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An Analytical Commentary on the Social Structure of the Dogon1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 August 2012

David Tait
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Extract

It is useful to review existing ethnographic writings from time to time in the light of advancing theory. The data considered here are contained in an impressive body of first-rate material collected in accordance with the best descriptive methods on which French ethnographers rely. This paper is in no sense a summary of the data collected by the various Missions Griaule; it is an ‘analytical commentary’ dealing only with the social system of the Dogon of Sanga that a structural analysis of the material reveals. Its purpose is to direct attention to some problems of structure for which further investigation is needed. It can most usefully be read side by side with the principal works on this people so far published.

Résumé

L'ANALYSE DE LA STRUCTURE SOCIALE DU DOGON

L'Auteur fait l'analyse des matériaux abondants, qui ont été publiés par les membres des Missions Griaule, au sujet des Dogon de Bandiagara et de Hombori, dans le Soudan français, afin de déterminer les principes fondamentaux de la structure sociale de ces tribus. La plus grande unité politique parmi le Dogon est une région tribale dans laquelle une tribu domine numériquement et aussi en ce qui concerne les rites. Une tribu comprend plusieurs lignées majeures dont chacune est divisée en une série de groupes, apparentés par la ligne paternelle, qui vont en décroissant et qui correspondent respectivement aux agglomérations de villages, villages et quartiers. L'autorité rituelle de chef (Hogon) s'étend sur une région ou agglomération de villages et elle est assignée à une lignée doyenne de la tribu dominante. L'auteur étudie le processus et les effets de la segmentation des lignées et démontre la signification du culte des ancêtres et des cultes totémiques, comme expressions de l'organisation linéale. II suggère qu'une recherche plus étendue pourrait démontrer le rôle important du système de groupement par âge dans le rattachement de sections de la population mâle d'un village ou d'une région qui à tendance a se diviser d'après les lignées. De la même façon, dans les cérémonies de l'Awa, les hommes sont répartis, pour les grandes fêtes, en deux groupes réciproques, et des rangs élevés dans le système de lignée et dans l'Awa s'excluent mutuellement.

Type
Research Article
Information
Africa , Volume 20 , Issue 3 , July 1950 , pp. 175 - 199
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 1950

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References

page 175 note 2 Delafosse, M., Haut-Sénégal-Niger, Paris, 1912Google Scholar; Paulme, D., Organisation sociale des Dogon (Soudan français), Paris, 1940Google Scholar.

page 175 note 3 Dim Delobsom, A. A., L'Empire du Mogho Naba, Paris, 1933.Google Scholar

page 175 note 4 Delafosse, M., op. cit., vol. i, p. 363.Google Scholar

page 176 note 1 Books by members of the Missions Griaule include:

Griaule, M., Masques dogons, Paris, 1938Google Scholar, Paulme, D., Organisation sociale des Dogon (Soudan français), Paris, 1940Google Scholar; de Ganay, S., Les Devises Dogons, Paris, 1941Google Scholar, Le Binou Yébéné, Paris, 1942Google Scholar; Dieterlen, G., Les Ames des Dogons, Paris, 1941Google Scholar. The Missions Griaule have so far done intensive work on social organization in the regions of Upper and Lower Sanga only. The structural relations discussed in the paper can, therefore, refer only to those regions.

page 176 note 2 In other sections possible connexions between regions will be discussed. Upper and Lower Sanga, Banani, Ireli, Ibi, and Nina appear to be united by ritual and other ties. The Dyon tribe, as have the other tribes, has its migration legends which account for the scattering of members of the tribe throughout Dogonland. In the migration legends of the Dyon tribe Sanga, Ireli, and Ibi are closely linked.

page 176 note 3 Fortes, Meyer, Dynamics of Clanship among the Tallensi, London, 1945.Google Scholar

page 178 note 1 These are the Lébé shrines. Lébé was himself the common ancestor of the eponymous ancestors Dyon, Arou, and Ono.

page 180 note 1 Paulme, D., op. cit., pp. 55Google Scholar ff., gives three genealogies only: that of the Doziou Orey lineage of Lower Ogol; that of the Amtaba lineage of Lower Ogol; and that of the Guinna lineage of Lower Ogol.

page 181 note 1 The use of the term ‘ginna’ or ‘ginu na’ is not yet clear. We find references to the ‘Big Ginna’ and the ‘Little Ginna’ (for example in de Ganay, Le Binou Yébéné). Paulme says of the ginna ‘les indigènes se servent en général du même terme (ginuna, ginna) pour désigner tantôt l'habitation, tantôt le groupe social’ (p. 92). Further (p. 123), she says that the term togu refers to a ‘Men's House’, and (p. 62) that the tire togu is a segment of the ginna, when the term refers to a social group. Dieterlen uses the term togu to denote the social unit Paulme calls a ginna, the term ginna to denote the house of the togu, and the term tire ginna to denote the house of the tire togu. Ginna and tire ginna must, then, be the Dogon terms translated by ‘Big Ginna’ and ‘Little Ginna’.

page 182 note 1 M. Griaule and G. Dieterlen: ‘The Hogon always lives in the ginna of th e major lineage to which he belongs. Thus the present Hogon, who is the head of Tabda, performs his office in the ginna of Pamyon of which Tabda is a segment.’ See the original distribution of the cults at the foundation as given in Les Âmes des Dogons, pp. 142-3.—Ed.

page 183 note 1 Dieterlen, G., op. cit., p. 143.Google Scholar

page 183 note 2 Fortes, M., op. cit., p. 40.Google Scholar

page 185 note 1 References occur in our authors to a ‘House of Dyandoulou’ in the Do quarter. It is shown in de Ganay's Devises des Dogons, on a diagram of Upper Ogol. There is a suggestion that the major lineage of the Do quarter is ritually superior to the other major lineages of Upper Ogol in spite of the belief that its founder, Annay, was the youngest of the four sons of Dyandoulou. In the Bago Di rites, or Harvest Festival, which take place in late September, the ginna bana of the major lineage of Do quarter plays the leading role and leads in the sacrifices which take place in the ‘House of Dyandoulou’ and on a shrine called Kan Amma. In the Sowing Festival, which occurs in late May, the focus of the rites is the Lébé shrine and the ruling Hogon takes the major role. [M. Griaule notes that the House of Dyandoulou is that which contains the funerary pottery (wagem altar) of the founder of the Dyon. It was placed there by Tire, the brother of the founder, who himself had no descendants. The head of the major lineage of Do quarter makes the first sacrifices at the Bago Di rites, since he is custodian of the House of Dyandoulou; but this is not regarded as an indication of ritual superiority here or in general.]

page 185 note 2 Leiris in La Langue secrète des Dogons quote s a number of prayers offered in sigi and dama rites, In one this passage occurs (p. 161) in his free translation:

‘Que Lebe garde (vos) jambes!

Que les pierres ancestrales gardent (vos) jambes!

Que les petites pierres ancestrales gardent (vos) jambes!’

page 186 note 1 Paulme, , op. cit., p. 55, n. 2.Google Scholar

page 188 note 1 M. Griaule and G. Dieterlen write: ‘It should be noted that all the binu can be divided, the cult objects being shared out. Beneficiaries may take away their part of the cult objects, give a new name to the binu and require those under its jurisdiction to observe taboos other than those associated with the original. For the babinu the principle of division is clear. The total population consists of 8 quarters and several binu which are all derived from one by division. The relation of these divisions of binu to lineages is not yet known.’—Ed.

page 189 note 1 M. Griaule and G. Dieterlen write: ‘The binu i expresses an individual relation established following a pathological condition or crisis interpreted as an intervention of the ancestor concerned. This condition requires an installation conceived as regularizing the situation. In general, a binu i is abandoned when the “owner” dies. On the other hand the babinu is always maintained and the rites may be carried out by the head of the group until another priest is revealed. We now know that underlying this totemism of babinu and binu i are seven animal and seven vegetal prohibitions of which we have the nomenclature and which are always the same. These fourteen prohibitions are observed without exception by all priests no matter to which binu they belong, Those under the jurisdiction of a binu observe only one or two prohibitions which may, moreover, be different from any of the fourteen. The priest concerned then observes these in addition to the latter.’—Ed.

page 189 note 2 Forde, D., ‘The Anthropological Approach in Social Science’, in The Advancement of Science, Brit, Ass. Adv. Sci. 1947Google Scholar, points to an analogous ecological situation among the Hopi Pueblos of Arizona.

page 191 note 1 Forde, C. D., Marriage and the Family among the Yako, L.S.E. Monographs No. 5, 1941Google Scholar.

page 191 note 2 Op. cit., p. 236; I have not been able to obtain or read ‘Les Rites de Circoncision chez les Dogons de Sanga’, Leiris, M. and Schaeffner, A. (Journal de la Société des Africanistes, vi, 2, Paris, 1936).Google Scholar

page 191 note 3 Griaule, , Masques dogons, p. 248.Google Scholar

page 192 note 1 M. Griaule and G. Dieterlen note that: ‘In principle every circumcised man belongs in the Awa, that is, he may make a mask and wear it in the dama. Every toru thus automatically participates in the Awa. At the same time there is a fixed number of tumo which is being studied by Mme de Ganay.’—Ed.

page 192 note 2 Dieterlen, G., op. cit., p. 108 n.Google Scholar

page 192 note 3 Dieterlen also says (p. 117, n. 1) that the innepuru who carry out the innepuru role in funerals of Lower Ogol come from Upper Ogol and vice versa. This cannot be true if her groupings (b) and (c) ate correct.

page 192 note 4 Prof. Griaule writes: ‘The funerary role of the innepuru who carves the abye dobu does not necessarily coincide with the role of those who officiate in the dama (see Ames des Dogons, pp. 108 and 117). So far as is known at present the functions of the innepuru, and the role of the divisions of quarters participating in this system, are quite independent of the babinu to which the participants belong.’—Ed.

page 193 note 1 Op. cit., p. 183.

page 194 note 1 Griaule, M., ‘L'Alliance cathartique’, Africa, xviii. 4, Oct. 1948, pp. 242–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 195 note 1 Radcliffe-Brown, A. R., ‘A further note on Joking Relationships’, Africa, xix, 2, Apr. 1949, pp. 133–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 195 note 2 Paulme, D., ‘Parenté à plaisanteries’, Africa, xii, 4, Oct. 1939, pp. 433–44;CrossRefGoogle ScholarPaulme, D., Organisation sociale, pp. 275 ff.Google Scholar

page 196 note 1 We have already seen, however, that the Arou lineages of Upper Sanga are attached, not authentic, lineages and this may also be the case in the other two regions. It is possible, therefore, that there are other structural relations not yet discovered among these five regions.

page 197 note 1 M. Griaule and G. Dieterlen write: Mangu is a twin relationship. It concerns the condition of an individual in relation to his ‘twin’. He has the double or counterpart of the material and spiritual forces at the disposal of the latter. So far there is no evidence for relation between mangu and babinu divisions.’—Ed.