Читать книгу Harlan's Crops and Man - H. Thomas Stalker - Страница 26

As previously indicated, the evidence seems to show that populations of hunter‐gatherers are maintained well below the carrying capacity of the range. This is, in part, what keeps the system so stable and durable. When crops fail, farmers die of starvation, but famine is not recorded among gatherers except where there has been a drastic disturbance by outside agents (Coon, 1971):

In every well‐documented instance, cases of hardship may be traced to the intervention of modern intruders. Starvation came to the Caribou Eskimo only after a few Cree Indians, armed with automatic rifles, had slaughtered a whole migration of caribou to cut out their tongues to sell to white canners.

What methods are used to keep the population stable? There seems to be little consistency in methodology; the only generality seems to be that some method or combination of methods is employed by each group. Infanticide is common, but far from universal. Since males are usually preferred to females, the practice may result in markedly displaced sex ratios in the population. Invalidicide is widespread, although some tribes treat the sick and injured with consideration and do not withhold customary medicines. Delayed marriage, late weaning, and wide spacing of children are among the most common methods of population control, and computer studies have shown that these alone can adequately stabilize a population (Skolnick & Cannings, 1972). Geronticide (killing of the aged) is also practiced in some tribes. In addition, warfare, raids, feuds, and similar activities often affect population size.

In general, there seems to be no model that has very wide application. Lee (1968) specifically investigated the situation of the aged among the Bushmen: “In a total population of 466, no fewer than 46 individuals (17 men and 29 women) were determined to be over 60 years of age, a proportion that compares favorably to the percentage of elderly in industrialized populations.”

It is evident, then, that the “nasty, brutish, and short” stereotype of the hunting–gathering life styles was a product of an egocentric sense of superiority and that all features of it are demolished by serious anthropological studies.