Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Interesting Reads: "Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches: The Riddles of Culture "

This is a book I read 4 or 5 years ago, back in high school. It was in a list of books our teacher gave us; we had to choose one and read it, and then write a paper about it.
When I saw the weird title I knew that would be the book I was going to read, and I'm sure it was a good choice because it really gave me some hours of good reading and kind of blowed my mind.

Have you ever wondered why indians worship cows? Or why muslims and jews are not allowed to eat meat? Well, the author, Marvin Harris, did. And he has this theory that there is a logical reason for people, society, to act that way. He states that every single human social behaviour (as weird or senseless as it can be) is ultimately caused by economic/survival needs or by environmental conditions like climate.

The book tells us that indians worship cows for the simple reason that they something to work/plow their lands with, fuel to keep them warm in winter, milk and flooring material, and a cow provides all that without the unnaffordable cost of buying tractors, gas/oil, etc. Cows are the tractors, fuel and heating. They don't eat beef because they need the cows for those other purposes. But people likes beef...the solution? Cows are sacred. You can't eat them. But yes, use them for whatever other needs you have and make them work so we keep the country running.

About the pig issue, it's pretty silly too. Islam and Judaism started in a desert-like place. Breeding pigs consumes a lot of water compared to other animals like sheeps or goats. For practical, economic purposes, eating pork was banned by those religions (by some smart guy that thought it was a bad idea to waste water in a desert landscape) At least it makes more sense than banning them for "being nasty" as those religions claim, when actually pigs are only that way if you breed them in a crowded, muddy farmyard. Pata Negra pigs prove that.

Concerning wars and witches, things get a bit more complicated. I encourage you to read the book and find out by yourselves! Or I may just re-read that part and write a review. We will see.


15 comments:

  1. Huh. I'll have to check that out.

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  2. That's really cool. I never thought about diving deeper into the issue.

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  3. It's all economics :) same as Karl Marx reasoning, same as George Orwell - Animal Farm(though that goes more to the power that comes with economics).

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  4. good review never heard of it before might check it out at the library some time

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  5. looks nice, thanks for the review

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  6. Borders is on my way home tonight. hehe

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  7. excellent ideas and very ineresting post, thx.

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  8. Also in the Mid East, firewood was hard to come by so it was almost impossible for them to cook the pork to the safe temperature to get rid of the parasites within.

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  9. I also saw a culture that worshipped rats

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  10. I had never heard of this book. Those are quite true concepts, though. Most of the teachings of religion are construed into cynical metaphors over the years. It was very logical for the Muslims to avoid consuming Pigs, however that exact message is rarely conveyed accurately. Nice blog, though. Would love to hear a review on the book.

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  11. I'm your 100th follower, do I win something? ;)

    great post btw, gonna check it out

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  12. Looks like it has some nice info in it. I might have to grab it through bittorrent

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