My Ishamel: Blog Post #2

What is Anthropomorphism?

According to the dictionary:

1. Attribution of human motivation, characteristics, or behavior to inanimate objects, animals, or natural phenomena.

Also:

1. The representation of the Deity, or of a polytheistic deity, under a human form, or with human attributes and affections.

2. The ascription of human characteristics to things not human

("anthropomorphism." The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004. 01 Mar. 2009. )
("anthropomorphism." Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary. MICRA, Inc. 01 Mar. 2009. .)

On page 82 of My Ishmael Ishmael is discussing how humans assume other animals are just like them regarding territory. They think that animals claim territory, but Ishmael points ou that most animals don't really have an interest in territories. This seems to tie in with the last definition stated above.

Erratic Retaliation

1. Ishmael describes "Erratic Retaliation" as being kind of like a game that the tribes played. They agreed to a certain set of rules and followed them. In the case of the Cawks if one tribe bugged another, they expected to get bugged back.

2. Erratic Retaliation is a peace keeping method because it's what they have left. According to Ishmael they've eliminated all the other peace keeping strategies, and this is what works for them.

3. If the Cawks annihilate someone, they'll probably succeed. But the other tribes see this, they'll fear their own tribe is at stake, especially if their annihilation is repetitive (They could probably get away with destroying one tribe). In turn they would feel this is the new game and they would all team up and annihilate the tribe that started the problem.