıdık/ızıh ile karşılanmıştır. Bu uygulama Sibirya’da meskun, Müslüman olmayan ve eski Türk inancını kısmen devam ettirmekte olan Sibirya Türkleri tarafından son zamanlara kadar devam ettirilmiştir. Izıh kurbanının bireysel olduğu kadar, toplumsal yanları da vardır. Aynı zamanda her kurbanda olduğu gibi ızıh kurbanının ekonomik boyutu da incelenmeye değer niteliktedir. Bu açıdan bakıldığında, adı geçen kurban uygulamasının son örneklerinin SSCB’de yapılmış olması, kurbanın tamamen ortadan kalkmasını hızlandıran etkenlerden biri olmuştur. Özelde Hakas Türkleri, genelde ise Sibirya Türklerinin inanç sistemlerinde kurbanın ortadan kalkması, onların geleneksel inanç sistemlerini de (olumsuz anlamda) büyük ölçüde etkilemiştir. Çünkü ızıhla ilgili uygulama ve ritüeller inancın değişik boyutlarını da içermiş, o ortadan kalkınca içerdiği inanca ait diğer unsurlar da yok olmuştur. Bu makale, Hakas Türklerinin tanrı ve ruhlarına adanmış hayvanlar olan ızıhlarla ilgili Hakas inançları ve dini törenleri üzerinde durmaktadır. Araştırma; arşivlenmiş belgeler, saha belgeleri ve yayınlanmış verilere dayandırılmıştır. Yazar, bu inanç ve uygulamaların, hangi yollarla aile ve kavim yapılarına, anlambilimlerine ve işlevlerine bağlı olduğu üzerinde durmaktadır.

Anahtar Kelimeler: Adanmış hayvan, ritüel, Şamanizm, tös, kabile, ruh, totem

ABSTRACT
Throughout history in all societies, sacrifice has been one of the man’s preferred ways to get closer to God or to communicate with him. Even though the practices on the sacrifice vary from society to society, they have basically remained the same. The Turks’ sense and practice of sacrifice before being a Muslim correspond to ıdık/ızıh. In Siberia, this practice has been continued until recently by non-Muslim Siberian Turks who partly continuing old Turkish beliefs. Izıh sacrifice has individual aspects as well as social aspects. At the same time, the economic dimension of ızıh sacrifice is worth to be examined as it happens in every sacrifice. When considered from this point of view, the latest examples of the above-mentioned practices of sacrifice performed in the USSR have been one of the accelerating factors of complete disappearance. In the belief systems of specifically Khakass Turks and generally Siberian Turks, the disappearance of the sacrifice has greatly affected (in negative sense) their traditional belief systems. Because the practices and rituals about ızıh have included the different dimensions of belief, and its disappearance has caused the disappearance of the other elements that belong to this belief. This article focuses on Khakass beliefs about ızıhs which are dedicated animals to Khakass Turks’ gods and spirits, and religious ceremonies. This research is based on archived documents, field documents and published data. The author dwells on in what ways these beliefs and practices depend on the structures of family and tribe, semantics and their functions.

Key Words: Sacred animal, ritual, shamanism, tyos, clan, spirit, totem

The subject of architecture is the subject that experiences architecture. Architecture is experienced in the way it is occupied. Hence the manner in which the body is choreographed through a building allows boundaries to be blurred, crossovers to occur and the architecture to unfold. The Museum of Anthropology in Vancouver by Arthur Erickson is a homage to otherness as it succeeds in crossing over to a space that as totemic as it is (ab)original.

Tenth Anniversary Issue. Vol.10 No.1 2007
(Author conversed with Arthur Erickson on the stage of the National Gallery of Canada March 5, 2007)

Myths  are  specific  accounts  of  gods  or  super-human  beings involved  in  extraordinary  events  or  circumstances  in  a  time  that is  unspecified  but  which  is  understood  as  existing  apart  from ordinary  human  experience.  Myths  are  also  accounts  of  the origin  of  societies  and  institutions  not  necessarily  subject  to rationalization.  A  totem  on  the  other  hand  is  an  animal,  a  plant or  any  other  natural object  believed  to  be ancestrally  related  to  a tribe,  clan,  family  or  group  of people  as  a tutelary  spirit.  The  aim of  this  chapter  is  to  critically  examine  the  existence  and significance  of  African  myths/totems  in  their  association  with the  environment  in  Tiv  society.  Emphasis  is  particularly  on  the Ikyalem  (green  snake)  myth  and  totemic  beliefs  such  as  dog meat,  Ibohough  (Gardenia  erubescens),  Ivervese  (Typlops punctatus)  and  several  others  -  associated  with  the  cultural history  of  the  Tiv  of  Central  Nigeria.  The  nature,  types  and reasons  for  the  formulation  of  myths,  and  how  the  environment pave  the  way  for  a  meaningful  existence  of  myths  in  Tivland  is also  examined.  This  research  is  timely  and  most  importantly problem  solving,  because  of  the  fast  disappearance  of  the knowledge  of  myths  and  totems  in  Tiv  society.  Data  for  this research  has  been  collected  through  In-Depth  Interviews,  key informants  and  Focus  Group  Discussion  with  elders,  traditional heads  and  other  people  with  good  knowledge  of  myths  and totemic  beliefs  in  Tiv  society.  In  addition  to  this,  secondary data were  also  acquired  from  existing  literatures  to  collaborate  oral information.

Se aborda el arte africano, particularmente en los pueblos Dogón y Massai como la paga a una deuda inconsciente, que se realiza a través del ritual; la deuda a saldar, es aquella que se fundó con el asesinato del Padre primordial, que devino en su representación simbólica que unificó  la horda primitiva a través de un Tótem que añora y recuerda a través del arte; el pueblo Dogón añora al Padre primordial a través de un Tótem abstracto, que ordena el mundo de manera cíclica, al que recuerdan a
través de rituales en donde sus manifestaciones artísticas aluden a geometrías y alusiones cíclicas; el pueblo Massai añora al Padre primordial a través de un Tótem guerrero, al que recuerdan a través de rituales en donde sus manifestaciones artísticas hacen referencia a la guerra, a la demostración de fuerza y vitalidad.

The following essay makes a route by diverse " orbits " of the imaginary. Orbits that have considered –from the notions of totem and taboo and the opposition between bricoleur and engineer—the negativity implied by the sense acts of corporal devoration and sexual practices. That is, totemism –as a regulation which includes the human beings in terms of sex and the animals in terms of food—outlines by way of thesis that these visions are pervaded by the nictomorphic imaginary regime, of the dark, of the black. As a consequence of that, and protected by certain scientism and a so-called human capacity (that would confront the animal and savage) several theories that intended to hide any colonial-Christian burden are set out. From this initial approach comes up a postmodern neo-totemism, in which the unlimited extension of the images produces an irreversible crisis in the regimes of the imaginary. Abstract: Resumen: