Book Review: Cosmos by Carl Sagan

Cosmos

by Carl Sagan

      Humans are story tellers. I’m not sure who said that first, but Joseph Campbell made a career out of demonstrating how mythologies transmit information about how to live in the world using personified symbols in narrative structures. But mythologies were products of pre-scientific societies. Ever since scientific understandings of the universe have become more prominent after the Enlightenment and the Renaissance, science has faced opposition from people who cling to the mytho-poetic and religious world view. But when the symbols of myth are revealed to be untrue in a literal sense, empirical realities fill in the void and renders the myths to simply be existential security blankets at best and fumbling attempts at explaining the unexplainable at worst. On second thought, maybe mistaking them for historical truth is a bigger problem. But mythological and religious explanations for our existence remain powerful forces throughout human societies. It seems they can’t be killed. And science is looked upon with deep suspicion and even scorn despite its high levels of success in improving our understanding of our nature at it deepest levels.

One suggested explanation for this epistemological split is that science doesn’t rely on stories to transmit information whereas the mytho-poetic framework does. In the latter case, the narrative framework of myth and religion limits the ability to apprehend and analyze information that is encountered outside of its own narrative boundaries. Science also has limitations, but it also takes into account those limitations and it attempts to correct for its own shortcomings as a system of data collection and interpretation. Therefore it has been more successful in improving the human condition, but possibly less successful at addressing deeply felt human needs for connection and meaning.

Enter Carl Sagan, one of the most ambitious and successful public relations spokesperson for science in our time. What he does in his classic book Cosmos is bridge the gap between story telling and scientific explanation by relating science-as-story to make it more relatable to your average person on the street.

Every story needs a beginning so the obvious starting point for a history of science is with the Big Bang. Sagan was an astrophysicist so there is a heavy emphasis on outer space and Earth’s place in the totality of everything. As it turns out, the sun we revolve around is a star smaller than average and it should humble us to know that Earth is only a small fraction of the size of the sun. Other topics covered are the definition of light years and how they explain why it is currently impossible to travel out of our galaxy, the Voyager probes sent to explore other planets like Saturn and Jupiter, the existence of black holes, and the search for extraterrestrial life especially in relation to the SETI program that Sagan was a part of.

Going in the other direction, Sagan explains the structures of molecules and atoms, the breaking apart of which leads to smaller and smaller subatomic particles all the way down to quarks and what may be beyond those if we ever get that far. While humans are not at the center of the cosmos, and it is extremely short sighted to think that we are, we do hold some kind of undefined place in a vast expanse that, as far as we know, is both infinitely small and infinitely large at the same time, extending in all directions at once. The limits of everything are far beyond the comprehension of our tiny little brains which have evolved as a mechanism for survival, not for accuracy or truth.

While humans may not be the center of everything, we are the center of humanity and so far, we are the only creatures we know of that would be considered of higher intelligence. I know the cynics out there will scoff at that idea in the face of massive amounts of human stupidity we confront on a daily basis, but Carl Sagan wasn’t that much of a pessimist. In fact, he celebrates humanity despite all of its faults. His exploration of the human race begins with an analysis of DNA and the theory that a comet crashing into Earth spread stardust across the world that eventually became the building block of all organic life.

Through the course of evolution, humans developed language and abstract reasoning which led to mytho-poetic explanations of physical phenomena. Rather than condemning early humans for being primitive, superstitious, and pre-scientific, he actual lauds them as being the first scientists because they tried to use reason to explain empirical observations. When ancient people looked at the constellations and saw hunters, lions, bears, and fish in the patterns of stars, they were trying to explain what they saw. And that kind of inquiry and explanation is the foundation of science. Likewise medieval astrologers became the first astronomers and alchemy evolved into the science of chemistry. Rationalists in our day can dismiss these things as naive occultism and pseudoscience, but Sagan gives credit where credit is due. Along with these pseudosciences came great advances in mathematics and medicine while great scientists like Newton, and Copernicus came directly out of these practices. Sagan presents the history of science and the rise of complex cultural systems as keys to understanding who we are as a species.

Some critics have dismissed Carl Sagan because they believe he gave too much attention to speculation and imagination. But Cosmos sufficiently counters this claim, especially in the way that Sagan writes about contacting extraterrestrial life. Such an endeavor is not just about where to look for life outside of Earth, but also about how to look for it. It is only through speculation about what we don’t know that we can begin to address problems like how to communicate, what to do in case other life forms are either friendly or hostile, or whether we can even recognize another life form if we find one. While the chances are statistically high that some other life form, possibly even an intelligent life form, exists somewhere in the multitude of galaxies, chances are just as high that such lfe forms would not resemble us in any way whatsoever. This is because they would have adapted to a different set of environmental conditions.

Sagan also argues that imagination is a necessary component of science because that is the most effective way of questioning threats to our existence. If we can imagine contacting an extraterrestrial life form that turns out to be hostile, we can hopefully predict how to deal with it beforehand. Also imagining a nuclear war should be sufficiently scary enough to make people take precautions against having one. And yet, politicians and businessmen around the world have made no strides towards nuclear disarmament. Sagan writes that the search for life outside Earth and its eventually discovery may be the only thing that can unite all of humanity in a way that would prevent us from destroying ourselves once and for all.

But he isn’t entirely optimistic either; when looking at the European conquests and the way those explorers reacted to their discovery of indigenous peoples, the results were violent and disastrous subjugation. We could be dumb enough to do the same thing to other life forms or, even worse, contact could result in them doing the same to us. His pessimism doesn’t stop there. Sagan writes about how science began to flourish in ancient Greece on the island of Ios, but when the standards of living increased, the intellectuals took an unfortunate turn towards mysticism and religion that almost entirely killed off scientific inquiry. Something similar happened with Mediterranean Muslims during the Middle Ages. The Muslims were once at the forefront of science, philosophy, and education. But when scientists made discoveries that contradicted things written in The Holy Qu’ran, Islamic fundamentalists turned on them and banished science and Aristotelian logic. With the current rise of religious fundamentalism and nationalistic bigotry on the right and anti-science attitudes in the social justice movements of the left, we are in danger of falling back into another Dark Ages. So far AI and digital technology don’t appear to be helping us in developing a more rational human society. These speculations relate back to science because it is through the imagination that we can contemplate possible scenarios for the future and hopefully save ourselves from the mutual destruction which appears to be the direction we are headed in now. Speculation in the service of science actually is part of the scientific process so long as it addresses problems derived from empirical data.

If Carl Sagan intended to bring science to the masses by writing about it as a story, he is only partially successful, at least from the standpoint of a conventional story telling narrative structure. He tends to wander from one subject to another in a non-linear fashion. He writes chapters that start in outer space and then take you directly to medieval politics or theoretical discussions on quantum mechanics. The pieces don’t always join together in ways that make sense. In the chapter on Ionian science and its degeneration into Pythagorean and Platonic mysticism, he transitions into an unrelated discussion on astrophysics and the limitations of our current technology. In another chapter, out of the blue he brings up whales and then abruptly transitions into a discussion about the challenges of interstellar space travel. At a distance, you could maybe draw a connection between our inability to understand the whales’ systems of communication with the potential problems we might have in communicating with life in other galaxies, but the connection isn’t firmly made in the text and may not even be Sagan’s intended meaning.

As such, if story telling is Sagan’s intention, this book works more like a collection of short stories than a novel. One reason conventional stories work is that they draw the reader into a series of related cause-and-effect events that culminate in the resolution of a conflict. The action is driven by a character who, in in some good stories, may embody abstract ideas, moral clarity, or exemplary behavior. But science, in its pursuit of ultimate truth, deals in abstractions, methods, logic, observation, probabilities, and other things that are taxing to the minds of people with little interest in technical discussions about the messiness of reality and our inevitable shortcomings in comprehending it as a whole. There are reasons why science is difficult to communicate using mythological language and those reasons are part of the problem that P.R. people for science face in a world full of non-scientific thinkers. But that doesn’t mean that Sagan doesn’t clearly articulate the ideas about science he wishes to communicate. He does and he does so better than other authors on this sbject. There is no reason to dismiss this book even though by literary standards it is flawed. If this issue concerns you, then Bill Bryson’s A Brief History of Everything might be worth checking out; it is basically the same book, but handled by a writer with more of a literary flair and his characteristic dark but warm sense of humor.

Cosmos is a treatise on entry level science. Its intention is to arouse curiosity in the mainstream because the mainstream is so preoccupied with entertainment over anything else. Since Carl Sagan, and the TV show that accompanies this book, have made inroads into pop culture, it succeeds at least on that level. It’s clearly written and easy to follow, but probably the best audience for this is young people who don’t know much about science and want to learn more but don’t know where to start. For people with more education and scientific knowledge, there won’t be much here that they haven’t already learned. For what it is, it’s a great book but if you have an undergraduate level of scientific knowledge it’s little more than refresher material. On the other hand, it serves as a reminder that the scientific quest to learn the ultimate truth about everything ny using sound and consistent methods is a large part of what makes us human.

 

Book Review & Critical Analysis: Cuban Counterpoint: Tobacco & Sugar by Fernando Ortiz

Cuban Counterpoint:

Tobacco & Sugar

by Fernando Ortiz

      If you mention Cuba, the first thing most people will think of is revolution, politics, Fidel Castro, and Che Guevara. The second thing would probably be music and dancing. After that, I’m guessing another strong association with that Caribbean island nation would be cigars. There might be a few other general associations like beaches, palm trees, jungles, Ernest Hemingway, and rum. Somewhere in there you might also find sugarcane. This is significant for Cuban anthropologist Fernando Ortiz since the titular essay of his book Cuban Counterpoint: Tobacco & Sugar is about defining his country’s national identity through its most prevalent economic industries.

While Fernando Ortiz is considered to have been Cuba’s premier anthropologist to date, the titular essay really isn’t a work of social science. The point of it is to compare and contrast Cuba’s sugar and tobacco industries in order to define the national character of the Cuban people. From the start it is clear that he believes tobacco to be the ultimate symbol of Cubanismo and that he has a less favorable view of the sugarcane industry even though it has been the backbone of Cuba’s economy for at least two centuries.

His argument is provocative. Tobacco is a native plant to Cuban soil and its cultivation and use was a part of the Taino and Arawak indigenous people’s culture before the arrival of European colonialists. Tobacco is grown in dry riverbeds called “vegas” and even though some cigars are manufactured using machinery, those of the highest quality are hand-rolled. Thus, making a good cigar is a craft or an art form, as he puts it, more than an industrially produced commodity. Cuban cigars are also a source of national pride because they are popular worldwide and considered to be the gold standard of smokes by connoisseurs. That is why if you tell someone you have a box of habanas or puro cubanos they know by association that it is a box of the best cigars you can buy. Even cigars from neighboring countries like the Dominican Republic or Jamaica don’t compare. The use of the words “habanas” and “cubanos” to mean cigars proves semantically just how closely people outside the country associate cigars with Cuba.

Sugar, on the other hand, is just sugar. While the quality of tobacco can range from putrid to a champagne-like elegance, there is little to no difference once sugar crystals have been processed and granulated into the white powder we find in any grocery store around the world. Sugar that comes from sugarcane is also indistinguishable from that produced by sugar beets. People generally don’t associate sugar with any particular nation the way tobacco is strongly associated with Cuba. Sugarcane was also imported by colonialists and is therefore, not native to the Caribbean. Sugarcane cultivation and the manufacture of processed sugar is also the primary reason so many slaves were imported into Cuba. This is a source of shame to Ortiz who also uses this as a chance to take a swipe at capitalism since it requires that laborers, be they slaves, indentured servants, or wage laborers, get treated as commodities for production rather than as human beings. You could easily counter this claim by arguing that communism does the same thing. Thus that problem probably has more to do with the technology of industrialization than it does with whatever politico-economic system that utilizes it.

So as it stands according to Fernando Ortiz, tobacco is far superior to sugar when it comes to symbolically defining Cuba’s national identity.

I’ll be honest at this point. I have no emotional investment in this subject. I have no ancestral ties to Cuba, but I find the history and culture of the nation endlessly fascinating. I do appreciate sweet foods, but I gave up smoking long ago when I became wise enough to admit that I am afraid of getting cancer. So the argument over whether tobacco or sugar is more suitable for defining Cuba’s identity is of no importance to me. I could weigh the pros and cons of Ortiz’s reasoning, but I don’t feel its necessary to expend my mental energy on the matter. It reminds me of John Milton’s rhetorical argument that the moon is superior to the sun. But Milton’s essay on that matter is a great work of art. I’d say that Fernando Ortiz’s essay is a great work of art too. It is fascinating to read from beginning to end and, even if you don’t agree with his opinion, or even care all that much, it does say a lot about Cuban history and society. It certainly serves as a good introduction to anybody who wants to learn about tobacco or sugar cultivation and how it relates to Cuban culture.

Some of the ideas might be outdated though. Ortiz argues that tobacco is masculine and sugar is feminine in a way that relies on traditional gender stereotypes. Even considering those stereotypes, I find his reasoning on that point to be vague and insufficient to make his case. And his attempt at defining national character leads in the direction of essentializing in a way that would get labeled problematic by hyper-sensitive social theorists today. I have some problems with the concept of “essentializing” to beging with, but this is not the place to take that up. The use of outdated words like “Negro” “retarded”, and “Mongoloid” will also be jarring to some, but this essay was written in the 1940s when those words were considered neutral terminologies. Any offense you might naively take will also be undercut by that fact that Ortiz was a strong proponent of racial equality and the bulk of his work was done to document the cultural practices and patterns Afro-Cuban people. Hopefully someday more of his works will be translated into English.

The following essay in the book is of some interest up to a point. Ortiz examines the cultural uses of tobacco in pre- and post-contact indigenous societies. Although he starts by examining the practices of the Taino, Arawak, and Carib peoples, the scope extends farther into what we now call North, Central, and South America. The cultural uses of tobacco fall into four main categories being the social, the medicinal, the ritual/spiritual/religious/shamanistic, and the individual/leisure uses. He examines the history of how tobacco was ingested and the paraphernalia used as well as the social etiquette and praxis. He also examines whether or not tobacco was the only substance used in these ways. Various other writers have labeled tobacco and nicotine with contradictory terms like “stimulant”, “depressant” amd “hallucinogen”. Thus he analyzes evidence from colonial, missionary, archaeological, and pharmacological sources to figure out if some naive scholars in the past, not paying careful attention to details, mistakenly designated plants other than tobacco as tobacco. A lot of the essay is also devoted to disputes amongst anthropologists and archaeologists over what tools and paraphernalia were used for ingesting tobacco smoke and snuff. I feel like those debates are of more interest to specialists in this field and not so much for the general reader. His arguments aren’t hard to follow though and if you want to learn about the reasoning process and problem-solving methodologies in the social sciences, this is an accessible place to look.

The remaining essays are about the history of sugarcane cultivation and the effects of the Industrial Revolution on mass production and consumption of sugar. Again, these essays are well-researched and easy to follow, however, they feel more like filler than anything substantially related to the supposed main theme of the book which is Cuba and the importance of tobacco and sugarcane to its culture and economy. These filler essays stand on their own but stray too far outside the subject of Cuban national identity to be worthwhile in the larger context of the book. If you are solely interested in the subject of Cuban culture, you might want to consider reading the titular essay only and skipping the rest of the book. If you’re interested in the history of tobacco and sugar from a global perspective than the whole book will be of value. I fall into the former category, not the latter, so reading a lot of this felt like a chore even though all the essays are well-written.

Cuban Counterpoint was written at the end of World War II when the post-colonial era was taking off. Cuba was politically turbulent at the time, but it was also at the peak of its pre-Revolution cultural development. At that time the island nation was asserting itself internationally as a tourist destination and a producer of goods for international trade. In this context you can see how the subject of national identity and character could be of importance to a social scientist like Fernando Ortiz, especially considering his high academic stature then and now. Still, the book feels a bit dated. The negative health effects of smoking tobacco have caused it to be associated more with lung cancer than Cuba. Processed sugar is now associated with obesity, tooth decay, and other diseases. The tobacco and sugar industries plus communism should have made outsiders’ perceptions of Cuba inherently bad yet the country’s reputation is still alluring. Maybe it’s time for Cuba to choose a new symbol to redefine its national character. I’d choose their music to be a symbol of that identity if it were up to me (it’s not). Who couldn’t be enticed by those beautiful curvaceous women in tight skirts and stilleto heels defying the laws of gravity while dancing to mambo, rumba, charanga, salsa, cha cha cha, or Latin jazz. And if this book is dated, it still can evoke fantasies of sipping rum in a shack on a beach, palm trees swaying in the wind while clear waved waters wash ashore as you relax with a burning puro, its tip dipped in honey, while the silvery blue smoke you exhale disperses in the Caribbean breeze. If we lived in a just world, cigar smoke wouldn’t be harmful. But we don’t. Your dreams, however, won’t hurt you. Let those dreams keep you alive. 

 

Book Review: Voice Of the Leopard: African Secret Societies and Cuba by Ivor L. Miller

Voice Of the Leopard:

African Secret Societies and Cuba

by Ivor L. Miller

     The general public is familiar with African diaspora religions in the Caribbean and South America via popular culture. Most of what people think of in association with Voudou (voodoo) or Lukumi (Santeria) involves skulls, drums, zombies, and black magic. It isn’t hard to see how film makers, artists, writers, and musicians have appropriated elements from these religions since mystical and sometimes dark imagery can easily capture the imagination. But not so many people realize that African diaspora religions are complex social systems that exist within broader historical, socio-political, and economic systems and thereby have function and meaning as groups within those larger systems. One of the lesser acknowledged African diaspora religions is Abakua, a secret society that began in Cuba in the 19^th century and continues to thrive today. Voice Of the Leopard, by the American anthropologist Ivor L. Miller, gives a broad overview of this group and the role they played in Cuban history.

When West African people were brought to Cuba as slaves, their religious practices accompanied them. While these religions were mostly forbidden in the United States, slave owners in places like Brazil, Haiti, Puerto Rico, and Cuba allowed them to flourish, mostly because they relieved some psychological pressure that built up under the living conditions of slavery. This may have worked to some degree, but the number of slaves who escaped to live in isolated communities in the Sierra Maestra mountains, called “cimmanrones” or “maroons”, proves their situation was not one to envy. Nonetheless, Cuba was unique in that the colonialists allowed slaves to earn and save money which they could use to buy their way to freedom. That is one reason for Cuba having a small population of free African criollos who survived by working as craftsmen. According to members of Abakua societies, there was even a smaller number of West African immigrants who voluntarily came to Cuba to give slaves guidance on how to safeguard their religion in the new land. The accuracy of that belief is of no importance in this book because that is what the Abakua believe and it influences how they see the world.

Using linguistics and cross-cultural comparisons along with historical records, Miller has traced the origins of Abakua back to the Cross Rivers region along the border of Nigeria and Cameroon. In that part of Africa, fraternal societies called Ekpe have existed since times long before colonialism. The language, rituals, and mythologies of Abakua and Ekpe bear too many similarities to be coincidental. This is especially true because Abakua initiates have their own language that is only spoken with Abakua members and, although time and distance have caused morphological changes, it is essentially the same language spoken by Ekpe initiates. A similar linguistic analysis has been used to trace the origins of Roma (Gypsy) people to Rajastan in northern India, a significant discovery since that ethnic group existed for centuries without knowing precisely where they originated. The mapping of the human genome has recently justified these ancestral histories.

Miller gives some brief explanations about what Abakua members do. He starts by analyzing what kind of a group they are. He prefers the term “initiate society” over “secret society” since membership in the group is not kept secret, only their beliefs and practices are. Readers hoping for a detailed explanation of those beliefs and practices will inevitably be disappointed since such information is only transmitted to initiates who have risen through s series of degrees and offices to widen their scope of Abakua. Some basic information is shared with the public though, for example various motifs from the Ekpe/Abakua mythology, their transmission of historical narratives through call and response chanting done to the accompaniment of drumming and dancing, and the presence of the fundamento in every juego (lodge). The fundamento is the ceremonial centerpiece, or omphalos, of each juego. The original is said to have been brought over from Africa by the aforementioned voluntary immigrants from the Cross Rivers region who taught the slaves how to practice Abakua in Cuba. The Abakua juegos are open to men only. There is no discussion as to whether Abakua is actually a religion or not. From my limited knowledge of the society, I prefer to think it doesn’t fit easily into any category, containing elements of religion, magic, political secret societies, social clubs, and mutual aid fraternities.

Abakua juegos serve various functions. One is that of a mutual aid society. Dues collected by each juego can be used as health or life insurance for each member. Money is also collected for charity or educational funding. During the 19^th century, illiterate slaves who joined Abakua could receive some education they wouldn’t get elsewhere. At a local level, lodges provided a means for upward social mobility in a colony where such mobility was limited for free Afro-Cubans and usually unobtainable for slaves. Membership in a lodge required the mastery of knowledge, commitment, and responsibility. Money could also be raised in an Abakua society to help a slave buy their own freedom. Plus, the hierarchical nature of the juegos gave motivated individuals a means for moving up a social ladder thereby growing and maturing as people.

Abakua was also important for historical reasons. Since juego activities were secret and only accessible to initiates, they served as near-perfect places for clandestine political activity. Afro-Cubans who sought for an end to slavery were deeply committed to the two Cuban Wars of Independence and used their gathering places for planning military and political strategies. The Independence leader and national hero Antonio Maceo was a member of Abakua for this reason. Freemasonry also had a strong presence in 19^th century Cuba and pro-Independence Masons collaborated with Abakua to fight against the Spanish crown. The Wars of Independence also led to the establishment of Abakua juegos for both white and Chinese members who were dedicated to the Cuban nationhood cause.

Other topics covered by Miller include the reasons why Abakua has not spread further geographically than it already has and the influence Abakua has had on Cuban music and art. In the latter case, Abakua drum rhythms have a strong presence in the syncretistic styles of mambo and son. The chapter covering music is not highly detailed so deeper insights into the subject should be looked for elsewhere. In the former topic, the explanation is that strict and complicated protocols for establishing new lodges has made it nearly impossible for Abakua to spread much farther than the regions surrounding Havana and and the nearby city of Matanzas. If you want to join, your only option would be to move to Cuba. Miller also writes about recent contact and collaboration between Ekpe initiates in Nigeria and Abakua members in Cuba who have traveled to Nigeria recently with assistance from the author who is an Ekpe initiate himself aside from being an anthropologist.

Since the practice of Abakua is kept secret and only accessible to members, this book is mostly historical in nature. However, some of their ceremonies, including dances, drumming, and call and response chanting, are publicly accessible since some ceremonies are done in the yards of juegos were neighbors can observe them or hear them from a distance. I speculate that this is done as a means of proselytizing and arousing the curiosity of potential recruits. Despite not providing much information about the inner workings of this society, its influence on Cuban history is a fascinating story to learn about, especially because mainstream historians have given so little space to Abakua’s role in achieving independence and building national identity. Unfortunately, there is nothing said about Abakua in their relation to the Cuban Revolution of 1958 and Fidel Castro’s subsequent dictatorship. Abakua survived throughout all of that so there must be something to be said about them during those times.

Voice Of the Leopard gives a good overview of Abakua and its history. It serves the purpose of demonstrating how such a secret society can maintain social stability and mental health in the midst of a chaotic and ever-changing world. By giving members a sense of participation in history and having roots in an antiquarian culture, a direct line between past and present is maintained which contributes stability to the community. In this way, Abakua has acted as a positive force in Cuban society. Up until recent times, America had societies based around common interests in much the same way that the Cubans have Abakua. In 2025, fraternal orders like the Masons or the Elks, hobbyist groups, bowling leagues, labor unions, social clubs, and other societies in which people create social bonds and a sense of belonging are mostly on life support if they still exist at all. As a result of the internet, people spend more time looking at screens on laptops and cell phones then they do in the presence of others. As a result, the rates of loneliness, depression, mental illness, and suicide have spiked, especially among young people. It would be interesting to research what the rate of these ailments are in African diaspora religions. My educated guess is that they would be far less frequent than in American society. Maybe a few more groups like the Abakua could save us from ourselves.

 

Book Review: Skulls To the Living, Bread To the Dead by Stanley Brandes

Skulls To the Living, Bread To the Dead:

The Day Of the Dead in Mexico and Beyond

by Stanley Brandes

      In the 1990s while living in Albuquerque, New Mexico, I went to a Day Of the Dead celebration. On the day after Halloween, a crowd gathered in the neighborhood of Barelas. Many wore skull masks or homemade calavera costumes. Some just wore ordinary street clothes. Some solo musicians strummed guitars while others beat on congas. There were kids and adults, people of all ages, ethnicities, and economic classes. Political activists and artists showed up and camera crews from the local TV stations were there to make 30 second clips to be shown at the end of the 6:00 news. The crowd formed into a procession and circulated through the main streets of Barelas. It was fun and inclusive. Nobody was turned away or told to leave. Occasional cars would pass by, the drivers honking their horns to arouse cheers from the procession, but there were very few people standing on the roadsides watching, something unusual for a parade. But the emphasis was on participation more than observation. After winding through the neighborhoods a few times, the sun began to set and the procession found its way to the Mexican-American community center where information booths were set up and vendors sold sugar skulls, tamales, and hot chocolate.

This way of celebrating the Day Of the Dead is controversial to some. Purists might think it is an inauthentic reinterpretation of a holiday that doesn’t respect Mexican traditions. Less conservative people might say it is an educational opportunity that raises awareness of the Chicano community in America and brings people of other backgrounds into friendly contact. The anthropologist Stanley Brandes, in his study of the Day Of the Dead Skulls To the Living Bread To the Dead, explores the way this most famous of Mexican holidays has changed in practice and meaning over time.

While doing fieldwork in the town of Tzintzuntzan, set in the Mexican state of Michoacan, Brandes began seeing changes to the way the Day Of the Dead, which should properly be called the Days Of the Dead because it is celebrated on November 2 and 3 on All Souls Day and All Saints Day, was celebrated. More people from outside the town were coming in for celebrations and a commercialized aspect was being introduced. This was in the 1960s. To his surprise, the local people welcomed these changes. So he set off to explore the origins of the holiday, how it changed over time, and what it has become today.

Brandes starts off with the common belief that the Days Of the Dead originated with the pre-Conquest indigenous people under the Aztec empire. After checking all the written records in the documented history, he did find evidence that those people had festivals commemorating death, but he did not find any direct connection to the Days Of the Dead. In fact, in most of its aspects, including sweet foods, altars, and the symbol of the skull, it appears to have been imported to Mexico by the Catholic church. In its most traditional form, people built altars in their houses, cleaned ancestral graves, gave sugar skulls to children as gifts, and attended an overnight mass in the cemetery. It was a small affair that mostly involved the family and not much else.

During the Mexican Revolution, the artist Jose Guadalupe Posada used iconography from the Days Of the Dead to make scathing commentaries on the politicians of his day. This brought the holiday into greater prominence both nationally and internationally. By the 1970s, the Mexican government realized how the Days Of the Dead could be used to promote a stronger cultural identity for Mexicans and attract tourists for the commercial benefit of the country at both local and national levels. As Halloween became more popular in Mexico and elements of the two celebrations merged, some Mexican intellectuals started questioning the meaning of the Days Of the Dead and how it related to Mexican national identity.

The controversies get more heated as Brandes’ studies take him north of the border into the United States where he examines the use of the Days Of the Dead as an educational tool. A whole passage is dedicated to how the holiday is presented in public schools, children’s books, and displays in libraries and community centers. He goes a little too in depth here for my tastes. He examines some of the Latino community’s reactions including controversies about what is presented and how. From my own point of view, which has nothing in common with anything the author says, these types of educational programs either overly-glorify aspects of cultural diversity or underwhelm the observer with watered down versions of cultural differences. From my own American perspective, educational programs teaching people about a holiday like Thanksgiving can be misleading. Books and displays make it look more festive than it really is and present history as if it is an important part of every American’s life. The truth is, most Americans can’t explain what Thanksgiving is supposed to be about let alone how it originated. Most people see it as a time to eat like pigs and care little about its intended meaning. Thanksgiving dinners with my family tend to be less than exciting and often not much different from other dinners we have together with the exception of what we eat. Likewise Mardi Gras, as celebrated in New Orleans, is a huge party where lots of people get blind drunk, but very few of them have any idea of what the celebration is actually about. But a survey of children’s literature on these holidays would give an entirely different picture. Community educational displays are also often weak and shallow without providing much in the way of experience or insight; they often come across as little more than scraps of information in a society already super-saturated in information and advertising. My whole point here is that attempts at teaching cultural and national traditions should be looked at with a critical eye since the people producing them mostly fail to give an accurate picture, usually little more than a small taste, of what they present. This applies to the educational representations of the Days Of the Dead just as much as to Thanksgiving and Mardi Gras.

There is little wonder that Chicano community leaders and their supporters raise questions about the authenticity of how the Days Of the Dead are promoted and celebrated in the United States. Brandes examines the whole spectrum from an activist group, at one extreme, that tries to create a Days Of the Dead celebration that is entirely composed of pre-colonial indigenous cultural motifs and from there to a working class neighborhood fiesta with music, dancers, theatrical performers, and vendors that seeks to build bridges between communities while fostering a positive image of Chicanos to those of other ethnicities. Beyond that is a Days Of the Dead art fair in the Mission District of San Francisco that is organized by a Korean woman and has displays that only marginally touch on the themes of the holiday. This is further complicated by the fact that the Mission District used to be a Mexican and Central American enclave that has since been gentrified and now is a predominantly Korean and Asian neighborhood. Brandes analyzes how each festival along this entire range generates its own controversies and disputes about representation and the Mexican-American identity in the USA. This is important as the Chicano community is growing and they need to establish some sense of identity in a sometimes hostile cultural environment where your average citizen knows nothing about Mexican culture aside from tacos, undocumented immigrants, and drug cartels along with whatever caricatures and cliches are found in popular culture.

Brandes finishes the book with a discussion on how the Days Of the Dead prove that Mexicans have a uniquely jocular attitude towards death. He contrasts Mexicans with other Western nationalities who he claims are more serious and less accepting of death. I have to say I disagree with him strongly on this. While I’m not qualified to speak on behalf of Mexican people, I can say that Americans are not any less casual about imagery representing skulls, grim reapers, ghosts, or other things we consider to be macabre. Horror movies are wildly popular as are haunted houses that are staples of carnivals and amusement parks, not to mention the ones that crop up at Halloween time. Jack o’lanters are ubiquitous in the Fall. Skulls are common on t-shirts, album covers, and tattoos. People tell jokes about death and it is a common subject for songs especially in the punk, goth, and metal genres. There was a musical trend in the 1950s called “death rock” in which teenage crooners sang about losing lovers in car wrecks. Death and murder as plot devices are ever-present in movies and TV shows. True crime is a popular genre in literature. And doesn’t he even know about the Grateful Dead? That cult band has done more to spread Days Of the Dead imagery around El Norteno since the 1960s than anybody else with their t-shirts and album covers. The list can go on forever. We see so many skulls and crossbones in America that it hardly even registers with us. Nobody is sad, disgusted, offended, or disturbed when somebody wears a Misfits t-shirt in public. We have a casual attitude towards death too; it just manifests in a different cultural style. Brandes isn’t the only anthropologist I know of who has made this erroneous claim about Mexico either. Leave it to the academics to be completely unaware of their own culture, the one they live in. I guess fish don’t comprehend the water they swim until they reach dry land.

While the conclusions aren’t infallible, Skulls To the Living Bread To the Dead provides a useful history and cultural analysis of Mexico’s most famous holiday. It forces us to question what cultural authenticity really is and also draws attention to socio-political issues embedded in representations of traditional practices. Stanley Brandes doesn’t come to any strong conclusions, but he thoroughly provides enough information to give the reader direction in how to think about Mexico and the Days Of the Dead.

 

Book Review: Devoted to Death: Santa Muerte the Skeleton Saint by H. Andrew Chesnut

Devoted to Death:

Santa Muerte the Skeleton Saint

by H. Andrew Chesnut

Over the last two decades, interest in a skeleton saint has grown in both Mexico and Latino communities north of the border in the U.S.A. In fact, the popularity has begun to spread outside of Latino communities too as different ethnic groups become familiar with each other. This saint is called Santa Muerte and it has also begun to attract media attention because of its popularity with Mexican drug cartels and other people associated with the underworld. What the media doesn’t tell you is that Santa Muerte’s appeal is wider than realized and in fact most of her devotees are ordinary people without any nefarious intentions. Anthropologist R. Andrew Chesnut sets the record straight in his study of this fledgling religious movement in Devoted to Death: Santa Muerte the Skeleton Saint.

After stating his intention to save the Santa Muerte community from negative publicity, Chesnut examines the history of this saint. He starts by discussing the Uto-Aztecan death goddesses. But he is more convinced that the image of Santa Muerte was not part of pre-Conquest culture and actually arrived with the Spanish invaders and the Catholic church. They brought over images of the Grim Reaper which sprung up during the Black Plague. The intention was to scare the people of Mexica into submission, but secretly some people were secretly putting the Grim Reaper on altars and making sacrifices to him for favors. Similar traditions have proliferated in Central America and Argentina, but these involved a male Grim Reaper and appear to be unrelated to the current phenomenon of Santa Muerte. In recent years, due to syncretism with African diaspora religions like Candomble, Vodou, and Santeria, Santa Muerte has emerged from hiding and taken on a new life.

In Mexico City, a grocery store with a shrine to Santa Muerte started attracting so much attention that the owner began offering monthly prayer and worship services complete with mariachi bands. Another chapel called the Temple of Death opened and the cult has been snowballing in membership ever since. Chesnut uses the word “cult” in the Latin sense of the word “cultus” which means “religious community” and in no way applies to the more current usage indicating authoritarian, high control groups led by charismatic leaders.

Each chapter in this book is about the different ways Santa Muerte is worshiped and petitioned for favors with some commentaries on who her devotees are along the way. Whether people are making offerings for money, work, love, or protection from harm, most ceremonies are relatively benign and innocent. Offerings of candles, incense, food, and drinks are common. The most controversial gifts include alcohol, cigarettes, and marijuana. Animal and human sacrifices are mostly the stuff of urban legends and media sensationalism.

While there are Santa Muerte devotees from all walks of life, a quick survey of the book reveals that most of them are working class mestizos like truck drivers, small business owners, police, and prison guards. There are, however, some upper class and educated followers too. Some are lawyers, some are teachers, and some are celebrities or corporate businessmen. A couple people the author interviews are goths with black clothes, nose rings, and tattoos. It should be considered that some people from a counter-culture like that might be pre-disposed to being receptive to a saint whose appearance is that of the Grim Reaper in women’s dress. And while Chesnut does rightfully downplay the media’s negative association of Santa Muerte with criminal activity, he does provide a chapter detailing the appeal of Santa Muerte to drug cartel members and organized crime gangs since altars to the Mother of Death are commonly found on their premises during police raids.

While the author does provide a lot of details regarding the practices and culture of the Santa Muerte cult, he doesn’t do any heavy theorizing and there is only minimal explanation as to why it has grown in popularity. He does identify some causes though. One is that Santa Muerte is available to everybody regardless of class, gender, ethnicity, or position in life. Santa Muerte is also amoral in a way that has caused the Catholic church to condemn her; she is believed to do favors for good or bad purposes without passing judgment on the devotee and that is why doctors as well as drug kingpins can approach her. Santa Muerte has a strong presence in the ambient popular culture too. She appears in novels, TV shows, horror movies, song lyrics, tattoos, and t-shirts. Finally, Santa Muerte is believed to be more powerful than other saints, especially those approved of by the church.

Chesnut doesn’t explain much beyond that. You are left to your own thoughts as to the proliferation of the Skeleton Saint. Personally I feel that the issues of power and condemnation from religious leaders are a part of the appeal. The skeptic in me that doesn’t believe in magic says that there is an equal statistical chance of any saint, spirit, or deity delivering what a devotee asks for in exchange for ritual offerings. There would be a random chance of obtaining the desired outcome no matter who or what is prayed to. But the perception that any one of these supernatural entities is more powerful than the others is what matters to the believer. Therefore as more people align themselves with the cult of Santa Muerte the more stories of successful rituals will circulate socially making it appear that she is the most powerful of them all. Meanwhile, people are more likely to remain silent about the ceremonies that fail creating a socially derived illusion that Santa Muerte ceremonies have a higher rate of success than they really do.

There might also be a subversive element in the worship of Santa Muerte. Since she is not recognized by the church, interacting with her could be a way of rebelling against traditionally accepted authority. This trend might be wider than Santa Muerte since the author points out that Evangelical Christianity is currently catching up in popularity to the Catholic church while African diaspora religions and secular humanism are also making inroads into Mexican society. This would indicate that Mexico is in a time of social transition and attraction to Santa Muerte is one manifestation of that change in answering to people’s needs.

The issue of power might also say something about who follows Sants Muerte. Occupations involving criminal activities on both sides of the law are extremely high risk. Life is just as dangerous for prison guards as it is for prisoners. People who work in construction, poorly regulated factories, the sex industry, or the taxi business are risking their safety every time they go to work. An unemployed man on the verge of going homeless would have extreme levels of anxiety. Santa Muerte, the most powerful saint, often appeals to those whose lives have put them on the front line of danger or despair so it would make sense that they would petition and desire to placate the representative of death to bless them with the gift of life. As for more mundane concerns like winning a poker game, passing an exam, or attracting a lost lover back, those desiring such favors might as well turn to the most powerful saint available. Why turn towards weaker saints? But otherwise the widespread devotion and rapid spread of Santa Muerte’s cult might be an indication of growing social anxiety. If magic is about power and control, than the growing popularity of a religion involving magic might indicate that wide sectors of society feel as though they have little or no control over the circumstances of their lives. While that lack of control could be present at any given time throughout history, the beginning of a new cultural practice addressing that anxiety might be a sign that the old ways are failing and the younger generations are searching for something more effective. Widespread anxiety might be commonplace, but changing cultural practices could indicate that a precarious rupture with the past might be happening.

R. Andrew Chesnut’s intentions here are to clear up misconceptions about Santa Muerte and advocate for the variety of people who are attracted to her rising popularity. It is written for the general reader. This is good because clarifying the beliefs and practices should encourage people to tolerate something about Mexican culture that they don’t understand. It’s too bad Devoted to Death doesn’t go deeper into an analysis and explanation for what is happening on both the south and north sides of the border though. It would be nice to have heard a professional anthropologist’s views on what this says about Mexican society. He just leaves you hanging to draw your own conclusions.

Anyhow, the next time you see a veladora decorated with an image of Santa Muerte, probably beside candles depicting the Virgen de Guadalupe, in a grocery store, a market, or a bodega you can ask the people selling it how to do a ritual. My experience with Mexicans and Chicanos has been that they are usually eager to talk about their culture with non-Latinos like me if you show a sincere interest. You might open some doorways, make some new friends, and maybe, if you’re lucky, you might even be blessed with good fortunes from the Skeleton Saint herself.

 

Book Review: People Of the Peyote edited by Stacy B. Schaefer & Peter T. Furst

People Of the Peyote:

Huichol Indian History, Religion, & Survival

edited by Stacy B. Schaefer & Peter T. Furst

      If you’ve ever been to Mexico, you might have seen some brightly colored yarn paintings on black backgrounds or other crafts in similar styles using pointilist technique or depicting animals or other objects in ways that might be considered mind altering or psychedelic. You would see these in markets or tourist trinket shops. Sometimes they are on display in art galleries. Chances are you were seeing the creations of Huichol Indians whose vibrant artwork is known for its depiction of mystical and shamanic themes. Their cultural and religious traits are largely intertwined with the use of the hallucinogenic peyote buttons found in the desert. People Of the Peyote, edited by Stacy B. Schaefer and Peter T. Furst, is a collection of essays about the Huichols, mostly centered around their shamanic traditions and religious practices and how they influence their community.

This book starts off with the definition and history of the Huichols who are a sub-branch of the Azteco branch of North American Indians. They live in the Sierra Madre Occidental region in the states of Nayarit, Jalisco, Zacatecas, and Durango. Culturally and geographically they are close to the Cora people and linguistically they are connected to the Pimas of southern Arizona. These early chapters give brief information about pre- and post-Conquest interactions with the Spanish and mestizo population of Mexico. Their social, political, and economic organizations are introduced as well. One chapter is written by a German traveler from the 19^th century named Konrad Preuss. Despite not being proficient in anthropological fieldwork techniques, his writings are highly valued because they provide some of the only accounts of Huichol religion and ritual from that time. Unfortunately, his writing isn’t very good. Another chapter lists the botanical and pharmacological properties and applications of peyote and other plants in Huichol medicinal culture. Also a theory is asserted that the Huichol’s use of peyote, while still being considered traditional, is actually of recent historical origins in their shamanic practices. These early chapters are sometimes difficult to read due to both poor writing, a serious problem for authors of history, as well as an abundance of technical terminologies and analyses that alienate a layperson. Fortunately, the book gets more accessible and interesting as it goes along.

As the more interesting parts of the book begin to pick up, we get some good chapters on the shaman’s role in society. The Huichol word for shaman is “ma’akame” and, as difficult as it may be fore an English speaker to pronounce, it is used throughout the entirety of the book. The mara’akame’s purpose is to organize and lead ritual practices. It gets more complicated than that though since the Huichol rituals are tightly intertwined with social structures and hierarchies, familial roles, seasonal calendars, and agricultural practices. A missing or altered piece of these interrelations can throw a whole village out of balance so the position of mara’akame is one of great responsibility. He also holds the place where the human and spirit worlds interact so of course that is a position of great power and influence. Aside from community rituals, the mara’akame also leads people on ritual peyote gathering expeditions and pilgrimages to the sacred mountain where it is believed that peyote originated. The psychotropic effects of peyote ingestion are also examined from neurophysiological and spiritual perspectives. The authors make it clear that peyote use is taken seriously by the Huichols for creative cultural purposes and that recreational indulgences in the drug is strictly forbidden.

Huichol mythology gets an interesting examination. They have a complex web of deities, elemental spirits including a pantheon of malevolent wind spirits, and animals. They have two deities superficially corresponding to Santa Maria and Jesus Christ although they don’t appear to play a major role in religious practices. Deer occupy a central place in the theoretical aspects of the mara’alame and they believe in a unified trinitarian spirit made up of deer, peyote, and corn which they are different manifestations of the same element. One way to think of it is the way water can hold the three forms of mist, ice, and liquid. This might be hard to grasp for people outside the Huichol culture, but to them it is obvious. This is the challenge of encountering a culture other than your own and that is where anthropologists come in for the sake of explaining this insider knowledge to outsiders. Otherwise, the ritual deer hunt is a sacred practice and a mara’akame who takes peyote can speak with living deer or deer in the spirit world. Huichol religious rituals are re-enactments of mythological stories so the mythology can be seen as an instructional guide to religious practices.

One standout chapter describes the practice of a rare subset of Huichol mara’akame, one that practices shamanic lycanthropy. Through ritual and peyote use, these shamans interact with wolves in the spirit world, eventually learning how to turn into wolves, and communicate with them for guidance on living in the human world. In the older days of anthropology, especially during the colonial era, anthropologists could be guilty of exoticizing the people they studied, especially by over-emphasizing the parts of other cultures that appear bizarre due to being the most different from the culture of the anthropologist. That accusation could apply here to this chapter, but it is probably unjust since the author makes it clear that this is not an ordinary practice among Huichol mara’akame. She didn’t write this essay to dazzle or entertain her audience either; it is a serious attempt at explaining a practice that may baffle anybody outside Huichol society.

By the end, the essays address the issue of how Huichols interact with the modern world, the market economy, and the problems these cause while they try to preserve their traditional culture. More and more, they are forced to interact with mestizos, some of which respect them and some of which don’t. Being at the margins of the economy makes them subject to exploitation for cheap labor. The importation of alcohol and guns are also causing disruptions. An even bigger problem is how they should deal with outsiders coming into their villages. Once the Huichols lived in remote mountain farming communities; now the building of new roads has resulted in busloads of clueless tourists gawking at them like exotic animals and burned out hippies showing up and demanding a shamanic spiritual experience that sometimes results in them running around naked and screaming at the sky until they pass out. Patronizing new age types are showing up hoping to find the crap that Carlos Castaneda wrote about in his fake anthropological books with the fictional character Don Juan. Such intruders are a nuisance and the hospitable Huichols have difficulty knowing what to do with these louts. They have reacted to all this by retreating deeper into the privacy of their own traditions and minimizing their contact with outsiders.

Aside from the previously mentioned difficulties of reading the opening chapters, my only real complaint about this book is that it says very little about day to day life in a Huichol community. Almost every essay is about the religion, mythology, or shamanism of the mara’akame and how they relate to the community as a whole, but it doesn’t give any real sense of what it would feel like to be born into this culture or to live in it for a lifetime. While the things written about in this book are fascinating and written about with sincere interest, sometimes it is worth hearing about the mundane parts of a society too since those also play a major part in holding a society together. My guess is that those mundane details are left out for commercial purposes. The essays were written and collected in good faith by professional anthropologists whose intentions are clearly enthusiastic so I’m assuming they questioned this as they pieced the book together. But very few people read books, an even smaller amount read anthropology books, and of those that do, most of them are probably casual readers who want to read about mysticism and drug experiences without much concern for the people being studied. Book publishing is a business and sometimes authors need to make compromises in order to send something to press. But otherwise these are excellent essays, written with care and clarity so for what it is, it is a great book.

People Of the Peyote leaves me with one last thing to consider. Given that I, and many others, can’t accept the beliefs and practices of the Huichol people as objectively true or as scientific facts, does that mean that I have to reject those beliefs in totality? The anthropologists demonstrate how important their rituals are in maintaining and regulating their society and also how any disruption in these rituals can cause lasting damage to the Huichols who practice them. Should it be considered that scientific objectivity should always be supported as the primary goal of human knowledge? What if believing in something that isn’t real is necessary to maintain social order? But it’s difficult to believe in something once you’ve admitted that it isn’t factually true. As of now, I can’t answer these questions. But what I can say is a big thank you to the anthropologist friend I had in Albuquerque who recommended this book to me after I returned from a trip to Mexico 30 years ago. Good luck Dr. S.T. wherever you happen to be these days.

 

Book Review: Corn Is Our Blood by Alan R. Sandstrom

Corn Is Our Blood:

Culture and Ethnic Identity In a Contemporary Aztec Indian Village

by Alan R. Sandstrom

      “That’s a weird name for a book,” said the bookstore cashier where I purchased Corn Is Out Blood by Alan R. Sandstrom. Of course, things that are unfamiliar are thought of as weird by default. And there is nothing more unfamiliar than a culture you know nothing about. Besides, the title is an idiom and, linguistically speaking, an idiom is a metaphorical phrases that makes no sense when translated into another language. Only those fluent in the language and culture will understand what it means. That is the value of the social sciences and, in this case specifically, anthropology. The author of this book did fieldwork in Mexico for the purpose of being able to explain a foreign culture to those from outside that culture. His intention is to prove that, contrary to what outsiders say, the people he studied are making effective rational choices in the maintenance of their ethnic identity given the living conditions they are faced with.

Sandstrom spent several years off and on over two decades with Nahua Indians in Mexico located in the Amatlan region of Veracruz state. The Nahuas are contemporary descendants of the pre-colonial Aztecs and speak Nahuatl as their language. Very few of them are fluent in Spanish. They mostly survive by subsistence farming, largely maize and beans, although they sometimes take surplus produce to market. Through language, religion, and clothing, they maintain a fiercely independent ethnic identity that is remote from the dominant mestizo identity of most Mexican citizens. Loyalty to their traditions and identity has caused many mestizos to call them irrational, especially because they live so precariously, being marginalized socially and economically, when they could join modern society and live more comfortably with greater wealth. Sandstrom therefore desires to prove that their supposedly irratoinal clinging to tradition is actually a strategy for survival in a host culture that is hostile to them.

The book starts out with a brief history of the Indian people in Mexico beginning with the pre-Conquest Aztec empire up to contemporary post-Mexican Revolution times. The Nahuas have suffered persecution and marginalization all along the way from the conquistadors, the Catholic church, and the modern mestizo state. They are therefore relegated to remote ejidos, or communally owned farmlands, and have little contact with the outside world. But they aren’t hostile people at all. Sandstrom describes them as gentle, quiet, good natured, and avoidant of conflict. The opening chapters are useful, interesting, and informative. The biggest problem is that some of the personal testimonies are dry and a little difficult to follow. However, they do illustrate the types of problems the Indians have with government officials and law enforcement that is corrupt, violent, and exploitative.

The book progresses into chapters on daily life for the Nahua people. Since they are subsistence farmers, agriculture plays a central role in their lives. Their milpas, or farming territories, are arranged according to ownership and, after a chapter describing those ancestral categorizations of geneologies and familial structures that anthropologists love so much, we learn that the Nahuas are patrilocal with groupings of brothers being the central building block of social organization in their society. The distribution of milpas is based on this form of social organization. They also use slash and burn techniques of agriculture and crop rotations that are loosely related to their sometimes unpredictable rainy seasons. All of these horticultural realities have a direct influence over the Nahua’s world view and religious practices. When they say that “corn is our blood” they literally mean that without corn they would die. As a source of food, health, income, and meaning it is the most important thing to them. In America we might think of money in a similar way since, like it or not, we can’t live without it within the context of our culture.

At one point, Sandstrom argues his case that Nahua people are highly rational even though mestizos insist they aren’t and just blindly follow traditions even though it would make more sense to modernize and join the market economy. One claim they make against the Nahuas is that they inist on making maize their staple crop even though beans fetch higher prices at the market. Sandstrom points out that maize is more cost effective, less labor intensive, and easier to grow in high quantities on a regular schedule. Beans on the other hand require higher monetary investments, grow irregularly, and are more likely to get eaten or contaminated by vermin. Beans are also more difficult to harvest and transport to the market. Maize is simply more efficient and more reliable. The mestizos could always ask the Nahuas why they prefer it, but they are human and that means it is better to live in the certainty of their own illusions than to find out the truth.

After describing the material culture of the Nahuas, Sandstrom goes on to examine their religious practices, most of which revolve around their horticultural cycle. They believe in a type of animism or pantheism that is similar to what Hindus and Buddhists believe. There is one unifying spirit permeating the entire world and we only see it in fragments because of our own natural limitations. Like other Aztec derived cultures, they believe in wind spirits that cause illness, accidents, and death. During ceremonies, they attract and then banish them through the use of figures made out of colored paper. Their religious rituals are performed to maintain a balance in the interaction between the material and the spiritual world. Shamans are the religious authorities of the Nahuas and aside from performing rituals, they also act as doctors, fortune tellers, and politicians in the ejido.

By the time Sandstrom returns to Amatlan in the 1980s, the Nahuas have begun to change. The government has built roads into Amatlan along with sturdy houses. They are in the process of bringing in electric power. More Nahuas are learning Spanish and going into the cities to work. American missionaries have also discovered them and done some damage too. A rift in the community happens as Protestant converts refuse to interact with the other Nahuas and the missionaries insist that vaccines are evil so a portion of the converts die from an outbreak of measles that could easily have been prevented.

The end of the book is a thorough examination of how the Nahuas benefit from having a strong ethnic identity that sets them apart from the mestizos in the surrounding areas of Veracruz.

Alan Sandstrom has written a fascinating book about the Nahua people. He advocates for them by making and defending the claim that Nahuas are rational despite what others think. There is one point where he drops the ball in his argument. He addresses the reason why Nahuas keep farm animals even though they don’t eat meat, don’t use them for farm labor, and don’t see them as status symbols. They are economically inefficient because they cost a lot to feed, but he claims the Nahuas keep them so they have something to use their unusable milpas for. But if those milpas are unusable, why have them in the first place? Despite this one weak point, the other arguments he gives are sufficiently strong enough to support his claim. Even without the theoretical argument he makes, this book would still be interesting as it gives such a clear impression of what it is like to live in this culture. And it seems like the ultimate work on anthropology since it is so accessible to lay people without losing its value for professional anthropologists. It isn’t bogged down or made confusing with abstract theories and endless references to other scholars in the field the way a lot of anthropology books tend to be. Better still, the author doesn’t glorify the Nahua people by making them look quaint or by turning them into noble savages of the 20^th century. He makes them out to be ordinary people living ordinary lives in a way that is outside the ordinary for most of us.

I’m no expert in the social sciences, but if anybody ever asked me to recommend books from that field Corn Is Our Blood would be one of the first suggestions I would make. Humanizing people in other cultures isn’t a task that should have to be done, but unfortunately it is and this book does a good job of it. It also adds another dimension to whatever it is you know about Mexican society and culture. Like anybody else, I love Mexican food, but there is so much more to this fascinating country and its richly layered culture that should be learned about. You might as well start by letting Alan Sandstrom point you in the right direction.

 

Rare Vintage Anthropology & Ethnography

The Hill Tribes of Northern Thailand

(A Socio-Ethnographical Report)

by Oliver Gordon Young

Communications Media Division/Thai-American Audiovisual Services

oversize paperback

1961

Available for Purchase on Ebay here