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A taboo is a social group's ban, prohibition or avoidance of something (usually an utterance or behavior) based on the group's sense that it is excessively repulsive, offensive, sacred or allowed only for certain people. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. " Taboo". Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2012. Retrieved 21 Mar. 2012" taboo". Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary, 11th Edition. Such prohibitions are present in virtually all societies. Taboos may be prohibited explicitly, for example within a legal system or religion, or implicitly, for example by social norms or conventions followed by a particular culture or organization.
Taboos are often meant to protect the individual, but there are other reasons for their development. An ecological or medical background is apparent in many, including some that are seen as religious or spiritual in origin. Taboos can help use a resource more efficiently, but when applied to only a subsection of the community they can also serve to suppress said subsection of the community. A taboo acknowledged by a particular group or tribe as part of their ways aids in the cohesion of the group, helps that particular group to stand out and maintain its identity in the face of others and therefore creates a feeling of "belonging".
The meaning of the word taboo has been somewhat expanded in the to strong prohibitions relating to any area of human activity or custom that is sacred or forbidden based on Morality, religious beliefs, or cultural norms. This article contains quotations from this source, which is available under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC by 2.0) license.
The term was translated to him as "consecrated, inviolable, forbidden, unclean or cursed". Tapu is usually treated as a unitary, non-compound word inherited from Proto-Polynesian * tapu." taboo". Online Etymology Dictionary. It also exists in other Oceanic languages outside Polynesian, such as Fijian language tabu, or Hiw language (Vanuatu) toq.
Those words descend from an etymon * tabu in the ancestral Proto-Oceanic language, whose meaning was reconstructed as "forbidden, off limits; sacred, due to a sentiment of awe before spiritual forces".
In its current use in Tongan, the word tapu means "sacred" or "holy", often in the sense of being restricted or protected by custom or law. On the main island, the word is often appended to the end of "Tonga" as Tongatapu, here meaning "Sacred South" rather than "Forbidden South".
Common taboos involve restrictions or ritual regulation of killing and hunting; sex and sexual relationships; reproduction; the dead and their graves; as well as food and dining (primarily cannibalism and dietary laws such as vegetarianism, kashrut, and halal) or religious (treif and haram). In Madagascar, a strong code of taboos, known as fady, constantly change and are formed from new experiences. Each region, village or tribe may have its own fady.
The word taboo gained popularity at times, with some scholars looking for ways to apply it where other English words had previously been applied. For example, J. M. Powis Smith, in his book The American Bible (editor's preface 1927), used taboo occasionally in relation to Israel's Tabernacle and ceremonial laws, including , ; ; , , and .
Albert Schweitzer wrote a chapter about taboos of the people of Gabon. As an example, it was considered a misfortune for twins to be born, and they would be subject to many rules not incumbent on other people.Schweitzer, Albert. African Notebook 1958. Indiana University Press
The most notable looking taboo in Greek myth can be found in the story of Orpheus and Eurydice. Orpheus, the son of Apollo, was well-renowned as a legendary musician whose music could move anything and everything, living or not, in the world. While walking among her people in tall grass at her wedding, Eurydice was set upon by a satyr. In her efforts to escape the satyr, Eurydice fell into a nest of vipers and suffered a fatal bite on her heel. Her body was discovered by Orpheus who, overcome with grief, played such sad and mournful songs that all the humans, nymphs, and gods learnt about his sorrow and grief and wept with him. On the gods' advice, Orpheus traveled to the greek underworld wherein his music softened the hearts of Hades and Persephone, who agreed to allow Eurydice to return with him to earth on one condition: he should guide her out and not look back until they both had reached the upper world. As he reached the upper world, Orpheus looked back toward Eurydice in his eagerness to reunite with her, tragically forgetting about the looking taboo given to him by Hades, and since Eurydice had not crossed into the upper world, she vanishes back into the Underworld, this time forever.
A speaking taboo in Greek myth can be found in the story of Anchises, the father of the Troy Trojan War Aeneas. Aphrodite had fallen in love with the mortal Anchises after Zeus persuaded Eros to shoot her with an arrow to cause these emergent feelings.Roman, L., & Roman, M. (2010). One interpretation recounts that Aphrodite pretended to be a Phrygians princess and seduced him, only to later reveal herself as a goddess and inform Anchises that she will bear him a son named Aeneas and warns him not to tell anyone that he lay with a goddess. Anchises does not heed this speaking taboo and later brags about his encounter with Aphrodite, and as a result, he is struck in the foot with a thunderbolt by Zeus. Thereafter, he is lame in that foot so that Aeneas has to carry him from the flames of Troy.
Another, albeit lesser-known, speaking taboo in Greek myth can be found in the story of Actaeon. Actaeon, whilst on a hunting trip in the woods, mistakenly and haplessly happened upon the bathing Artemis.Callimachus, Hymn v.Callimachus gives no site: a glen in the foothills of Cithaeron near Boeotian Orchomenus, is the site according to Euripides, Bacchae 1290–92, a spring sanctuary near Plataea is specified elsewhere. When Artemis realized that Actaeon had seen her undressed, thus desecrating her chastity, she punished him for his luckless profanation of her virginity's mystery by forbidding him from speech. Whether it be due to forgetfulness or outright resistance, Actaeon defied his speaking taboo and called for his hunting dogs. Due to his failure in abiding by his speaking taboo, Artemis turned Actaeon into a stag and turned his dogs upon him. Actaeon was torn apart and ravaged by his loyal dogs who did not recognize their former master.
In Islam, the story of Adam and Eve is quite different, though it contains an eating taboo: the Quran mentions that Adam (Arabic language: آدم), as the successive authority of earth by decree of Allah, is placed in a paradisal garden (not Jannah nor the Garden of Eden) therein along with his wife (unnamed in the Quran, though the Hadith gives her the name Ḥawwā’, Arabic: حواء); such a paradise this garden was, that they would never go hungry nor unclothed, nor would they ever thirst or be exposed to the sun's heat. Allah took a promise from Adam:
Iblis, angered at his expulsion from Jannah for refusing to bow to Adam at his inception, decided to trick Adam and his wife into being shunned by Allah, just as he was. Allah had warned Adam and his wife about Iblis, telling them that he was a "clear enemy". Iblis swore in the name of Allah that he was their sincere advisor, revealed unto Adam and his wife each other's nakedness, and convinced them to eat from the forbidden tree so that they may never taste death. After eating from the tree (thus breaking the eating taboo), Allah removes Adam and his wife from their paradisal garden, telling them that mankind will be condemned with some being enemies with others on the earth wherein they will be provided habitation and provision, for a while, and “There you will live, there you will die, and from there you will be resurrected.”
In the Gnosticism telling of this story, the taboo is a plot by the archons to keep Adam in a state of ignorance by preventing him from eating the fruit, which allows him to attain gnosis after the serpent, who is viewed as representative of the divine world, convinces him and Eve to eat it.
A looking taboo can be found in the Judeo-Christian telling of the story of Lot found within the Book of Genesis. In , two angels in the form of men arrived in Sodom at eventide and were invited by Lot to spend the night at his home. The men of Sodom were exceedingly wicked and demanded Lot that he bring his two guests out so that they might "know" them; instead, Lot offered up his two daughters, who had not "known" man, but they refused. As dawn was breaking, Lot's visiting angels urged him to get his family and flee, so as to avoid being caught in the impending disaster for the iniquity of the city. The command was given, "Flee for your life! Do not look behind you, nor stop anywhere in the Plain; flee to the hills, lest you be swept away." Whilst fleeing, Lot's wife broke the looking taboo by turning to look back at the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and was turned into a pillar of salt as punishment for disobeying the angels' warning.
Changing social customs and standards also create new taboos, such as bans on slavery; extension of the pedophilia taboo to ephebophilia; prohibitions on Prohibition, smoking ban, or psychopharmaceutical consumption (particularly among pregnant women), unmoderated discussions of politics and religion, sexual harassment and sexual objectification are increasingly becoming taboo in recent decades.
Incest itself has been pulled both ways, with some seeking to normalize consensual adult relationships regardless of the degree of kinship (notably in Europe) and others expanding the degrees of prohibited contact (notably in the United States).Joanna Grossman, Should the law be kinder to kissin' cousins? Although the term taboo usually implies negative connotations, it is sometimes associated with enticing propositions in proverbs such as forbidden fruit is the sweetest.Ladygina-Kots, Nadezhda Nikolaevna. "Infant Ape and Human Child: (Instincts, Emotions, Play, Habits)." Journal of Russian & East European Psychology 38.1 (2000): 5–78.
In medicine, professionals who practice in ethical and moral Loophole, or fields subject to social stigma such as late termination of pregnancy, may refrain from public discussion of their practice. Among other reasons, this taboo may come from concern that comments may be taken out of the appropriate context and used to make ill-informed policy decisions that would lead to (otherwise preventable) maternal death.
Function
Communist and materialist theorists have argued that taboos can be used to reveal the histories of societies when other records are lacking. Marvin Harris explains taboos as a consequence of ecologic and economic conditions.
Modernity
Some argue that contemporary Western multiculturalism societies have taboos against (for example, ethnocentrism and nationalism) and (racism, sexism, homophobia, extremism and religious fanaticism).
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