Dreaming the Future Closer

Just something I ran across last night:  

The Dahomean believes, and will say with conviction, that each narrative “history” is fixed and unique, both in form and content.  We tried the experiment of reading to a cult head two different versions of the myth giving the quarrel of the two brothers, Sogbo, the Thunder, and Sagbata, the Earth….The unhesitating reply was that the gods do not reveal the same things to everyone, and that each narrator was telling “true history” according to the way the vodun have given it to him.—Melville J. & Frances S. Herskovits, Dahomean Narrative (18)

For context, it’s important to mention that in this section the Herskovitses are distinguishing between two types of tales among the people of Dahomey.  First, there are tales that are just stories, which narrators are free to develop and vary according to their own skill.  Second, there are ‘histories’ which encompass not just a history of a people, but myths sacred to the vodun cults.  Histories must be told a certain way.

It’s worth pointing out that the ‘just stories’ tales may use mythic figures but it’s understood by listeners that these tales are not ‘true’ tales of the vodun, but creative uses of ideas the people of Dahomey have about the vodun.  Yes, a worthwhile reminder that oral cultures are as savvy about narrative as literate ones.

Now, the differences between the two cults’ recounting of the myth are not dramatic and end up being ones of tone.  In both tales, Sogbo becomes lord of sky, water, and fire, while Sagbata becomes lord of the earth and crops.  In both tales, the two vodun come to agreement that allows rain to fall and crops to grow.  However, each cult emphasizes the importance and action of their respective vodun.

The elder’s statement presumes the limited nature of human faculties, establishing right away that we do not grasp the whole of things.  What’s more, it suggests that, as individuals, we have different ways of being in the world, different natures.  What is good for a devotee of Sagbata is not as good for a devotee of Sagbo.

As a counterpoint, the Herskovitses also talk about a young man who, as a result of working with them, hears many lineage histories from lineages other than his own and becomes baffled.  To his surprise, the lineage histories share many common elements and events.  He cannot easily resolve the apparent similarity, especially since they involve events to which only one lineage ought to be able to lay claim.

They differ in a way similar to the way religious myths vary, except that in this case the agents change while the actions remain the same.  For example, the cunning princess may bring good fortune to her family but she may be from lineage X in lineage X’s histories and from lineage Y in Y’s histories.

Now, qua myth, both lineages’ histories serve the same function within the lineage line.  They foster a sense of pride and likely help define acceptable and exceptional behavior for its members.  In the past, they likely also fostered a sense of admiration for the monarchy by way of establishing how their cooperation with the monarchy fostered good fortune. 

They are thus true ‘in the same way’ as myth, as modeling relationships, this time between people rather than between spiritual forces.  However, unlike the religious myths, they do not foster difference but similarity.  As history becomes mythologized, it veers toward a one-way for all model.  Following the ideas implicit in the elder’s understanding of variation, this means more people living in ways that, at the very least, are not quite as good for them as other ways of living.

This all dovetails nicely with my last post and provides a more concrete way of talking about the fundamental issues I have in mind.  I want to be able to validate both the elder’s sense of myth’s multiple expressions and the young man’s questioning of applying mythic standards of truth to claims about the history of people and societies.

This requires a differentiation between a historical account of how things have been and are and a mythical account that models and supports present relationships.  History is primarily descriptive, it aims to tell us what happened in as much detail as possible and to provide us insight into how one happening impacts another happening.  Myth is primarily normative, it aims to tell us what ought to happen and to provide us with some insight into how we might make what ought to happen, happen.

That last paragraph is really important.  Myth and history blur because they are both caught up with sharpening our insight.  Moreover, myth turns to history for an understanding of how things happen in order to better grasp how things can be made to happen. 

But, myth is forward directed, suggesting a means for how to change, even if it is just to change enough to keep the situation mostly the same.  It doesn’t need to get the history ‘right’ in order to function.  History is subsumed to myth’s normative role.

This can become toxic when the myths we are taking up are not ’appropriate’ to us (as when the history gets treated as myth), if they reflect norms alien to us, norms that hinder us.  In this history becomes an important tool a reminder of the plurality of ways that we can be in the world.  It can be a refuge and it can also be the means by which we can encounter the myths that do speak to us, that do provide us with models to change our surroundings for the better.