THE DYNAMICS OF CULTURAL DISCONTINUITY IN A PEASANT SOCIETY.

In this paper I have tried to suggest some probable extensions and projections into the future of what is at present a dimly visible and restricted condition. As previously reported, the situation at present is stable, in the sense that the attitudes supporting the traditional way of life of both Ladinos and Indians are dominant, and some of the tensions are capable of being drained off by desertion of Indians to other areas. Moreover, the average Indian is so securely orientated and integrated to a pattern of poverty, illness, and hard work that he seems quite capable of taking considerable slack in his psychological belt to adjust to still more of the same. The dynamics of alienation from tradition are at present cumulating their forces. How quickly the power which they contain will be recognized by or forced upon the Indians and Ladinos is a matter of speculation. The evidence would seem to point to considerable resistance to any variation in the way of life to adjust to the new forces at work. It is for this reason that in a previous paper the situation was described as one which has much promise of long life. For, there always remains the alternative that the Indians will grow increasingly small in numbers, but will nevertheless stubbornly keep up their traditions. If this alternative is pursued, it may be some generations yet before they either effectively disappear as a local community, or, through various other mechanisms, become so altered as to be no longer recognizable for what they were in 1940. It seems of significance to note here, finally, that the stratification by age and generation and the vertical division of the sexes in the community have come to have special significance. It makes considerable difference to the observer whether he views the situation through the eyes of a young man or an old man, a father or a son, a mother or a daughter. One does not get the same picture from any randomly selected individual in the community. This in some measure is a decided qualification on the usual assumption of homogeneity of such peasant or primitive communities, an assumption which underlies the use of one or two "trust- worthy informants" as the principal sources of information about such communities. These materials therefore incidentally suggest that a more adequate sampling of peasant populations in transition is called for than has hitherto been practiced in typical ethnographic investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]