The Bushmen vs. the Romans
In this paper I compare the non literate society of the African Bushmen to the ancient agricultural society of Rome. I specifically compare the human institution of family. The other institutions are religion, education, economy, and politics. These five institutions are ways that all humans meet their needs. They connect all humans. The men and women of the Bushmen, play two different roles in the family. Men provide for the family when in reality the food the wife scavenge sustains the family. The men are the hunters of the family. The women are the gatherers. They find nuts, berries and other vegetation. Whatever the wife brings home from a day of scavenging is hers to share with her family. When a man comes back from the hunt with meat, it is divided up it portions and distributed throughout the tribe. The parents' job is to provide food and nurture their children. The children are the main concern for Bushmen parents. For example, in the video the father gets baby birds to make broth for his child. He says that he nor his wife will drink any of the broth. Bushmen parents are very loving as seen when they play with their children and take special pains to entertain them. Perhaps one motivation be
The Romans lived with extended families. Grandparents, uncles, and aunts could all live in the same place. These families did much to entertain themselves. They played musical instruments and told stories. Casson Lionel. Daily Life in Ancient Rome. New York: American Heritage Publishing Co.. 1975 In the Bushmen society there are extended families. This means that not just husband and wife and sons and daughters live together. Grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. live together. If and when the children became adults they were married. The marriages were arranged by the head of the house. Women were married around ages 12-15 years and males ages 14-17 years. This could have very well been the rite of passage into adulthood. The ceremonies were formal and not very elaborate. The woman usually wore a special dress to show the specialness of the occasion. In the ceremony certain rituals were performed to ensure the couples welfare as a new family. A modern aspect of Roman marriage was the availability of divorce. Only men held this power at first but it was later granted to affluent women. One thing that is clearly different from the two cultures is that the Roman community did not act as a family like the Bushmen did. Their community would have been a very large one seeing as Rome had 600,000-800,000 citizens. There would be no way to see that every citizen was provided for. Unless, that is, if everyone was brought to an equal status. There was a clear line between the rich and the poor in Rome. Possessions were very important to the Romans. You got many privileges if you were rich and none if you were poor. Each family was very different because of these privileges.
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1153
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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