outside reading # 2 - Kim Robinson

2. Once again I’m going back to talk about readings from my anthropology class. Along with studying Hmong shamanism, we also learned about the Lost Boys of Sudan, the Dinka. These men were once youngboys targeted to become kid soldiers and their entire family and village could and were attacked by northern forces. These boys fled from their homeland of Sudan to Ethiopia and then Kenya on a 5 year journey and now many still live in the Kakuma refugee camp. So what do these boys have to do with our class? While living in Africa many southern Sudanese were members of small nomadic groups that practiced forms of animism, even though they also believed in the God, Nhialic. Animism is a common form of primal religions in which the animals are sacred to the people, and in this case their sacred animal is a cow. The Dinka herd and take care of their cows and often sacrifice the cows in ritual ceremonies for various reasons. Even though the sacrifice their beloved animal the treat the remains with respect and use every aspect of the cow. Cows are common figures of worship in animistic religions. Also in the book rituals of Dinka rites of passage are discussed and about how these rituals are fading away. Although the book doesn’t go into explicit detail about the ritual, one aspect of it is the boys enduring pain while having a sharp object pierce they’re forehead. This ritual is going through the same thing many other rituals and myths from many different religions and cultures are going through, the fading of tradtion. Being away from their homelands and not being able to live the life they once lived the Dinka have had to adapt and certain aspects of their culture have began to completely fade away. Many other people have to go through the same thing too. With modernization and globalization, older features of small cultures have begun to disappear.