ANTH 208 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Nilotic Peoples, Bride Price, Social Anthropology
Anth. 208 Week Ten Lecture Notes
The Nuer Film Notes
● Can see cattle and other animals clearly permeating all aspects of life
● Credit having cows to supernatural entities, part of why many of their religous rituals
involve sacrificing said cows, though only certain ones at certain times.
● Marked with gar on the forehead, four lines, which means someone is a man not
considered so without them, also when boy receives an ox from his father and a new
name to go with it that is linked to said ox
● Cows also used as payment in various interactions, bride price, debts, etc. Upon
divorcing a wife asked to be returned
○ Question of this brought to sort of council of wise men, mostly older adult males
○ Men can only drink with men of the same age group
● Cows house in the middle of the village, just outside, all around basically
● Have belief in the afterlife, ghosts, etc. have rituals linked to them, involving house
building and the sacrifice of goats
● Someone outside the village comes to administer gar, always done or because of
smallpox?
○ At gar also sacrifice a goat
● In introduction gives brief overview of what he is setting out to do, location of Nuer
(Ethiopia) and also information about the Nilotic peoples in general and how they’re
related to one another
● This is the first volume looking at the political system of the Nuer as it’s main theme (how
it’s linked to ecology, etc.)
● The Nuer are a segmentary system, essentially a system which divides itself up into
segments which all have similar goals but operate separately though they are also
interdependent on one another
○ Groups or segments are usually somewhat mobile
○ Follows bilateral/cognatic kinship allowing for small mobile groups that are
flexible and can move around each other, etc.
■ To a certain extent we have a segmentary system but it’s not as focused
on ‘sharing’ or reliance on one another when necessary like the Nuer is
■ Has the capability to fall apart and be rearranged and put back together
○ Tends towards a patrilineal system as most matrilineal systems result in more
unification and such as well as complications with succession in a segmentary
system
● Have a tribal system with a ‘leopard-skin’ chief, who is more of a religious/spiritual
leader/figure rather than someone in a traditional position of power
● Have a patrilineal descent system as well as ‘age sets’ which are fairly unique to the
Nuer
○ Agnatic: Sometimes in social anthropology agnatic means only the males in
descent traced through males, as in leaving out the females, but this isn’t always
true there really isn’t a definitive difference between this and simply patrilineal
kinship
Document Summary
Can see cattle and other animals clearly permeating all aspects of life. Credit having cows to supernatural entities, part of why many of their religous rituals involve sacrificing said cows, though only certain ones at certain times. Cows also used as payment in various interactions, bride price, debts, etc. Upon divorcing a wife asked to be returned. Question of this brought to sort of council of wise men, mostly older adult males. Men can only drink with men of the same age group. Cows house in the middle of the village, just outside, all around basically. Have belief in the afterlife, ghosts, etc. have rituals linked to them, involving house building and the sacrifice of goats. In introduction gives brief overview of what he is setting out to do, location of nuer (ethiopia) and also information about the nilotic peoples in general and how they"re related to one another.
