Las mujeres en cargos ejecutivos y puestos de responsabilidad dentro del COI

In the preceding chapter it was concluded that although stylistic regions are indeed perceptible, overlapping boundaries and shared thematic sets suggest that there is nevertheless some degree of uniformity in the cosmology and rock art of southern African San foraging peoples (Lewis-Williams 1984a:227, 2002:52, 67; Smith 2006:86).

Widely shared themes, from the Cape to Zimbabwe (Lewis-Williams 1984a: 227), Zambia (Smith 1997), and Tanzania (Lewis-Williams 1986) are evident in the distribution of depictions and combinations across the southern African region of postures, imagery, and contexts symptomatic of altered states of consciousness (Lewis-Williams 1984a; Dowson 1988). However, Guenther (1999:228) notes that San society, albeit within the context of egalitarianism, also tend to produce individuals who

“do and think their own thing”. This in turn fosters a fragmented, fluid, flexible,

adaptable, and heterogeneous world-view (Guenther 2001:265) in which a wide range of ideas and practices are expressed and transmitted by socially equal yet culturally individuated men and women. It is this complex and ambiguous blend of individuality-within-social-structure which typifies and also greatly problematises the study of San religion, sociality, and expressive culture (ibid.; see also Barrett 2001:147-150).

Notably, several conceptual approaches to ethnic identity emphasise an individual level of analysis where notions of identity formation and development are linked to an

individual’s self-concept (Trimble 2000). Much of the work in this area relies on Tajfel’s (1982) theory of social identity, according to which one’s social identity strongly

influences one’s self-perception. Consequently, the individual should comprise the central locus of any evaluation of how concepts of ethnicity are initially conceived. The strength and weakness of the self is largely determined by the status of the individual within their reference groups and how individuals assess members of out-groups: when ethnicity forms the nexus of an in-group, self-identity will be correspondingly influenced.

Individual distinctive ethnic characteristics can also be restrictive as a person may reject external judgments and opinions of their own ethnic group and in turn establish their own criterion to challenge and refute those of the dominant out-group. Other responses may entail the withdrawal or disassociation of individuals from the referent group, thereby creating added psychological complications for themselves. Tajfel’s theory has generated considerable influence on ethnic identity research, and many researchers prefer to conduct their research under the ethnic self-identification rubric.

For example, Cheung (1993) defines ethnic identification as “the psychological

attachment to an ethnic group or heritage” (ibid.:1216), thus positioning the construct of ethnic identity within the domain of self-perception. Saharso (1989) extends the

definition to include social processes that involve an individual’s choice of friends, a future partner, and the reactions of others in their social environment. An individual may strongly identify psychologically with an ethnic group, however, the strength and authenticity of the identity is contingent on the acceptance and acknowledgment of in-group and out-in-group members. There are therefore two distinct levels of ethnicity (Bekker 1993:12). The first refers to the individual and ethnic identity, and the second to ethnic communities. Although the first can not, on its own, be used to discuss ethnicity comprehensively, any study of ethnicity invariably entails the simultaneous analysis of individual and collective identities (ibid.:13). Evidently, an exploration of the individual, as agent, is imperative to the attainment of a clear understanding of how ethnicity and ethnic identities are conceived, communicated, and also transformed.

Thus, and in asking whether it is in fact possible to “discern the hand, the agency, of individuals as, by making images they reproduced and subverted their own society”

(Lewis-Williams 2002:217), I will now explore the influence which the individual, as a social agent, may have exerted in San society.

Agency and identity

Like other aspects of San religion, rock art is not entirely restricted in its subject matter and also has an individualistic component (Dowson 1988; Lewis-Williams 1995a;

Guenther 1999). As indicated by Dowson (1988:116), the recurring themes so evident in forager rock art tend to derive from two interconnected modes of conveying the trance experience, namely verbal accounts and pictorial depictions. It has therefore been argued that rock art may have played a role similar to modern verbal accounts, and that visions of the “other” world may constantly have reminded people of the nature of the spiritual world (Lewis-Williams 1982:438; Lewis-Williams & Loubser 1986:280;

Dowson 1988:117). With regards this mnemotechnic function of rock art, Lewis-Williams and Loubser (1986:280) have proposed that the hallucinations of southern shamans may have been more uniform than those of their northern, non-painting counterparts, precisely because rock art acted as a stabilising agent of the range of visions experienced during trance.

Although archaeologists draw on the theoretical source materials of Giddens (1979, 1984) and Bourdieu (1977) when making use of practice theory, concepts of agency are generally manifest as two distinctive types. According to the first, social agents are assumed to act strategically and intentionally to advance their own interests (e.g.

Blanton et al. 1996; Joyce & Winter 1996; Cowgill 2000). Individuals in these interpretations tend to be portrayed as autonomous and rational actors who take full advantage of some aspect of economic, political, or symbolic resources. A more extreme version of this type of individual action informs some evolutionary approaches (e.g. Hayden 1995), but this type of individual agent has been adeptly criticised (Gero 2000; Barrett 2001). At the other end of the continuum are those who view the

meaningful actions of individuals in historical and social circumstances as only partly of their own making (e.g. Johnson 1989; Hodder 1991; Dobres & Hoffman 1994; Barrett 2000; Pauketat 2000; Wilkie & Bartoy 2000). In this scheme, individual actions are contextualised within an array of rules and resources that govern them but which also present them with opportunity for action. The dialectic is one between structure and agency (Giddens 1984; Barrett 2001; Silliman 2001), and social agents are viewed as equally constrained and enabled by social structure. Gell (1998:16) defines agency as

Attributable to those persons (and things …) who / which are seen as initiating causal sequences … events caused by acts of mind or will or intention … An agent is the source, the origin, of causal events, independently of the state of the physical universe.

Although social agents frequently do act with explicit intent and strategies for

accomplishing their objectives, they also act in ways that allow them to “go on” in the world (Giddens 1984; Barrett 2001). In addressing the universals and specifics of shamanic beliefs, visions, and experiences, Weil (1986:29; see also Siegel 1985:248;

Lewis-Williams 1997:813) emphasises the importance of “set” or individual

expectations and personality, and “setting”, the physical and social environment, in determining how an altered state of consciousness is experienced. Shamanic experience is generated by an interplay between neurological universals and cultural and personal realisations. For the human agent, both the universal and the cultural components of altered states of consciousness have the potential to become a resource capable of manipulation for personal and group ends. In some shamanic societies the making of art that is associated with and that in some ways define altered states is one of the most important resources available to human agents (Lewis-Williams & Dowson 1989; Dowson 1989, 1994; Solomon 1994; Lewis-(Lewis-Williams 1997).

As is now widely accepted, material culture, which includes rock art, does not merely reflect culture and society, but, in the hands of human agents, also constitutes culture and society (Miller 1987; Shanks &Tilley 1987, 1992; Conkey 1991; Gell 1998). Most importantly, individual image-makers or rock-artists “… actually did things and achieved

ends with material culture.” (Lewis-Williams 1997:813). The notion of art and artistic items as social agents is not new (Layton 1981:43, 2003:5; Wolff 1981:24), as is evident in the claim by Appadurai (1986:4) that “… in many historical societies, things have not been so divorced [as in contemporary Western thought] from the capacity of persons to act.” Although some engraved images are startlingly alike, no two are identical. The rather peculiar engraved depiction (Fig 5.1) provides one example of an especially idiosyncratic artistic portrayal.

FIG.5.1. An example of a highly idiosyncratic engraved depiction, the so-called “aeroplane”

panel from Bosworth. The extent of weathering and patination suggests that this engraving predates the arrival of aircraft in South Africa by centuries.

Biesele (1978a:170) suggests that the apparent culture-cosmological diversity in San society derive from the influence of “extraordinary individuals”. Shamans narrate distinctly idiosyncratic accounts of the supernatural world after a religious experience (Biesele 1978b:938), and some of these personal reports become generally accepted as accurately representing the other world. Biesele (1993:72) furthermore writes of the Ju/’hoansi San:

Initiates have certain experiences in trance because they expect to do so, basing their expectations on other accounts they have heard … The hallucinations of actual n/omkxaosi become, by a process at once highly individual and highly social, conventionalised vehicles facilitating trance for the uninitiated.

In the Kalahari today, San listen attentively to reports of trance visions and experience (Biesele 1978b:938; Guenther 1999:186), and these reports create an expectation of what might be seen in trance. Although subsequent versions of trance experiences do vary as time passes, the understanding of the religious experience and related

revelations remain constant (Biesele 1993:70). Shamans tend to experience

hallucinations of culturally pre-constrained objects, images, and experiences, and this may account for the visual and experiential equivalence of visions (Lewis-Williams &

Loubser 1986:280). Thus, and because expectation partially determines trance

experience, analogous visions are eventually experienced by other trancers. Obviously, not all accounts enjoy such widespread success, and these merely remain as

idiosyncratic revelations. Similarly, and even though not all individuals manage to achieve some enhanced measure of social standing, some certainly do. Gulbrandsen (1991:99, see also Lewis-Williams & Pearce 2004b:218) identifies three conditions in which authority-figures are likely to develop:

i) when historical circumstances create communities significantly larger than a band;

ii) when wide-ranging nomadism is restricted and people are confined to a site;

iii) when resource- and social problems are created by external agricultural groups.

To this observation Guenther (1999:41) adds that even under “normal” circumstances, San social organisation leads to “the delineation of the individual as an exceptionally sharply profiled actor and agent.” In fact, and as noted by England (1968:416) some four decades ago, the origin of San social differentiation and leadership lies in their recognition of different degrees of the effectiveness and stature among shamans, even if they are not “paid” for their services.

Bushmen know particularly big (n!a n!a, big, big) medicine men by their reputation; they call them gaoxa (chief) and fear and respect their powers even though the medicine men dress, eat, sleep, and otherwise pursue their lives just as any other member of the community.

More recently, Shennan (2002:224) also argues that the prime locus for the generation of social inequality in forager societies was the cultural transmission of ritual

knowledge: the sharing of ritual knowledge may be “the only legitimate locus for the generation of inequality” (ibid.:223). This, according to Lewis-Williams and Pearce (2004b:218) appears to have frequently been the case in San communities. It is

therefore apparent that at least three parallels may be drawn with the observations by Gulbrandsen (1991:99):

i) !Xõo bands are indeed organised into larger social units, namely band clusters or nexuses (Heinz 1972; Wiessner 1977, 1983; Barnard 1979, 1992; Cashdan 1983;

Guenther 1986);

ii) wide-ranging nomadism is definitely restricted as, and in light of the persistent maintenance of strips of “no-man’s-land” between the territories of adjacent nexuses, individuals certainly do not hunt on the land of an adjoining nexus (Heinz 1972:408);

iii) the increase in social complexity during the past two millennia unquestionably impacted on the socio-political organisation of the !Xõo-speaking foragers of the western regions of the southern African central interior.

In modern times, Nharo San healers in Botswana move between communities and settle on white-owned farms. Unsurprisingly, it is also these healers who have emerged as Nharo political leaders (Guenther 1999:195). As a consequence of interaction with farmers and their capitalist ideologies, there is, in addition to changes in social structure and a “simplification and rationalisation of belief”, also a shift towards an increasingly perceptible “differentiation and professionalism in the status and role of the trance dancer” (ibid.:246; see also Lee 1993:123). It is apparent that the incidence of higher social standings amongst shamans does not necessarily derive from interaction with other socio-economic groups (England 1968:416; Guenther 1999:41). Katz (1982a:59) also offers insight into the social status of shamans amongst contemporary Kalahari San. One particular shaman, Toma Zho, has surpassed all healers to become the “… biggest healer at Xaixai. He is big, big! There are others who do num, but they are far behind him.” Toma Zho confidently offers a similar evaluation of himself, stating that “At Xaixai, I’m the only one with strength.” (ibid.). Like many other healers in the Kalahari today, Toma Zho endeavours to diverge from “traditional” healing within his own camp, to instead become a “professional” healer who receives cash payments for his services. Although payment in any form, whether food, gifts, or cash, is undeniably well received, there is another form of imbursement which may incite even more fervour to become a popular healer: sex. Toma Zho, upon reminiscing about his former competence as a dancer and healer, offers some explicit insight into the excitement the prospect of sexual intercourse may have held for many shamans (ibid.186):

These dances would go on all day, and people would be lying all over the place. By night time I’d go to sleep. I’d go to sleep with one women on my left side and one on my right side … both would start after me, and each one wanted to have sex first … We used to do it, but now I’m too old for that sort of thing. I used to really like it.

Toma Zho continues, stating that

The women used to love me. They were crazy about me, because I was a healer, because I was a dancer, because I was good at everything … Yes, the women really liked the healers. Whenever I see one who is just getting num, I say ‘Think of the sex that guy’s going to get!’ I remember all the sex I used to get as a healer.

In both myth and in real life, women are in fact in control of sexual relations (Guenther 1999:153). One myth, set in an early time of the First Order, relates how men and women “came together” (Guenther 1989:43). After offering some clues to the men as how to go about satisfying their “unaccountable new appetites”, they finally managed to have their way with the women. That accomplished, “there was much pleasure in the village” (ibid.:154), and to this day men consider what they receive from women as

“very nice food”, “delicious fat”, and “as sweet as honey” (ibid.). In reality also, women retain control over the allocation of sex. While they may reject the advances of either lovers or husbands, they usually do not, as they enjoy sex themselves and as they have engaged in sexual play since childhood (Shostak 1976:272; Lee 1993:90, as cited in Guenther 1999:154). As described by N/isa (ibid.155), female sexuality is to men what male healing potency, n/um (!Kung) or tssõ (Nharo), is to humankind. Thus, apart from the purely congenial nature of sexual intercourse, and a possible but as yet unexplored connotation to reproductive and socio-subsistence strategy, there is a deeper, more spiritual relevance of sex. Guenther (1999:184) refers to a Nharo informant equating the ability to achieve an altered state of consciousness with the

“staying power” of a man during intercourse. This accords with a comment by Lee (1993:120) that, amongst the Ju/hoansi, !kia or trance appears to be “connected with sexual arousal and orgasm.” During trance, the shaman also goes through a process of personal transcendence which significantly alters his or her “sense of self, time, and space” (Katz 1976:288). What is important is that this takes place in the context of the social community: all members share in the personal transformation of the healer, and this adds an explicit public element to the passage of the individual (Guenther 1999:

186). As emphasised by Katz (1976:284), the shaman’s personal experience brings

“transcendence into ordinary life and ordinary life into transcendence.” In other words, and by bringing “the benefits of the other world - healing and insight” to the community (Biesele 1993:70), shamans perform an essential public service. It is therefore not surprising that some healers achieve “celebrity” status: they are admired for their sexual prowess, respected for their brave transcendental deeds, and valued for their ability to cure and restore to health. Such charismatic individuals, who certainly also excelled at maintaining favourable relationships with scores of people over wide expanses, are indeed t’xudi kaus, those “masters of cleverness” referred to by Yellen (1977:47). Accordingly, it should be expected that the insights and opinions of such

“extraordinary individuals” (Biesele 1978a:170), whether pertaining to matters spiritual, social, economic, political, or artistic, are equally sought after and valued: these individuals were also masters of social transformation.

Deaux (1992), in attempting to ascertain the link between personal and social identity, argues that while some features of social identities are consensually based and will be expressed along normative lines, other aspects may be based on personal feelings and values and will be expressed along those lines. Thus, and as clarified by Biesele (1978a:170, 1993:72), idiosyncratic characteristics, as related to an individual’s personal identity, are added to normative characteristics of social identities, and, over time, certain idiosyncratic accounts become part of accepted tradition (Lewis-Williams 2006c:13). Deaux further indicates that particular personal identities may be linked to specific social identities, creating unique ways of expressing membership in particular groups: some personal identities may even come to embody and pervade the

membership groups to which the individual belongs. In San society individuals are known to have initiated long-lasting trends by altering particular images, motifs, or themes in art and expressive culture (see Rudner & Rudner 1968, 1970; Wiessner 1984; Guenther 1999), and some have even transformed entire expressive genres such as styles of painting or beadwork, or forms of song and dance (Biesele 1993:67).

At the same time, and even though individual agency is a force that directly influences social processes (Guenther 1999:40), egalitarianism is maintained by several levelling mechanisms that curb the desires and ambitions of the individual (ibid.:42). For instance, and by “insulting the meat” (see Bleek 1932:240 for the incidence of this custom amongst the /Xam and Lee 1993:54 for similar behaviour amongst the !Kung) skilled hunters concede their “levelled” status and verify their recognition of the egalitarian ethos of equality and sharing (Guenther 1999:43). Ethnographic and historical studies have shown that shamans do indeed play active roles in social and political change (Guenther 1975; Hitchcock 1982; Aldenderfer 1993; Lewis-Williams

2002), and Hodder (1982, 1986; as cited in Dowson 1988:125), rightly advocates that the role of the individual should be afforded a central position in archaeological theory.

Even though we shall never know the name of the potter, he stresses we must not forget that each pot was made by an individual (Hodder 1986:7). In the same way, engraved images were made by individuals: they were not made by “society” (Lewis-Williams & Pearce 2004b:220).

Although there were undoubtedly conventions as to what could be engraved and what was inappropriate for depiction, there are images that appear to contravene normative artistic values (e.g. Fig. 5.1). Many engraved “panels” or “scenes” expose the subtle interplay between normative and idiosyncratic contributions: the classic dichotomy

Although there were undoubtedly conventions as to what could be engraved and what was inappropriate for depiction, there are images that appear to contravene normative artistic values (e.g. Fig. 5.1). Many engraved “panels” or “scenes” expose the subtle interplay between normative and idiosyncratic contributions: the classic dichotomy