Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gvvz8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T10:50:45.206Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Ice and travel among the Fort Norman Slave: Folk taxonomies and cultural rules1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

Keith H. Basso
Keith H. Basso
Affiliation:
University of Arizona
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Through the use of data collected among Slave Indians living in northern Canada, this paper explores a problem in ethnographic methodology: how to describe cultural rules such that contextual restrictions which operate upon them are identified and made explicit. Following a discussion of some of the ways in which the aims and assumptions of current sociolinguistic theory can be applied to this problem, a formal model is presented of Slave rules for travelling on the ice of frozen lakes and rivers. This model, which specifies the conditions under which a Slave hunter can be expected to cross an expanse of ice or avoid it, reveals the sensitivity of normative rules to variation in contextual features and illustrates both the value and feasibility of incorporating these features into ethnographic accounts. (Ethnographic methodology, sociolinguistics, formal analysis, Canadian Indians, language and environment.)

Type
Articles
Information
Language in Society , Volume 1 , Issue 1 , April 1972 , pp. 31 - 49
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1972

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Barker, R. G. & Wright, H. F. (1955). Midwest and its children: the behavioral ecology of an American town. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Basso, K. (1970). ‘To give up on words’: silence in Western Apache culture. SJA 26. 213–30.Google Scholar
Berlin, B., Breedlove, D. E. & Raven, P. H. (1968). Covert categories and folk taxonomies. AmA 70. 290–9.Google Scholar
Brown, R. & Ford, M. (1961). Address in American English. Jnl Abnormal and Social Psychology 62. 375–85.Google Scholar
Brown, R. & Gilman, A. (1960). The pronouns of power and solidarity. In Sebeok, T. (ed.), Style and language. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. 253–76.Google Scholar
Burke, K. (1945). A grammar of motives. Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Burling, R. (1970). Man's many voices: language in its cultural context. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.Google Scholar
Conklin, H. C. (1959). Linguistic play in its cultural setting. Lg 35. 631–6.Google Scholar
Conkling, H. C. (1962). Lexicographic treatment of folk taxonomies. In Householder, F. W. and Saporta, S. (eds), Problems in lexicography. (Research Center in Anthropology, Folklore and Linguistics, Publication 21; (and) IJAL 28 (2) pt 4.) Bloomington: Indiana University.Google Scholar
Conklin, H. C. (1964). Ethnogenealogical method. In Goodenough, W. (ed.), Explorations in cultural anthropology. New York: McGraw-Hill. 22–55.Google Scholar
Epstein, A. C. (1958). Politics in an urban African community. Manchester: Manchester University Press.Google Scholar
Ervin-Trip, S. (1964). An analysis of the interaction of language, topic and listener. In Gumperz, J. and Hymes, D. (eds), The ethnography of communication. (AmA 66 (6) Pt 2.) Washington, D.C.: American Anthropological Association. 86–112.Google Scholar
Fischer, J. L. (1958). Social influence in the choice of a linguistic variant. Word 14. 47–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frake, C. O. (1962). The ethnographic study of cognitive systems. In Gladwin, T. and Sturtevant, W. (eds), Anthropology and human behavior. Washington, D.C.: The Anthropological Society of Washington. 72–85.Google Scholar
Frake, C. O. (1964 a). A structural description of Subanun ‘religious behavior’. In Goodenough, W. (ed.), Explorations in cultural anthropology. New York: McGraw-Hill. 111–29.Google Scholar
Frake, C. O. (1964 b). How to ask for a drink in Subanun. In Gumperz, J. and Hymes, D. (eds), The ethnography of communication. (AmA 66 (6) Pt 2.) Washington, D.C.: American Anthropological Association.Google Scholar
Garbett, G. (1970). The analysis of social situations. Man 5. 254–27.Google Scholar
Garfinkel, H. (1967). Studies in ethnomethodology. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Gluckman, M. (1958). Analysis of a social situation. (Rhodes—Livingston Paper 28.) Manchester: University Press.Google Scholar
Gluckman, M. (1961). Ethnographic data in British social anthropology. Sociological Rev. 9. 5–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goffman, E. (1958). The presentation of self in everyday life. (University of Edinburgh Social Science Research Centre, Monograph no. 2.) Edinburgh.Google Scholar
Goffman, E. (1961). Encounters: two studies in the sociology of interaction. Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merril Co.Google Scholar
Goffman, E. (1963). Behavior in public places. New York: Free Press, Glencoe.Google Scholar
Goffman, E. (1964). The neglected situation. In Gumperz, J. and Hymes, D. (eds), The ethnography of communication. (AmA 66 (6) Pt 2.) Washington D.C.: American Anthropological Association.Google Scholar
Goodenough, W. (1964). Introduction. In Goodenough, W. (ed.), Explorations in cultural anthropology. New York: McGraw-Hill. 1–24.Google Scholar
Goodenough, W. (1965). Rethinking ‘status’ and ‘role’: toward a general model of the cultural organization of social relationships. In Banton, M. (ed.), The relevance of models in social anthropology. London: Tavistock. 1–24.Google Scholar
Goodenough, W. (1967). Componential analysis. Science 156. 1203–9.Google Scholar
Goodenough, W. (1969). Frontiers of cultural anthropology: social organization. In Frontiers of cultural anthropology. Proc. Amer. Philosophical Soc. 113. 329–35.Google Scholar
Gumperz, J. (1958). Dialect differences and social stratification in a North Indian village. AmA 63. 668–81.Google Scholar
Gumperz, J. (1961). Speech variation in the study of Indian civilization. AmA 63. 976–86.Google Scholar
Gumperz, J. (1964). Linguistic and social interaction in two communities. In Gumperz, J. and Hymes, D. (eds), The ethnography of communication. (AmA 66 (6) Pt 2.) Washington, D.C.: American Anthropological Association. 137–53.Google Scholar
Gumperz, J. (1970). Sociolinguistics and communication in small groups. (Working paper no. 33. Language—Behavior Research Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley.)Google Scholar
Hammel, E. (ed.) (1965). Formal semantic analysis. (AmA 67 (5) Pt 2.) Washington, D.C.: American Anthropological Association. 142–85.Google Scholar
Howard, P. G. (1963). A preliminary presentation of Slave phonemes. In Hoijer, H. et al. (eds), Studies in the Athapaskan languages. University of California Publications in Linguistics 29. 42–55.Google Scholar
Hymes, D. (1962). The ethnography of speaking. In Gladwin, T. and Sturtevant, W. (eds), Anthropology and human behavior. Washington, D.C.: The Anthropological Society of Washington. 55–53.Google Scholar
Hymes, D. (1964 a). Directions in (ethno-)linguistic theory. In Romney, A. K. and Andrade, R. D' (eds), Transcultural studies in Cognition. (AmA 66 (3) Pt 2.) Washington, D.C.: American Anthropological Association. 6–56.Google Scholar
Hymes, D. (1964 b). Introduction: toward ethnographies of communication. In Gumperz, J. and Hymes, D. (eds), The ethnography of communication. (AmA 66 (6) pt 2.) Washington, D.C.: American Anthropological Association. 1–34.Google Scholar
Hymes, D. (1967). Models of the interaction of language and social setting. In Macnamara, J. (ed.), Problems of bilingualism. Jnl Social Issues 23. 2.Google Scholar
Keesing, R. M. (1967). Statistical models and decision models of social structure: a Kwaio case. Ethnology 6. 1–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keesing, R. M. (1969). On quibblings over squabblings of siblings: new perspectives on kin terms and rule behavior. SJA 25. 207–27.Google Scholar
Lounsbury, F. (1964 a). The structural analysis of kinship semantics. In Lunt, H. G. (ed.), Proceedings of the ninth congress of linguistics. The Hague: Mouton and Co. 1073–99.Google Scholar
Lounsbury, F. (1964 b). A forman account of the Crow- and Omaha-type kinship terminologies. In Goodenough, W. (ed.), Explorations in cultural anthropology. New York: McGraw- Hill. 351–94.Google Scholar
Miller, G., Galanter, E. & Pribram, K. (1960). Plans and the structure of behavior. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.Google Scholar
Romney, A. K. & D'Andrade, R. (eds) (1964). Transcultural studies in cognition. (AmA 66 (3) Pt 2.) Washington, D.C.: American Anthropological Association.Google Scholar
Tyler, S. A, (1969). Cognitive anthropology. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.Google Scholar