Music and Mysticism in Totemic Cultures

People in many traditional cultures around the world live intimately close to nature and regard natural objects and processes as having thoughts and wills just like those of humans. Therefore, the sounds of nature are widely interpreted as the voices of spirits and gods.

These spirits and gods are the real forces in the world, not humans, who depend on the goodwill of the spirits and gods to provide humans with a livable environment. Different cultures use different means to summon and propitiate the forces of nature, but one virtually universal component in that communication is sound, often in its heightened form of music.

Some of those traditional cultures follow a belief system known as totemism. Totemism is a form of social organization based on the belief in a kinship or a mystical relationship between one or more persons and an animal, plant, or other object or natural force.

That object or force is called a totem. The word totem comes from Ojibwa ototeman ("his totem," signifying a blood relationship).

Peoples exemplifying this form of society still exist, or have recently existed, all over the world, especially in Africa, India, Oceania, North America, and parts of South America. Among the totemic cultures are the Australian Aborigines, the African Pygmies, the Nor-Papua of New Guinea, the Iban of Malaysia, the Birhor of India, some Ugrians and western Siberians, and some tribes of herdsmen in northern and central Asia.

The totemic world is anthropomorphic and sonic. All things in nature are animated by good and evil spirits, who have voices and whose interaction determines the course of the world.

The sounds of nature are the voices of the spirits who dwell in natural objects. The spirits are the totem gods, the audible souls of the mythic ancestors of humankind.

Each totem god, during its life on earth, called into being one kind of object or creature: the kangaroo god, the kangaroo; the cloud god, the cloud; the flute god, the flute; and so on. The totem gods died, but their mystical bodies and spirits still live in the totems, in which the gods (dead ancestors) constantly reincarnate themselves. The sounding souls of the dead are the givers of life and preservers of the world.

The role of humans in totemism is to maintain the health and welfare of the totems. Each tribe entrusts a person or a clan to care for a particular totem and to worship the corresponding god (ancestor).

A worshiper communicates with a totem god by copying the physical characteristics of the totem and by vocally imitating its sound (voice). A believer will behave like a tiger, a wind, a wave, a tree, or another natural entity while imitating its noises. Worshipers representing many different totems hold "nature concerts" of such sounds.

The voice is regarded as "a mysterious bond uniting all things in the universe." When a worshiper imitates the voice of a totem with realism, a mystical unity occurs between the person and the totem: "whoever croaks like a frog, is a frog." The vocal imitation becomes a song, and "the song represents the dwelling of the dead ancestor, or is itself the dead ancestor, who, together with all the other ancestors, forms the substance of the world. Vocal imitation is the strongest form of mystic participation in the surrounding world." (Schneider, 9-10)

Among the Nor-Papua, for example, totem animals are imagined to be spirit creatures dwelling in sacred flutes, in figures preserved in each person's house, or in other disguises. At the end of initiation ceremonies, the members of the group mimic the totems.

A central place in the belief system of the Australian Aborigines is held by the corroboree, a festivity in which the people celebrate special events by singing and dancing while imitating totem birds, fish, animals of other kinds, and natural phenomena, such as storms and floods.

Among the Wiradjuri of Australia, the medicine man has his own individual totem. By singing, the medicine man sends out the spirit of his totem for various purposes, such as to destroy an enemy. To transmit his totem to a novice, the medicine man has the candidate lie on his back, places a replica of the totem animal on the person's chest, and "sings" the spirit of the totem "into" him. The medicine man then instructs the apprentice through song.

The process of calling out a totem god is analogous to the technique of causing an open string on a musical instrument to vibrate by sounding its tone on a nearby instrument (a phenomenon called resonance). By singing a totem god's name or song, or by playing a flute in the presence of the god's image on a mask, the performer forces the god to sound in the singer's breath, in the flute, or in the mask-that is, to become substantially (acoustically) present.

The sound (voice) is "the ultimate indestructible substance of each object," including humans. Every person has an individual sound or is a particular melody. This sonic substance leaves a person's body at death by escaping through the mouth in the form of the death rattle, or through the nose as the sound of breathing, and carries away the person's soul. The soul "(that is, the substance of the human being) survives as an essence (spirit) which is perceptible only in sound." (Schneider, 10)

This equivalence between the sonic human soul and the sonic ancestral totems provides the basis for a totemic culture's belief system (humans and totems are both sonic and therefore akin) and serves as the vehicle by which humans can mystically enter, and absorb the wisdom and power of, the spirit world of the totems.