Elderly People Growing Tails

The Constitution of a Nonempirical Idea

Bibliographic Data

ID2226319
AuthorsG Forth (0000-0001-6298-8665, corresponding author)
Year2018
Volume59
Issue4
Pages397-414
Publication date2018-08-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueCurrent Anthropology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0011-3204 • E-ISSN: 1537-5382
PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1086/698936
OpenAlexW2883866510
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited19

Since the inception of the discipline, anthropologists have endeavored to explain why people the world over develop ideas that lack empirical support and how such ideas are accepted as true. This article deals with a claim found among the Nage people of eastern Indonesia, namely, that extremely elderly people grow tails. The idea is discussed in relation to local experiences of aging and the elderly and in relation to cosmological beliefs with which it appears consistent, and it is further analyzed in the context of Nage folk biology. By drawing on cognitivist theory, it is then demonstrated how the representation comprises a counterintuitive idea that readily combines with intuitive knowledge relating to observable processes of physical change in elderly humans. Also discussed are a notional taboo on looking at the putative tails that reinforces the belief, in part by adding to its counterintuitive appeal, and the idea's potential for enabling younger people to distance themselves ontologically from senility

Constitution · Context (archaeology · Counterintuitive · Epistemology · Notional amount · Political science · Politics · Relation (database · Representation (politics · Sociology · Taboo · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Anthropology · Computer Science · Geographies of human-animal interactions · History · Law · Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies · Philosophy · Psychology

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