dead baby beliefs
A couple of weeks ago I was in the coordinator's office, and the subject of dead babies came up. Conversations about tribal beliefs can be very interesting in the Komku office because we have a fairly diverse crowd, and many of them have travelled and learned about the customs of other tribes/cultures as well. In particular, we have an employee from Zimbabwe, and his beliefs - about the Zim political situation, as well as Shona traditions - are always new and interesting.
We've discussed topics as wide-ranging as bride prices, marriage laws, Islam, how much to cook your meat, Obama, why there are tides, and now... dead babies.
In these situations I often find myself caught out - does Canadian culture have a specific tradition for dead babies? Not really, except that it's a tragedy. There haven't been any babies dying recently, but our finance officer's 23-year-old daughter died a few weeks ago, which is what brought us to the topic.
"Do you bury your babies in the house?" E, the Zimbabwean asked, out of the blue. "When I was working with the Kgalagadi," he continued by way of explanation, "they told me that they buried their dead babies in the house. In Zim we would think is very strange."
"Yes," CC replied, "we do bury them in the house. But for us it's different from the Kgalagadi. For a Nharo person, the baby is a very new person - it hasn't lived long and it shouldn't feel lonely. So we bury it in the house so that it can be close to everyone. When the tribe moves on, the baby is left there in the house. Sometimes old people who are going to die are left behind in the house as well."
"But it's different for Kgalagadis," Z cut in. "For Kgalagadis, they believe that if you bury the baby in the house, it will attract more children, and the mother will conceive again. If you bury it in the graveyard, it will attract no children and the mother will be barren."
"Hmm," said E. "For us in Zimbabwe, it is again very different. We put the baby in a calabash, and bury it in a shallow grave on the edge of the river. When the river floods, it washes the baby away." He pondered for a moment. "But I don't know why we do that!"
We've discussed topics as wide-ranging as bride prices, marriage laws, Islam, how much to cook your meat, Obama, why there are tides, and now... dead babies.
In these situations I often find myself caught out - does Canadian culture have a specific tradition for dead babies? Not really, except that it's a tragedy. There haven't been any babies dying recently, but our finance officer's 23-year-old daughter died a few weeks ago, which is what brought us to the topic.
"Do you bury your babies in the house?" E, the Zimbabwean asked, out of the blue. "When I was working with the Kgalagadi," he continued by way of explanation, "they told me that they buried their dead babies in the house. In Zim we would think is very strange."
"Yes," CC replied, "we do bury them in the house. But for us it's different from the Kgalagadi. For a Nharo person, the baby is a very new person - it hasn't lived long and it shouldn't feel lonely. So we bury it in the house so that it can be close to everyone. When the tribe moves on, the baby is left there in the house. Sometimes old people who are going to die are left behind in the house as well."
"But it's different for Kgalagadis," Z cut in. "For Kgalagadis, they believe that if you bury the baby in the house, it will attract more children, and the mother will conceive again. If you bury it in the graveyard, it will attract no children and the mother will be barren."
"Hmm," said E. "For us in Zimbabwe, it is again very different. We put the baby in a calabash, and bury it in a shallow grave on the edge of the river. When the river floods, it washes the baby away." He pondered for a moment. "But I don't know why we do that!"
posted by Jenn at
8:49 AM
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