Shoes, Feet and Dogs
December 16, 2008 by ithinkthereforeib
If you have been reading the news, you might be aware of the recent ’shoe-throwing incident’. I don’t want to go into the politics of that, but we can learn something about cultural practices and beliefs from it. Slate nicely does us the favour of listing the significance of shoes and feet across a range of cultures and religions, examples that might come in handy for a future ToK essay.
Although in this case people seem most focused on the shoe-throwing, the incident also involved Muntader al-Zaidi, an Iraqi journalist, shouting “You dog”. The explanation for the phrase is that this too was meant as an insult as in Arab culture dogs are considered “unclean” and are not even commonly pets. I myself have had friends that would not touch certain animals they considered “dirty” and “disgusting” because of their cultural and/or religious upbringing. This might all seem rather bizarre to you, but such beliefs do differ. You can see it with food too – different religions do not allow certain types of animals for consumption. But, it is not all a ‘hate’ relationship, it goes the other way too: in India cows are revered and wherever you might go you are likely to encounter a cow – in the middle of the road, right next to your car, on the playground, next to the water fountain in the shopping area and looking right into a shop window. I’m not joking! These are dusty, dirty (and skinny) cows that may go wherever they like, they defecate everywhere too – and no one complains.
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I had the oportunity to attend a presentation by Gary Weaver a professor at the American University and he mentioned how in some Middle Eastern cultures pointing the soles of your shoe was considered really offensive, and how several cultures believed that the feet were the worst part of the body, because it touched the dirt, or something similar. I think it is really interesting how the reactions vary from culture to culture, I mean most people probably saw the shoe-throwing incident like a simple act of rudeness, and did not comprehend the depth of that act (i knew it was bad, but had no idea that it was so commonly done not even the true meaning of the insult).
I knew it was rude too, but didn´t know it was an insult. Bush obviously didn´t realise that either, since he laughed it off.
The left hand supposedly has negative associations in several cultures too – in some countries people do not take objects offered with the left hand. Also in Western countries, there are some negative associations – being left-hand was considered “wrong” in the recent past still and I still know people who were forced to learn to write with the right hand.