One-Sided Analysis : "Younger" and "Elder"

From what we know of the moiety system of the Bororo it is clear that the moieties are bound to exchange reciprocal services in feasts, funerals, initiation.rituals, etc. But at the same time, as it occurs in Assam7 and elsewhere, there is a definite relation of subordination between the moieties: the Cerae,to whom the two chiefs of the Bororo village always belong, and who possess the best ornaments, are "superior" to the Tugaregue. Col- bacchini's informant emphatically denied that the usual meaning of those words: "strong," and "weak," could be attached to the names of the moieties.8 On the con- trary, the Bororo of the Rio Vermelho were positive of the fact that Cerameant "weak" when I visited them in 1936.9 This fits well with the "unequal" names of the moieties among other South American tribes: "Younger" and "Elder" among the Tupi- Kawahib, "Good" and "Bad" among the Tereno, etc.... Among the Bororo, how- ever, an apparent contradiction results from the fact that the "Superior" moiety would be at the same time the "Weak," and the "Inferior" the "Strong." This can perhaps be explained through the use of the kinship terms reported by Cruz and by Colbacchini: if an exogamous moiety claims as its own the cultural heroes and ihe supernatural beings of the tribe, and thus conquers a political and cultural supremacy over the other moiety, it results immediately, in a matrilineal system where patrilineal filiation follows the pattern of alternate generations, that the members of this moiety will become removed from their male ancestors one degree farther than the members of the opposite moiety. If the Sun and the Moon, and the heroes Bakororoand Itubore, belong to the Ceramoiety, they can only be the "grandfathers" of the Ceraemen, while becoming the "fathers" of the dethroned Tugaregue.These, in turn, become the "elders" of the ruling Cerae. A perhaps one-sided analysis of the dual organization has too often put the emphasis on the principle of reciprocity as its main cause and result. It is well to remember that the moiety system can express, not only mecha- nisms of reciprocity but also relations of subordination. But, even, in these relations of subordination, the principle of reciprocity is at work; for the subordination itself is reciprocal: the priority which is gained by one moiety on one level is lost to the op- posite moiety on the other. Political primacy has to be paid at the price of a subordi- nate place in the system of generations.

5 Loc.cit., p. 97. 6 Loc.cit., pp. 196-197.

7J. K. Bose,SocialOrganizatioonftheAimolKukis,andDualOrganizatioin Assam(Journal of the Departmentof Letters,Universityof Calcutta,vol. 25, 1934).

8Colbacchinil,oc.cit.,p. 30.

9C. Levi-Strauss,Contributiodnl'gtudedel'organisationsocialedesIndiensBororo(Journal de la Societedes Americanistesde Paris,2, 1936).268 AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST [N. s., 46, 1944