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A prohibition treated as self-evidently forbidden rather than grounded in a stated doctrinal reason, the anthropological sense of taboo rather than a synonym for prohibition generally. The definition is deliberately narrow, which is why the subcategory looks thin next to the prohibitions nearby.
Facts
Overview
What Defines This GroupingThings a tradition holds must not be done or touched because danger inheres in the thing itself, as distinct from acts forbidden by a stated rule. The English word is a loan from Polynesian tapu, taken up by Cook's expedition in 1777 and generalised by nineteenth-century anthropology; Polynesian tapu, Jewish and Islamic purity law and Indian notions of pollution do not share a mechanism. 2 Origins
Whose Classification This IsThe generalisation of Polynesian tapu into a comparative category was the work of nineteenth-century anthropology - Robertson Smith, Frazer and Freud above all - and Franz Steiner's Oxford lectures, published in 1956, are the standard critique of it. 2 Status
Standing as a Comparative CategoryUsed, but its validity as a comparative category is disputed 2 Learn More
The Taboos
This small group holds a taboo, a strict prohibition on contact with, or action toward, something set apart as sacred or dangerous, whose violation is held to bring pollution or harm. The concept, named from a Polynesian word, is found across the world's traditions.
The browser will find the taboo the atlas classes here. The entry describes it in its own terms, noting the tradition in which it holds.
Sources
2. Taboo
Franz Steiner; edited by Laura Bohannan, preface by E. E. Evans-Pritchard, Cohen and West, 1956
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