Environment
To talk about the
Mongolian culture one have to understand the distinction between the country of
Mongolia which bordered with Russian an China,
and the Mongolian ethnic group who live in some parts of China, and Russian,
but mainly in Mongolia. I will present the geographical description of Mongolia
because 94.9% of its population is Mongol. Today around 20% of its total
population spend 1.25$ per day, 12% have access to internet, 30% are nomadic
or semi-nomadic, and a few people has access to essential service like clean
water. The climate is dry and sunny with very
different temperature in the same day in any season. In spring there are many
sandstorms. During summer rains mainly occur, and the average temperature is 65
°F.
It is usual to snow during fall. Winter are harsh with some snow (-13°F).
Mongolia is known as the country of the “Blue Sky” because it has an estimate
of 240 of sunny days. Mongolia is very diverse and unique on its flora and
fauna because it has different natural regions from mountain forest near the
cold Siberian border and the arid Central
Asian. Its land surface consist in grassland
and shrubs 52%, forest 15%, and desert vegetation 32%Also Mongolia has a huge
fauna with more than 400 species of birds, and its rivers and lakes have around
380 species of offish. Among all its animal kingdom on can find exotic spices
like snow leopard, Argali and Ibex.
Adaptations
Mongols have been
developed physical adaptations to maintain homeostasis and survive. They had to
overcome the environmental stress of windy and snowy climes and low
temperatures. First they developed epicanthic
folds around their eyes for protection, so Mongols have a natural eyes
protection against the wind and snow.
The second physical adaptation that Mongols show is their small bodies.
Mongols can keep their body heat easier than Africans because their bodies are
smaller, so warm blood can travel fast through the body to keep them warm.
The
cultural adaptations of traditional Mongolian culture are simple to identify:
nomadic lifestyle, pastoralism and use of horses. First, there is their nomadic
lifestyle. When they had a unexpected disaster in their territory, they could
establish easily in a new place, and live peacefully. Because of their nomadic
lifestyle, they develop another cultural adaptation called pastoralism.
Pastoralism consists in take advantage of grasses. Mongols have not been living in a proper
area for agriculture, so they have been using the grass around them to feed
their animals. A third cultural adaptation is their use of horses. Mongols have
been training horses for centuries. The use horses was an important factor to
won their wars, and they them to travel long distance like when Mongols move
out to a new place.
Language
The main language used by Mongols is Mongolian that is part of the Ual - Altaic language family where Kazakh, Turkish,
Korean and Finnish are included. One of the characteristic of Mongolian
language is that it has a lot of vowels (compared to other languages), and it
makes difficult to foreigners to heard the difference between sounds. Mongolian
has a written system which has a long history, and the creation of its written
system reflects how great the Mongolian Empire was. In
1204 Genghis Khan ordered the creation for the Mongolian written system. One
can see that when a society became big and complex, it needs written system to
have order and control. Moving one, one can find interesting facts in Mongolian
language; for example, even though Mongolian,
Korean and Japanese are very different language, they have a similar grammar
structure. The other interesting fact about Mongolian language is that it has
more than 2 million words.
Gender role
Mongolian culture has a division between its two
genders. Men typically are in charge of military, political care of animal’s
matters. On other hand, women in the Mongol culture are mainly in charge of
housework and childcare. Mongolian women can enjoy of a high social status
because fertility is more important than virginity for the society.
Historically men seem to have more important importance, but women have an
important a crucial role. It is common to a man to get married to an older
woman, so he can get advances by her wisdom. If a man did not listen to her wife’s
advices, he would be label as immature.
There are some activities that both gender share.
For example, in making and breaking
camps or caring of some animals, and sometimes woman receive military training
to fight with men. However, there is not a crossover gender in all activities
because men are always expecting to hunt and fight in wars, but never do
housework. Young learn the genders role by the examples of the adults.
There is not a specific age when they became a boy or a girl become adult, but
they started to help their parents with small duties like caring small animal,
cooking and cleaning the house.
I
am not sure if Williamson will be very welcome in the Mongolian culture because
topic of intersexed people is new for me. I would say that if an intersexed
child will be rise as a normally child, and then the parents will decide if the
teen should have duties of a woman or men
Subsistence:
The main food items of Mongolian culture are meat of
mutton, beef and goat, and milk with other daily
products from those animals. Traditional Mongolian diet is provided by its
livestock, so the products are available throughout the whole year. Children only do animal caring with small
animals when they became teenager boys are allow to hunt and work with big animals,
and girls help their mother by cleaning and cooking. Men are mainly responsible
for livestock, and women for housework. Traditional Mongolian diet had
to change over time because it lack of iodine, so Mongolian diet has adopted vegetables,
pasta and rice. Globalization has helped them to get easier access to the
products that they do not have.
Economic systems:
Economic activity in Mongolia
culture is traditionally based on herding of animals, livestock and the product
derived from them. In the old Mongolia the economic system was basically on
trade animals and daily products for goods that they did not have. People did
not show great labor specialization because they were more a warrior culture. On
other hand, today Mongolia export Cooper, apparel, livestock, cashmere, wool,
hides, fluorspar coal and another nonferrous metals to China, Canada, UK and
U.S. Mongolian’ import are mainly flue, machinery, equipment, chemicals, foodstuffs,
cars which are from Russia, China, and Japan. Also Mongolia has many mineral
deposits, but most of them still unexploited Mongolia economy is very depending
on its two giants neighbors Russia and China, and unfortunately Mongolia do not
have adequate ways of transportation to connect North and South.
Marriage
The traditional Mongol
culture is monogamous, and it allows people get married with their relatives. A
man can marry his sister, but just from his father’s side. Also, even a man can
get married his father’s wife if the father dies. In the old Mongol culture
marriage was an agreement between the families involved where proximity and
social stratum played and important role. It was common
that the groom had to pay a dowry of livestock, jewelry, and clothing, so it shows that the women
had an importance in the culture because fertility has an important place.
Mongolian culture had patrilineal system, so the new couple would move to the groom’s family camp, but a bride still in contact with her
family. I am not sure if
traditional Mongolian culture allow homosexuality, but in Mongolia homosexually
was illegal especially during the time of the Soviet Union, and in 2002 it was
legalized.
Kinship
Mongolian culture has a
patrilineal
descent system so they traced descent from fathers to sons, and it shows that
men control the wealth and power of households. The maternal side of a family had
less importance than the paternal side. A husband is the highest authority in
his household, but his wife is a big support for him because she gives him
advices and consolation. Inheritance is just given to the sons, and the
youngest one receives the biggest part than the others.
Social
organization
Mongolian
social organization has change over the time, but it has always been stratified.
Mongolian society used to be divided in hierarchy families, clans, tribes, confederations,
and in social classes such as nobility, herders, artisans and slaves existed.
The distinctions amount the social classes were clothing, headdresses, jewelry,
and horse-blankets. The actual Mongolian society is divided by social classes
which are structured by economic status. In old and actual Mongolian culture
has been existing mobility, so individual can get a higher or lower position.
Political
structure
Today in Mongolia the
political power is divided in its Executive power, Legislative power and
Judiciary power. Mongols elect a president every 4 years, and the president
have to share his executive power with a prime minister. The legislative power
is a unicameral parliament which is made of 76 representatives who are elected by
the people, and this power is in charge to pass and change laws. In the
judicial branch consist in a chief judge and 12 subordinate judges who interpret the Mongolian constitution.
Today the government is trying to reduce every expression of violence, and especially
domestic violence which is very common.
Belief
Systems
Mongolian culture used to be shamanism, but then it
adopted Tibetan Buddhism which does not have any God, so it is neither
monotheistic nor polytheistic. However, when a person accomplishes the goal of
becoming a Buddha, he is considering as a deity. Buddhism was originated in 5th
century on India. The is unclear how Mongols adopted Buddhism, but Mongols started
to have sympathy for Buddhism when in 1240 the Mongolian prince Konton with his
Forces entered to the Tibet, and met with
the Tibetan Buddhist master Sakya Pandita. Also, other factors that have
could influenced the adoption of Buddhism are the similarities between Tibetan
and Mongol culture like both culture were Nomadic pastoralism, and their
geography and cultural distance to Chinese culture.
Buddhism
is one
of the major world religions. It
is based on the principles of non-violence,
loving and kindness for all living things, peace, tolerance and
compassion. Also, encourages human to live as the Buddha masters by reach a state of peace. After the decline of
the Yuan Dynasty, the Mongolian culture stated to suffer
foreign and internal wars. Mongols started to see life vain and sorrowful, but
Buddhism brought
internal pace stability to them. Tradition Mongolian culture will not function
without its religion becose it has become part of it.
Art
Artwork:
Mongolian culture present painting and sculpture, and both of
them had religions and decoration purpose. The primitive Mongolian paintings were made in
rock, and Mongolian nomadic used for informative purpose
Music Mongols
used music to express their love for their houses and the nature around them,
so they use music for entertainment. The Mongolian traditional instruments are horse-head fiddle, tovshuur,
shudrag, and Khuuchir.
Performance:
Mongolian culture has been showed interest for dancing, and it first
performances were about shamanism, and tell relevant battle and events
Conclusion
Mongolian culture
has been affected by many cultures through
the time from my point of view a positive change was the adoption of Buddhism and
a negative impact would be its interaction with the Soviet Union. Mongolian
culture used to practice shamanism, and because of its interaction with the Tibet,
the adopted Buddhism as its main religion. I do not have anything against
shamanism, and I respect people who practice it. However, I think that Buddhism
is great religion, and we can learn something from its ideas of no-violence and
peace. The interaction of Mongolia with the Soviet Union had a negative impact
for Mongolian culture. Communism always seeks to destroy and remove the culture
of the country, and one example of it was the destruction of many Buddhist temples,
and the murder of many monks in Mongolia.
Mongolian culture is in risk of lost their cultural identity because its
government is not making enforce to preserve it. Every year Mongolia is becoming
more and industrialized country.
Mongolian culture used to be a huge empire with an important role in
Asia, but today it does not have a relevant role in the modern world. Mongols play
an important role to Russia and China because they have a trade line.
sources
Great opening section and good discussion on adaptations and language.
ReplyDeleteYou wander a bit when talking about economy. Remember we are talking about the culture of the Mongols here, not the nation of Mongolia, so this needed to focus on the economic system of the cultural groups, not the economy of the country of Mongolia. This applies to your political discussion as well.
Good catch on the influence on the Soviet Union on the issue of homosexuality. Good note on cultural change influences. It is interesting to see how the culture changes again after the influence is removed.
Great section on spirituality and your section on culture change was well done.
One additional comment: The Mongols are known historically as being a warring culture. Take Genghis Khan, for example. I notice that you didn't mention this in your discussion of violence, even though this was a key trait of the culture at one point. Has this changed in modern populations or does it still play a role?
ReplyDeleteI really liked your post, especially the section about gender roles. It's really interesting that men like to marry older, fertile women. It seems like in our culture,people prefer women who aren't old or don't have many children. Perhaps marrying their widowed step-mothers is acceptable partially because they find older women attractive.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed your post and learning about the Mongols. I especially enjoyed the sections on gender roles, marriage, and your concluding paragraph. I found the gender roles fascinating and how men can marry their sisters or even their father's wife. Your post was really interesting.
ReplyDeleteIt was hard to made distinction between Mongolian Culture and Mongolia, and I thought that Mongolia would be like the actual Mongolian culture because most of the people there are Mongols.
ReplyDeleteCertainly in the old Mongolian culture violence was very common. The Mongolian Empire killed thousands of people in China, Persia, Russia, Hungary and Eastern Europe. Genghis Khan created a empire bigger Rome Empire.I think Mongolian culture has become less violence because of the adoption of Buddhism and its weak military forces.
Thank you for the reply.
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