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The Unique Mawlynnong People: An Analysis of Matrilineal Culture in Rural India

In this exhibition, the culture of the people of Mawlynnong village, India will be analyzed, as it is expressed through various media forms. The people of Mawlynnong village is worth to get the attention is because, unlike almost all cultural groups today, the members of this small village are part of a matrilineal and generally matriarchal tradition. Their culture will be examined primarily through the methodology of ethnography, as this offers the best chance to define and relate to the unusual social aspects of the Mawlynnong media-culture.The cultural and media ‘footprint’ of the people of Mawlynnong is incredibly small (as you will see, the total population of the village is less than 500 people, making locating any examples of culture in media forms extremely difficult) there are several key ways in which the culture of the Mawlynnong people emerges through various media forms.

Figure 1 - Ritual dance of Mawlynnong's Khasi culture – women are given a central position

However, such an undertaking immediately comes with a question; why bother investigating the media and culture of a matrilineal Indian village in the first place? The answer is rather simple. Take, for example, the recent presidential elections in the United States. In the race between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, the idea of gender and sex played a key role. Many people were interested in the idea of a woman ruling the United States for the first time. After all, throughout human history, there are so few examples of women dominating society, either politically, culturally or socially. Furthermore, in recent examples of when women did have political power (for example, in the UK and in South Korea), this political power clearly did not reflect the female dominance of that society, but rather of women rising to the top of a primarily patriarchal system. The Mawlynnong culture, one the other hand, does give a modern, real-world example of a situation where women dominate society socially and culturally, as well as politically. The Mawlynnong, therefore, become worthy of study as a way of observing what we can learn from a unique, modern example of matrilineal culture and society.

For this exhibition, visual examples of Mawlynnong cultural practices will be focused as seen in the media, particularly of Mawlynnong dance and clothing seen in videos and photographs. The paper will also focus on media examples of key Mawlynnong cultural practices like the creation of so-called ‘living bridges’ and the Mawlynnong practice of constant group cleaning and maintenance of their village. Cultural practices seen in visual examples of the Mawlynnong people will be analyzed throughout the exhibit. The culture of the Mawlynnong promotes community spirit and environmentally friendly activities. Their values are extremely valuable and should be adapted to other cultures and societies, especially patriarchal societies.

Patrilineal/Patriarchal Culture

Patriarchy “denotes a social structure where the actions and ideas of men are dominant over those of women” (Soman, 2009, p. 253). Typically, patriarchal societies are also patrilineal, meaning that the family name (and often family possessions) passes through the male line, often to the eldest son, rather than to female members of society (Soman, 2009). It is important to note that patriarchal societies need not oppress women directly, but rather prioritise social, cultural, and economic practices that are aligned with goals from the male psyche and mindset (Soman, 2009). This kind of preference for male goals can take place intentionally, where people regard “women’s subordination as universal, God-given, or natural, hence immutable” (Lerner, 1986, p. 16). Of course, such prejudice can also take place unintentionally, where the person, people (or even entire society) acts in a patriarchal way without actually realising their bias (Lerner, 1986).

In terms of examples in media, the cultural influence of patriarchal and patrilineal societies can be either quite obvious or very subtle, but either way it is incredibly common. Take the following Budweiser advert (featured both online and on television):

Figure 2 - A typical modern Western Budweiser beer advertisement

Naturally, the image here appeals to the male psyche and male goals. One can only assume that the idea behind the advert is to associate purchasing Budweiser with the idea of meeting beautiful women. From an ethnographic perspective, the advert suggests the influence of patriarchal culture, in the sense that clearly here male desires are being catered to specifically (arguably at the expense of female dignity). Visually, the advert reduces the images of women to a kind of ‘window dressing’, and portrays women as sexual objects designed to do little more than selling a product. While such sexualisation of women could be seen as a rather simple expression of the idea that ‘sex sells’, the dominance of such imagery throughout television, film and new media commonly seen in Western culture suggests as much an exploitation of female qualities for the enjoyment of a patriarchal society as much as it is merely a sales technique.

The second aspect of patrilineal and patriarch societies is the apparent preference in media for activities and values that are primarily masculine. For example, the incredible rise of the sport right around the world, both as an aspect of cultural identity and as mass entertainment, can be connected to patrilineal and patriarchal concepts (Messner, 1988). In particular, the dominance of male sports icons in media stands out as an aspect of culture that denotes patrilineal and patriarchal societies. While there are isolated examples of female sports stars as centres of media attention (for example, in tennis, or in Winter Olympic sports), both online and on television, it is almost impossible to avoid the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo (figure 3), Tom Brady, Tiger Woods, or even slightly older sporting names like Wayne Gretsky. Indeed, the dominance of male figures in the world of sport is so pronounced that the various forms of media that surround the sporting world has become “an arena of ideological battles over gender relations” (Messner, 1988, p. 197). Messner goes on to say that “organized sport has been a crucial arena of struggle over basic social conceptions of masculinity and femininity” and concludes that organised sport, as it exists today, “has become a fundamental arena of ideological contest in terms of power relations between men and women” (Messner, 1988, p. 197).

Figure 3 - Famous Soccer Player Cristiano Ronaldo is idolized by millions worldwide

From this brief discussion of patrilineal societies and how the culture of such societies are reflected in media examples, the influence and dominance of masculine values and qualities are clear. As you will see, in matrilineal societies, often this power balance is reversed, with women were given a much more dominant role.

Understanding Matrilineal Societies

Matrilineal societies are structured quite differently than patrilineal societies. Typically, in matrilineal societies, the family name is passed down matrilineally, meaning that all possessions and titles are to be passed down through generations of female offspring to female offspring (Hartung, 1985).

Figure 4 - Traditional Khasi culture song

Matrilineal societies, at their core, can be defined in situations where “a woman's ‘family’ remains the family of her mother, brothers, and sisters even after she marries” (Hartung, 1985, p. 661). In such scenarios, wives will retain their mothers’ family name, her children will retain their grandmother’s family name, etc. Interestingly, Hartung suggests that the creation of matrilineal societies was a response to the same problems that led to the creation of patrilineal societies. This problem is the fact that “husbands risk investing a significant component of reproductive success in other men's children if wives engage in extramarital sex” (Hartung, 1985, p. 661). This, according to Hartung, was a big problem for earlier, more primitive societies. The problem is that, with no accurate way to distinguish one’s offspring from the offspring of another man, males could not be sure if their children (and all the thousands of hours spent raising the child) might really be the offspring of another man (Hartung, 1985).

Figure 5 - Traditional Khasi dresses

Patrilineal societies are obviously one way of dealing with this problem, as they usually put considerable social, cultural and potentially even legal constraints on the sexual activities of women, usually far more than the restrictions placed on men (Hartung, 1985). In this way, societies would try to ensure that patriarchal lines are maintained while minimizing the risk of female sexual activity breaking a family’s patrilineal lines (Hartung, 1985). However, matrilineal societies offer their own solution to this issue of sex and paternity. Matrilineal societies take advantage of the fact that, unlike the father, a child’s mother can always be correctly identified, for obvious reasons (i.e. they give birth to the child). From a social point of view, the immediate effect of focusing on the maternal line is that the continuity through generations can be identified without having to worry about the possibility of other sexual partners being involved (Hartung, 1985).

Mawlynnong: A Village of Khasi Culture

Mawlynnong is located in north-east India, in the area north-east of Bangladesh (Nieves, 2015). The total number of people living in the village of Mawlynnong is quite small, roughly 500 people, making identifying media examples of traditions specific to this village a difficult proposition (Nieves, 2015).

Figure 6 - Two Mawlynnong women wearing traditional clothing

The people of Mawlynnong identify as part of Khasi culture, an ethnic group made up of well over 1 million people (Mawrie, 1981). The Mawlynnong, for countless generations, have been a matrilineal society, with the youngest daughter inheriting “the lion’s share” of her mother’s property, as well as taking a central role in the decisions of the family (Mawrie, 1981, p. 17). Mawrie also notices that this matrilineal system goes back in time far enough to be tied to the Khasi myth about creation, which was done by a female god (Mawrie, 1981). This ties in with Hartung’s position highlighted in the previous section, that the creation of matrilineal societies was a solution to the ancient problem of sex and inheritance (Hartung, 1985). In this way, the Khasi matrilineal society is reinforced not just as a social and cultural necessity, but as a religious one too (Mawrie, 1981). All of this suggests that the Mawlynnong culture very much fits the general model of matrilineal societies that was discussed in the previous section. In fact, as a matriarchal leader of the family, a Mawlynnong mother is assigned all sorts of religious and cultural roles of importance, from creating older family members to feeding poor family members at religious feasts (Mawrie, 1981). Other unusual cultural practices include a tradition whereby married men often remain living in their mother’s home until they have had one or two children with their wife (Mawrie, 1981). It is also commonly found that men do much of the menial chores for the family that is commonly attributed to women in patrilineal societies (Mawrie, 1981). Compared to patrilineal and patriarchal societies, gone is any hint of the oppression of women. In fact, often times it can be the husband in the family unit who is given less responsibility and the more basic chores and tasks of the household (Bouissou, 2011). Some suggest that the family unit in Mawlynnong can actually oppress the male figure to some extent, with one Mawlynnong man commenting, unhappily, that “all he can do is play the guitar, sing, take to drink and die young” (Bouissou, 2011). While this final evidence is quite anecdotal, it does suggest that, very much like the stereotype of the ‘unhappy housewife’ in Western culture, so too can men take on this social role of positions are reversed. This role-reverse is another good example of how matrilineal seems to affect societies, and it is interesting to note that, by reversing the dominant social leader, the opposite gender is given the more menial tasks and responsibilities.Looking at visual the examples Mawlynnong and Khasi culture provided so far in this exhibit, many of these matrilineal and matriarchal elements can be clearly seen. In particular, in figure 1, we see Khasi women again and again in a position of power. They are dressed in expensive clothing, including a golden crown. Importantly, they are guarded and protected on all sides by men. These men are much more plainly dressed, and appear to be servants. As the dance continues, the women do very little to exert themselves, and instead watch on from the background as the males perform a kind of ritual dance, apparently for the entertainment of the women. Figure 5 and figure 6 show the traditional clothing of Khasi women in more detail. Note again the expensive clothing, the use of gold and jewelry. Again, these visual examples of Mawlynnong culture highlight the position of social and cultural dominance that women have in society.At this point, this exhibition has explained some of the ways that matrilineal Khasi culture is unique. I talked about key concepts related to matrilineal culture in general and then showed how visual examples of Khasi and Mawlynnong culture reinforce matrilineal beliefs, particularly by examining representations of ritual dance traditions and the traditional clothing of Khasi women compared to Khasi men. However, some the most interesting and unique aspects of Mawlynnong culture seen in media examples go beyond rituals and traditional clothing and actually affects some key practices in Mawlynnong society itself. I will explain these practices, and argue that these practices are extremely valuable, should be adapted to other cultures and societies.

Khasi Culture: ‘Living Bridges’ and Village Maintenance

Pictured below (figure 8) is one of the so-called ‘living bridges’ of Meghalaya (Meghalaya is the region in which the Mawlynnong village is located). These bridges are unique to this region and their construction is unique to Mawlynnong and Khasi culture. These bridges have become quite famous, and are one of the main ways that Mawlynnong culture is seen in media forms.

Figure 8 - A 'Living Bridge' made from roots and branches

The bridges are Ficus elastica plants that are literally grown, piece by piece, decade by decade, into the shape of a bridge (Shankar, 2015). Over the years, the bridges grow to support a lot of weight and are an impressive, innovative example of a ‘low tech’ solution to a very common engineering problem (Shankar, 2015). Beginning as small shoots that are little more than twigs, these bridges can take generations of care and growth before becoming strong enough to serve any purpose, such as the bridge shown in figure 8 (Shankar, 2015). However, once fully grown, the ‘bridges’ form a vital travel route for the wider, mostly rural people of the region. They offer vital routes over rivers that might otherwise be impassable, or that would wash away traditional bridges during the wet season (Chaudhuri et. al., 2016). In this way, the bridges have become an international media icon for a region that would otherwise be largely culturally anonymous, but also a vital piece of infrastructure for sustaining and enhancing everyday life. These bridges are one of the few ways that Mawlynnong culture has truly become visible on a global level, with many websites, photographers and analysts focusing on construction methods, the used to the local people, cultural influences, etc. These visual examples of Mawlynnong culture suggest that the Mawlynnong thinks about sustainability as a long-term issue, allowing them to find solutions to problems that are both environmentally friendly and suitable for the purposes of their community.This is an admirable quality of Mawlynnong culture and is something that all societies can learn from. Especially today, when the problems of climate change are often weighted against the financial cost of becoming more environmentally friendly, the example of the Mawlynnong for thinking in the long-term about the well-being of future generations is a value that all societies should adopt. A second unique aspect of the culture of Mawlynnong village is the peoples’ attitude towards the town itself. Renowned as “the cleanest village in India”, the Mawlynnong people have become totally devoted to maintaining the cleanliness of their village, a particularly unusual trait in Indian society (Badal, 2015). With an example pictured in figure 9, It seems that this focus cleanliness permeates through all of the villages of Mawlynnong, with children doing quite a lot of work around the village before attending school or returning to focus on chores in their own homes (Badal, 2015). Such chores include sweeping leaves and garbage, separating various forms of garbage, separating organic waste from garbage and burying biodegradable waste (Badal, 2015). The incredible degree of cleaning, far beyond even Western standards, stands out as a unique aspect of Mawlynnong culture that has now been extensively documented online. Children pictured below can be seen cleaning the grass beside the road and using traditional hand-made baskets designed specifically for this activity.

Figure 9 - Mawlynnong Children carefully cleaning some grass

As with the examples of ‘living bridges,’ here Mawlynnong culture shows a much greater sense of community togetherness than one might expect.This community spirit stands out not just against Western and/or developed societies, but within India itself, where the Mawlynnong’s practices have become famous. It is another interesting example of a culture that is uniquely matrilineal positively influencing the social practices of that culture. Along with the creation of the ‘living bridges’, this group cleaning suggests a very different relationship with the natural world, and with how resources – both social and physical – should be created and managed.

Conclusion

While the media footprint of the Mawlynnong village is extremely small – as was mentioned, the total population rarely reaches more than 500 – there several examples of Mawlynnong culture have moved out from north-east India through various media forms. In addition to discussing Mawlynnong clothing and cultural traditions represented visually throughout this exhibit, two key visual examples of Mawlynnong culture through the internet, have emerged as examples of the culture of Mawlynnong that can be seen around the world. The first example was photographs of the so-called ‘living bridges’ found in the region around Mawlynnong, which stand out as unique, multi-generational building projects found nowhere else in the world. Photographs detailing these bridges and how they are built are a good an example of how the Mawlynnong people think and act in relation to their environment, and especially how they are willing to devote countless hours to projects that can take many generations to complete. The second example was the fact that Mawlynnong has become famous in India and the world as one of the cleanest villages in India. The many photographs of the town and people available online and in the video show us a place where the community seems particularly united and together, working as one to achieve goals that the entire group benefits from. The focus on togetherness and sustainability –problems all too commonly ignored in India and around the world – suggests a unique and extremely positive relationship with the environment and a very healthy level of social integration. Societies and cultures around the world could benefit greatly from these practices.

References

Bouissou, J (2011). Where women of India rule the roost and men demand gender equality. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jan/18/india-khasi-women-politics- bouissou

Chaudhuri, P., Bhattacharyya, S., & Samal, A. C. (2016). Living Root Bridge: A potential no cost eco-technology for mitigating rural communication problems. Int. J. Exp. Res. Rev, 5, 33-36.

Desicinemaaclassical (2015). Khasi Dance: Meghalaya | National Tribe Festival Vanaj 2015 (Figure 1). Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTZyGfhJS8c

Lerner, G. (1986). The creation of patriarchy (Vol. 1). Oxford University Press, USA.

Gneezy, U., Leonard, K. L., & List, J. A. (2009). Gender differences in competition:Evidence from a matrilineal and a patriarchal society. Econometrica, 77(5), 1637- 1664.

Hartung, J. (1985). Matrilineal inheritance: New theory and analysis. Behavioural and Brain Sciences, 8(04), 661-670.

Kharmaw, N. (2016) Khasi Traditional Song (Figure 5). Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwH6mhiU_EA

Nieves, E. (2015). Girls Rule in an Indian Village. New York Times. Retrieved from: https://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/06/03/girls-rule-in-an-indian- village/?src=me&_r=0

Mawrie, H. O. (1981). The Khasi Milieu. Concept Publishing Company.

Messner, M. A. (1988). Sports and male domination: The female athlete as contested ideological terrain. Sociology of sport journal, 5(3), 197-211.

Shankar, S. (2015, September). Living Root Bridges: State of knowledge, fundamental research and future application. In IABSE Symposium Report (Vol. 105, No. 4, pp. 1- 8). International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering

Soman, Uthara. Patriarchy: Theoretical Postulates and Empirical Findings. Sociological Bulletin (2009): 253-272.

Vaquero Pernia, I. (2013). The 'Living Bridges Planet’. AI Practitioner, 15(2).

https://www.zotero.org/groups/1063757

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tinasheng-blog · 8 years ago

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The Unique Mawlynnong People: A Media-Culture Comparison of Matrilineal Culture and Western Patrilineal Culture

In the 21st century, with the internet, television, radio and other media forms, there is more information available about different cultures and societies than ever before. One must only turn to Google in order to find endless videos, photographs, articles and data about the thousands of cultural minorities that exist across the globe. As knowledge and available information from these societies grows and grows, the many differences between the media-culture of these groups can become a little overwhelming. It can seem impossible to try and fully understand the differences in culture and tradition between, for example, a Salish First Nations person, a Syrian immigrant, a Chinese factory worker or an Indian rural farmer. The media-cultures of these people are just so different, whether you are focusing on language, traditions, history or social structure.

Figure 1 - Ritual dance of Mawlynnong's Khasi culture – women are given a central position

On the other hand, on a very basic level, even the most different cultures usually share some common areas. For example, very different cultures might all engage in some kind of cultural or ritual dance or singing, even though the language and rhythm and even the scale used might be totally different. The importance of the family unit might be very central to all cultural groups, even though the way that family values are promoted in specific cultures can be totally different. So even for societies that initially seem like they have nothing in common from a media-culture point of view, often there is at least some basic cultural connections to work from.

This paper will focus on the media-culture of the people of Mawlynnong village, India. The group is chosen to be researched is because unlike almost all cultural groups today, the members of this village are part of a matrilineal and generally matriarchal tradition. While the cultural ‘footprint’ of the people of Mawlynnong is incredibly small (as you will see, the total population of the village is tiny) there are several key examples in which the media-culture of the Mawlynnong people emerge onto a global scale. As a comparison to these examples, modern western culture will be used – or at least the patrilineal parts of Western culture – as a way to highlight some of the key differences between typical Western culture and the Mawlynnong people.

However, such an undertaking immediately comes with a question; why bother investigating a matrilineal culture and why bother comparing it against patrilineal cultures? In my opinion, the answer is rather simple. Take, for example, the recent presidential elections in the United States. In the race between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, the idea of gender played a key role. Many people were interested in the idea of a women ruling the United States for the first time. After all, throughout human history, there are so few examples of women being placed in a position of power, either socially or culturally. The Mawlynnong culture, while very different from U.S and western culture, at least gives a real-world example of a situation where women have much more power. The Mawlynnong, therefore, become worthy of study in order to see what we can learn from a unique, modern example of matrilineal society and media-culture. By exploring the matrilineal people of the village of Mawlynnong, one can see up close how a culture is affected when it is matrilineal instead of patrilineal, providing a ‘mirror’ (as opposed to thinking hypothetically) to hold up against some of the patrilineal parts of Western culture that we sometimes do not even notice.

Figure 2 – Mawlynnong women dressed plainly

This issue will be examined primarily through the methodology of ethnography, as this offers the best chance to define and relate to the unusual social aspects of the Mawlynnong media-culture. The paper begins with definition and examination of some examples of patrilineal culture as expressed in contemporary media. This section will be followed by a brief introduction to the concept of matrilineal culture. Then the Mawlynnong village will be discussed directly, as well as the wider Khasi community that these villages are a part of. While the paper will discuss certain social practices and traditions, the paper will also focus on the Mawlynnong’s social practice of group cleaning and the practice of creating ‘living bridges’, and how these are expressed in various forms of media-culture.

Patrilineal/Patriarchal culture: Hidden in Plain Sight

Patriarchy “denotes a social structure where the actions and ideas of men are dominant over those of women” (Soman, 2009, p. 253). Typically, patriarchal societies are also patrilineal, meaning that the family name (and often family possessions) passes through the male line, often to the eldest son, rather than to female members of society (Soman, 2009). In general, patriarchal societies need not oppress women directly, but rather prioritize social, cultural, and economic practices that are aligned with goals from the male psyche and mindset (Soman, 2009). This kind of preference for male goals can take place intentionally, where people regard “women’s subordination as universal, God-given, or natural, hence immutable” (Lerner, 1986, p. 16). Of course, such prejudice can also take place unintentionally, where the person, people (or even entire society) acts in a patriarchal way without actually realizing their bias (Lerner, 1986).

In terms of media-culture, the influence of patriarchal and patrilineal societies can be either totally obvious or highly indirect, but either way it is incredibly common. Take the following Budweiser advert (featured both online and on television):

Figure 3 - A typical modern Western Budweiser beer advertisement

Here, the use of women as a means to sell alcohol makes for a rather obvious patriarchal image. Naturally, the image here appeals to the male psyche and male goals. One can only assume that the idea behind the advert is to associate purchasing Budweiser with the idea of meeting beautiful women. From a cultural, ethnographic perspective, the advert suggests a culture that at least has elements of a patriarchy, in the sense that clearly here male desires are being catered to at the expense of female desire (and arguably female dignity). Moreover, the image here could be said to suggest a trivialisation of women in society, reducing images of women to a kind of ‘window dressing’ designed to do little more than sell a product. While such sexualisation of women could be seen as a rather simple expression of the idea that ‘sex sells’, the dominance of such imagery throughout television, film and new media in Western culture suggests as much an exploitation of female qualities for the enjoyment of a patriarchal society as much as it is merely a sales technique.

A second aspect of patrilineal and patriarch societies is the preference in media-culture for activities that are primarily masculine. In modern times, the incredible rise of sport right around the world, both as an aspect of cultural identity and as mass entertainment, can be connected to patrilineal and patriarchal concepts. In particular, the rise of male sport icons stands out as an aspect of culture that denotes patrilineal and patriarchal societies. Online and on television, it is hard to avoid the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Tom Brady, Tiger Woods, or even slightly older sporting names like Wayne Gretsky.

Figure 4 - Famous Soccer Player Cristiano Ronaldo is idolised by millions worldwide

Indeed, the dominance of male figures in the world of sport is so pronounced that sport has become “an arena of ideological battles over gender relations” (Messner, 1988, p. 197). Messner goes on to say that “organized sport has been a crucial arena of struggle over basic social conceptions of masculinity and femininity” and concludes that organised sport, as it exists today, “has become a fundamental arena of ideological contest in terms of power relations between men and women” (Messner, 1988, p. 197). While certainly there are many famous female athletes (tennis stars in particular stand out as being globally famous), typically it is the stereotypically male traits, such as strength, power, speed and decisiveness that are used to identify sporting stars in virtually all forms of media.

Understanding Matrilineal Societies

Matrilineal societies are naturally structured quite differently than patrilineal societies. Typically, in matrilineal societies, the family name is passed down through the female line, with any possessions or titles that are to be passed down through generations also typically passing from female offspring to female offspring (Hartung, 1985).

Figure 5 - Traditional Khasi culture song

Matrilineal societies, at their core, can be defined in situations where “a woman's ‘family’ remains the family of her mother, brothers, and sisters even after she marries” (Hartung, 1985, p. 661). In such scenarios, wives will retain their mothers’ family name, her children will retain their grandmother’s family name, etc. Interestingly, Hartung suggests that the creation of matrilineal societies was as a response to the same problems that led to the creation of patrilineal societies. This problem is the fact that “husbands risk investing a significant component of reproductive success in other men's children if wives engage in extramarital sex” (Hartung, 1985, p. 661). This, according to Hartung, was a big problem for earlier, more primitive societies. The problem is that, with no accurate way to distinguish one man’s offspring from the offspring of another man, males could not be sure if their children (and all the thousands of hours spent raising the child) might really be the offspring of another man (Hartung, 1985).

Figure 6 - Traditional Khasi dresses

Patrilineal societies are obviously one way of dealing with this problem, as they typically put considerable social, cultural and potentially even legal constraints on the sexual activities of women, usually far more than the restrictions placed on men (Hartung, 1985). In this way, societies would try to insure that patriarchal lines are maintained, while minimising the risk of female sexual activity breaking a family’s patrilineal lines (Hartung, 1985). However, matrilineal societies offer their own solution to this issue of sex and paternity. Matrilineal societies take advantage of the fact that, unlike the father, a child’s mother can always be correctly identified, for obvious reasons (i.e. they give birth to the child). From a social point of view, the immediate effect of focusing on the maternal line is that the continuity through generations can be identified without having to worry about the possibility of other sexual partners being involved (Hartung, 1985). Needless to say, whichever method a society uses to solve this problem, will dramatically affect the society in question. Beyond a solution to this age-old problem about paternity and maternity, the differences that can be created in a wider cultural sense can be very noticeable. In the following sections, the Mawlynnong media-cultures will be explored more directly, highlighting any unusual social and cultural aspects of the society that show up in examples of media-culture.

Mawlynnong: A Village of Khasi Culture

Having defined the origins and basic functions of matrilineal societies, and given some examples of how patrilineal societies are expressed in media-culture, it is now possible to study the people of the Mawlynnong village directly.

Figure 7 - Two Mawlynnong women wearing traditional clothing

Mawlynnong is located in north-east India, in the area north-east of Bangladesh (Nieves, 2015). The total number of people living in the village of Mawlynnong is quite tiny, roughly 500 people, making identifying media-culture specific to this village a difficult proposition (Nieves, 2015). The people of Mawlynnong identify as part of Khasi culture, an ethnic group made up of well over 1 million people (Mawrie, 1981). The Mawlynnong, for countless generations, have been a matrilineal society, with the youngest daughter inheriting “the lion’s share” of her mother’s property, as well as taking a central role in the decisions of the family (Mawrie, 1981, p. 17). Mawrie also notices that this matrilineal system goes back in time far enough to be tied to the Khasi myth about creation, which was done by a female god (Mawrie, 1981). This ties in with Hartung’s position highlighted in the previous section, that the creation of matrilineal societies was a solution to the ancient problem of sex and inheritance (Hartung, 1985). In this way, the Khasi matrilineal society is reinforced not just as a social and cultural necessity, but as a religious one too (Mawrie, 1981). All of this suggests that the Mawlynnong culture very much fits the general model of matrilineal societies that was discussed in the previous section.

In fact, as a matriarchal leader of the family, a Mawlynnong mother is assigned all sorts of religious and cultural roles of importance, from cremating older family members to feeding poor family members at religious feasts (Mawrie, 1981). Other unusual cultural practices include a tradition whereby married men often remain living in their mother’s home until they have had one or two children with their wife (Mawrie, 1981). It is also commonly found that men do much of the menial chores for the family that are commonly attributed to women in patrilineal societies (Mawrie, 1981). Compared to patrilineal and patriarchal societies, gone is any hint of the oppression of women. In fact, often times it can be the husband in the family unit who is given less responsibility and the more basic chores and tasks of the household (Bouissou, 2011). Some suggest that the family unit in Mawlynnong can actually oppress the male figure to some extent, with one Mawlynnong man commenting, unhappily, that “all he can do is play the guitar, sing, take to drink and die young” (Bouissou, 2011). While this final evidence is quite anecdotal, it does suggest that, very much like the stereotype of the ‘unhappy housewife’ in Western culture, so too can men take on this social role of positions are reversed. This role-reverse is another good example of how matrilineal seems to affect societies, and it is interesting to note that, by reversing the dominant social leader, the opposite gender is given the more menial tasks and responsibilities.

Khasi Culture: Living Bridges and Social Harmony

Pictured below (figure 8) is one of the so-called ‘living bridges’ of Meghalaya (Meghalaya is the region in which the Mawlynnong village is located).

Figure 8 - A 'Living Bridge' made from roots and braches grown together over decades

These bridges are unique to this region and Mawlynnong’s Khasi culture, and go through an incredible process of creation over several generations. The bridges are Ficus elastica plants that are literally grown, piece by piece, decade by decade, into the shape of a bridge (Shankar, 2015). Over the years, the bridges can take a surprising amount of weight, and can be held up as an amazing, innovative ‘low tech’ solution to a very common engineering problem (Shankar, 2015). Beginning as tiny shoots that are little more than twigs, these bridges can take generations of care and growth before becoming strong enough to serve any purpose (Shankar, 2015). However, once fully grown, the ‘bridges’ form a vital travel route for the wider, mostly rural people of the region. They offer vital routes over rivers that might otherwise be impassable, or that would wash away traditional bridges during the wet season (Chaudhuri et. al., 2016). In this way the bridges exist both as an international media icon for a region that would otherwise be largely culturally anonymous, but also a vital piece of infrastructure for sustaining and enhancing everyday life. In terms of media-culture, these bridges are one of the few ways that Mawlynnong culture has truly become visible on a global level, with may websites, photographers and analysts focusing on construction methods, uses to the local people, cultural influences, etc.

A second unique aspect of the culture of Mawlynnong village is the people’s attitude towards the the town itself. Renowned as “the cleanest village in India”, the Mawlynnong people have become totally devoted to maintaining the cleanliness of their village, a particularly unusual trait in Indian society (Badal, 2015). It seems that this focus cleanliness permeates through all of the village of Mawlynnong, with children doing quite a lot of work around the village before attending school or returning to focus on chores in their own homes (Badal, 2015). Such chores include sweeping leaves and garbage, separating various forms of garbage, separating organic waste from garbage and burying biodegradable waste (Badal, 2015). The incredible degree of cleaning, far beyond even Western standards, stands out as a unique aspect of Mawlynnong culture that has now been extensively documented online. It is another interesting example of a society that is uniquely matrilineal indirectly creating media-culture and managing to stand out from neighbouring cultures and societies. Along with the creation of the ‘living bridges’, it suggests a very different relationship with the natural world, and with how resources – either cultural, social or physical – are created and managed.

Figure 9 - Mawlynnong Children carefully cleaning some grass

Final Comparisons and Conclusion

Having spent some time focusing on differences between patrilineal and matrilineal cultures, several interesting aspects of the media-culture of the Mawlynnong people stand out. While the cultural footprint of the Mawlynnong village is extremely slight – as was mentioned, the total population rarely reaches more than 500 – there are at least two obvious areas where their media-culture that have moved out from north-east India. In particular, I focused on two examples that, through the internet, have emerged as examples of the media-culture of Mawlynnong. The first example I chose was the creating of the so-called ‘living bridges’ found in the region around Mawlynnong, which stand out as unique, multi-generational building projects unique to this culture. They stand as an example of how the Mawlynnong people think and act in relation to their environment and how they are willing to devote countless hours to projects that take many generations to complete. The second example I chose was the fact that Mawlynnong has become famous in India and the world as one of the cleanest villages in India. The many images of the town and people available online and in videos show us a place where the community seems particularly tightly knitted together. The focus on the issue of garbage – a problem all too commonly ignored in India – suggests a different cultural relationship with the environment and the world in general.

While throughout this exhibition I concentrated on highlighting differences between patrilineal, patriarchal societies with matrilineal, matriarchal societies, it is important to note that this was not done to propose a direct “cause and effect” relationship in any media-culture differences between matrilineal and patrilineal groups. Surely there are countless historical and cultural differences that set such different groups apart, none of which could hope to be explained by a simple cause-effect matrilineal/patrilineal model. However, in noting some of the differences between Mawlynnong culture and western, typically patrilineal culture, some interesting and unique media-culture situations nevertheless come forward. With so few examples of matrilineal societies, either in modern media-culture (or at any time in history), highlighting these points both shows up some obvious flaws in patrilineal cultures, but also suggests that, if given the chance, matrilineal, matriarchal societies also have a lot of interesting, positive cultural and social ideas to offer. More generally, it can sometimes be hard to see the flaws in one’s own culture and one’s own society. By focusing on a different media-culture that explores ideas that are very different to a traditional, patriarchal culture, it becomes possible to truly see just how strange one’s own media-culture can be. In this way, by focusing on examples of opposing media-culture, we can hope to learn more not just about the media-culture in question, but about ourselves, our own society and our own media-culture.