ANTH 100A Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Ritual Purification, Mary Douglas, Old Testament
Document Summary
Two levels - action itself and discussion about the action. Breaking taboos can yield a certain amount of power. In some cases, even discussion of that thing is forbidden. Old testament food taboos from the abominations of leviticus". Douglas highlights the unusual" particularities of judeo-christian practice as worthy subjects of. They establish social laws which must be followed in order to gain or maintain group membership. They establish boundaries between groups and provide a rationale for maintaining closeness with some and distance from others. They create continuity across time and space (generation and location) The law" is about classifying the social order, and attaching moral judgement to certain behaviours and statuses. Ideally, the law should not profile social groups, but often it does implicitly, How do the laws of specific microcultures (like food taboos) come to be codified as. Law and order" is a culturally relative concept.
