For this paper, I will be looking at the musical expression of the Yurok and Yaqui tribes of Native North America. There are two major types of musical expression for the Yurok, world renewal dances, and medicine songs. Both of types of music are sacred and hold a prominent place in Yurok society. For the purpose of this paper, I am going to focus on the world renewal dances because they provide interesting similarities and differences to Yaqui Deer songs. Yaqui Deer songs can be sung by themselves, but they provide the most amount of information about the Yaqui culture and religion when they are performed within the context of the Deer Dance, which is a night-long dance that originally preceded a deer hunt. Before we can dive into Yurok and
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It is Wohpekumeu’s actions that the Yurok often imitate so that they can gain favor from the wo’gey. Wohpekumeu very much is both wo’gey and human; his actions depict the best and worst qualities of the wo’gey and humans. The most likely reason that the Yurok revere Wohpekumeu above all of the other spirit beings in their culture is that he shows the greatest potential and worst pitfalls of being a human. Like humans have with language and ritual, Wohpekumeu can speak things into being and transform them, yet at the same time, he is gluttonous and constantly lusting after women. The Yurok can relate to Wohpekumeu on a deep level because he has made horrible choices and paid the consequences, like when he had sex with Skate and she blinded him, but he has also done heroic acts, such as bringing fire to mankind (Kroeber 207, …show more content…
Sigmund Freud originated the theory that our personalities are made of an id, ego and super ego. The id is pure desire, the super ego is made up of society’s rules and the ego develops out of our choices between our desires and the rules placed on us. Babies and children don’t have a super ego yet, they do everything they can to get what they want, and so does Wohpekumeu; he is pure id. Whenever Wohpekumeu wants food or companionship, he seeks it out and tricks as many people as he needs to in order to get what he wants. If Wohpekumeu can’t get what he wants on his own, he cries and expects someone else to get it for him. Crying is an expression of his lack of an ego or super
It is Wohpekumeu’s actions that the Yurok often imitate so that they can gain favor from the wo’gey. Wohpekumeu very much is both wo’gey and human; his actions depict the best and worst qualities of the wo’gey and humans. The most likely reason that the Yurok revere Wohpekumeu above all of the other spirit beings in their culture is that he shows the greatest potential and worst pitfalls of being a human. Like humans have with language and ritual, Wohpekumeu can speak things into being and transform them, yet at the same time, he is gluttonous and constantly lusting after women. The Yurok can relate to Wohpekumeu on a deep level because he has made horrible choices and paid the consequences, like when he had sex with Skate and she blinded him, but he has also done heroic acts, such as bringing fire to mankind (Kroeber 207, …show more content…
Sigmund Freud originated the theory that our personalities are made of an id, ego and super ego. The id is pure desire, the super ego is made up of society’s rules and the ego develops out of our choices between our desires and the rules placed on us. Babies and children don’t have a super ego yet, they do everything they can to get what they want, and so does Wohpekumeu; he is pure id. Whenever Wohpekumeu wants food or companionship, he seeks it out and tricks as many people as he needs to in order to get what he wants. If Wohpekumeu can’t get what he wants on his own, he cries and expects someone else to get it for him. Crying is an expression of his lack of an ego or super