The internal skeletal structure of the body is also used as a metaphor for the internal structure
of society. The word bone was used for clan among the Mongols, and the aristocracy was referred
to as White Bone to distinguish them from commoners, who were referred to as Black Bone. A
slightly different metaphor is used by the Riff of Morocco, who refer to their clan as a vein. Just as
the Mongols used a skeletal metaphor, the Riff use the metaphor of blood vessels to represent the
interconnection between the branching parts of their society. Americans use the metaphor of blood
to represent kinship. In thinking about the biological facts of conception, we can see that the sperm
from the father and the egg from the mother, which unite to form the new individual, have nothing
to do with blood. Yet Americans say that the blood of their fathers and mothers flows in their veins.
This is our symbolic way of talking about kinship.
Among the Ko’a on the island of Palu’e in Eastern Indonesia, “the body metaphor is applied
at every socio-cosmic level” (Vischer 2003: 59). The house is considered a body through which
flows the energy associated with life; the lower part of a settlement is classified as its feet and the
The Cavaliers of seventeenth-century England wore their hair long, while their Puritan opposition wore
their hair short. In this cartoon of the period, both men and their dogs are characterized by their respective
hairstyles.
94 THE TAPESTRY OF CULTURE
upper part as its head. The ceremonial mound at the center, the navel of the settlement, is associated
with growth. Body metaphors are also associated with the island itself, with the seaboard
as the feet and the volcano and mountain as the head. Since it is seen as a living body, the blood
is what rises up in the volcano, that is, the lava that eventually flows to the sea (Vischer 2003:
59). Vischer notes that “sacrificial blood is [ also] hierarchically ranked according to its potency
and efficacy as ritual agent” (2003: 56). The blood of humans, “big blood,” generally not a part of
sacrificial events, is the most potent. Water buffalo that are sacrificed also have “big blood,” the
only substance that can be used to directly contact the “Supreme Being.” Pig’s blood, which can
transform a “state of conceptual heat” harmful to people into a state of coolness, is of lesser potency
and is used in life crisis and agricultural rituals. Healer-sorcerers may use the blood of fowl
in ritual, which is of still lesser potency. Substitutions can be made, but a vegetable can never be
used as a substitute for blood, since it does not have the potency of blood.
Aho notes, “The personal body, . . . is a metaphor of the social body; orifices in particular
stand for a group’s weak spots (2002: 11). An example is the ancient Israelites whose polity was
threatened constantly by enemies. They had a whole series of taboos relating to the orifices of
members, their symbolic points of vulnerability. The dietary taboos and the need to separate from
Gentiles were ways of setting the Jews apart according to God’s edict. Circumcision was another
means of maintaining separation. The dietary laws regarding separation of different kinds of food;
preventing contamination of foods, dishes, pots, and pans; and filtering drinking water all “functioned
sociologically to maintain the solidarity of the Jewish community” (Aho 2002: 37–39).
Jesus moves Christianity in a different direction, suspending the dietary laws and circumcision
and thus reversing the metaphor so that Christians are no longer separate from other people.
Sharp illustrates some of the ways in which “the human body is a symbolically charged landscape”
in her analysis of organ transplantation (2001: 112). Organ donation and procurement, an
emotionally charged area, have generated a complex set of “symbolic renderings of the body, death
and mourning.” Once it has been determined that brain death, the point considered to be the death
of the self or the individual, has taken place, “harvesting” of the viable organs from a body still
otherwise functioning can take place if the donor’s kin have given their approval. To the transplant
specialists, the donor has become dehumanized, and his or her organs have become “sophisticated,
replaceable mechanical parts” completely separated from the identity of the donor (Sharp 2001:
115). Donated organs are not paid for at present; however, because of the shortage of such organs
the suggestion has been made that a system of payment be instituted. Even now, organs are treated
as if they were commodities, like other commercial medical goods that are bought and sold today
(such as blood, sperm, and ova). In an effort to mask this commercialization, the donor kin are
encouraged to see the transplanted organs of their loved ones as continuing to live in the bodies of
unknown recipients, a life after death, so to speak. The donated organs are seen as a “gift of life,”
and transplant personnel use various strategies to accomplish the “veiling of procurement” (Sharp
2001: 118). The identity and life history of the donor are always kept secret, as well as the circumstances
of his or her death, violent or otherwise. The message of the transplant professionals is “a
greening of the body, a form of ‘semantic message’ that foregrounds the goodness associated with
donation while simultaneously denying transplantation’s more disturbing reliance on death and
SYMBOLIC MEANINGS