VOA标准英语2014--古代女性战争幸存下来

 

How Ancient Women Survived War 古代女性战争幸存下来

Traditional stories from around the world are providing insight into how ancient women survived war. The oral histories tell of women developing strategies to protect themselves and their children.

Whether it was centuries ago, or today, women have suffered greatly in war -- even though they are usually not combatants. Stories passed down through the generations indicate they used their wits to make the best of terrible circumstances.

Michelle Scalise Sugiyama -- an anthropology¹ instructor² at the University of Oregon – studied those stories. They come from North American Indian tribes, the Eskimo of the arctic, Australia’s aborigines, the San of South Africa and tribes in South America. She says both indigenous³ people and anthropologists agree that hunter-gatherers passed down their knowledge by telling tales not by writing them down.

“My main interest is the role that story telling has played in human evolution – and how far back it dates in human pre-history. And the basic argument that I make in my research is that it dates back thousands of years, tens of thousands of years to when all humans on the planet were making their living by hunting and gathering⁴. So I just started asking myself, well, what kinds of information does it take to make a living as a hunter-gatherer? What are some of the problems that they face on a regular basis? And warfare⁵ is one of those problems.”

She said that there’s a lot of research in evolutionary⁶ psychology⁷ on warfare and when it emerged in human pre-history. But she said there’s little information on women and war through the ages.

“The research focuses on men because warfare is primarily waged by men, especially in forager⁸ societies. Women are victims of it. The defend themselves, but they don’t really participate in attacking other groups. The research is focused on why males would be motivated to engage in this behavior. What the possible benefits are – on how male psychology has been shaped to enable males to engage in warfare,” she said.

Scalise Sugiyama said oral stories provide long-term patterns of behavior that archeology, for example, cannot provide. She says more men die in war than women, but adds that women are affected⁹ by war in many ways.

“Death in violent interactions is not the only potential cost of warfare, especially in the case of women. Women are often taken captive and children, too, whereas men are more likely to be killed. They don’t tend to be taken captive. So that just started me thinking about the different ways in which warfare affects women,” she said.

She gave an example of how women in the midst of war could react.

“If a woman was taken captive and she wanted to escape, well, one really useful piece of information would be what the terrain¹⁰ is like between the enemy village that you’ve been taken to and her natal¹¹ village – the village that she’s trying to get back to. You have to be able to find your way back. Another set of useful information would be, well, how do these different enemy groups -- living around me -- how do they treat their captives? Do they tend to adopt them into the tribe and treat them like group members? Do they torture them? Do they rape¹² them?”

So, would it better to fight her attacker or go along as a captive knowing she would not be killed? Another possible strategy, she said, is the use of sex by women to escape.

She said, “Women are typically taken as wives. So, she’ll pretend to like her new husband. And then when an opportunity to escape arises she will typically engage him in very vigorous sexual intercourse¹³ to tire him out so he falls into a deep sleep. And then while he’s asleep she kills him. Or sometimes her husband kills him. Her husband may be in on the escape attempt. So, he’ll sneak¹⁴ into the tent after the captor has been exhausted¹⁵ – kill him – and then he and his wife make their escape.”

The anthropology instructor said the so-called Stockholm Syndrome¹⁶ may have ancestral roots. It’s when hostages bond with their captors during abusive conditions.

“When I started researching it I was surprised to discover that there are actually no validated¹⁷ criteria¹⁸ for diagnosing it. And it’s not recognized as a psychiatric disorder¹⁹ or condition by the medical community. And so that suggests that it might actually be a coping mechanism²⁰ or a coping strategy. It may increase the captive’s chances of survival by motivating her to identify with her captor and adopt his views and the views of his society so she can fit in in this new society,” she said.

Scalise Sugiyama said she wonders what the psychological state might be of hundreds of girls kidnapped earlier this year by Nigeria’s Boko Haram militant²¹ group.

“When women are taken captive they’re put in this really difficult position, which is: you don’t know if you’re going to be rescued or not. So, you don’t know if you’re going to spend the rest of your life in this new society in which you’re basically an enemy, an outsider – or if you’re going to manage to get back to your natal group, you know, your own people.”

She added the research could lead to better social and psychological help for women affected by war. The findings appear in Springer’s journal Human Nature.

1 anthropology   

n.人类学

参考例句：

• I believe he has started reading up anthropology.我相信他已开始深入研究人类学。
• Social anthropology is centrally concerned with the diversity of culture.社会人类学主要关于文化多样性。

2 instructor   

n.指导者，教员，教练

参考例句：

• The college jumped him from instructor to full professor.大学突然把他从讲师提升为正教授。
• The skiing instructor was a tall,sunburnt man.滑雪教练是一个高高个子晒得黑黑的男子。

3 indigenous   

adj.土产的，土生土长的，本地的

参考例句：

• Each country has its own indigenous cultural tradition.每个国家都有自己本土的文化传统。
• Indians were the indigenous inhabitants of America.印第安人是美洲的土著居民。

4 gathering   

n.集会，聚会，聚集

参考例句：

• He called on Mr. White to speak at the gathering.他请怀特先生在集会上讲话。
• He is on the wing gathering material for his novels.他正忙于为他的小说收集资料。

5 warfare   

n.战争(状态)；斗争；冲突

参考例句：

• He addressed the audience on the subject of atomic warfare.他向听众演讲有关原子战争的问题。
• Their struggle consists mainly in peasant guerrilla warfare.他们的斗争主要是农民游击战。

6 evolutionary   

adj.进化的；演化的，演变的；[生]进化论的

参考例句：

• Life has its own evolutionary process.生命有其自身的进化过程。
• These are fascinating questions to be resolved by the evolutionary studies of plants.这些十分吸引人的问题将在研究植物进化过程中得以解决。

7 psychology   

n.心理，心理学，心理状态

参考例句：

• She has a background in child psychology.她受过儿童心理学的教育。
• He studied philosophy and psychology at Cambridge.他在剑桥大学学习哲学和心理学。

8 forager   

n.强征（粮食）者；抢劫者

参考例句：

• "A forager won't come back until it finds something, " Gordon says . “一只觅食蚁在发现食物之前是不会返回蚁巢的”，戈尔顿博士讲道。 来自辞典例句
• In Japan a fungus forager can earn a good living. 在日本，采蘑菇可以过上富足的生活。 来自互联网

9 affected   

adj.不自然的，假装的

参考例句：

• She showed an affected interest in our subject.她假装对我们的课题感到兴趣。
• His manners are affected.他的态度不自然。

10 terrain   

n.地面，地形，地图

参考例句：

• He had made a detailed study of the terrain.他对地形作了缜密的研究。
• He knows the terrain of this locality like the back of his hand.他对这一带的地形了如指掌。

11 natal   

adj.出生的，先天的

参考例句：

• Many music-lovers make pilgrimages to Mozart's natal place.很多爱好音乐的人去访问莫扎特的出生地。
• Since natal day,characters possess the visual elements such as dots and strokes.文字从诞生开始便具有了点画这样的视觉元素。

12 rape   

n.抢夺，掠夺，强奸；vt.掠夺，抢夺，强奸

参考例句：

• The rape of the countryside had a profound ravage on them.对乡村的掠夺给他们造成严重创伤。
• He was brought to court and charged with rape.他被带到法庭并被指控犯有强奸罪。

13 intercourse   

n.性交；交流，交往，交际

参考例句：

• The magazine becomes a cultural medium of intercourse between the two peoples.该杂志成为两民族间文化交流的媒介。
• There was close intercourse between them.他们过往很密。

14 sneak   

vt.潜行(隐藏,填石缝)；偷偷摸摸做；n.潜行；adj.暗中进行

参考例句：

• He raised his spear and sneak forward.他提起长矛悄悄地前进。
• I saw him sneak away from us.我看见他悄悄地从我们身边走开。

15 exhausted   

adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的

参考例句：

• It was a long haul home and we arrived exhausted.搬运回家的这段路程特别长，到家时我们已筋疲力尽。
• Jenny was exhausted by the hustle of city life.珍妮被城市生活的忙乱弄得筋疲力尽。

16 syndrome   

n.综合病症；并存特性

参考例句：

• The Institute says that an unidentified virus is to blame for the syndrome. 该研究所表示,引起这种综合症的是一种尚未确认的病毒。
• Results indicated that 11 fetuses had Down syndrome. 结果表明有11个胎儿患有唐氏综合征。

17 validated   

v.证实( validate的过去式和过去分词 )；确证；使生效；使有法律效力

参考例句：

• Time validated our suspicion. 时间证实了我们的怀疑。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• The decade of history since 1927 had richly validated their thesis. 1927年以来的十年的历史，充分证明了他们的论点。 来自辞典例句

18 criteria   

n.标准

参考例句：

• The main criterion is value for money.主要的标准是钱要用得划算。
• There are strict criteria for inclusion in the competition.参赛的标准很严格。

19 disorder   

n.紊乱，混乱；骚动，骚乱；疾病，失调

参考例句：

• When returning back,he discovered the room to be in disorder.回家后，他发现屋子里乱七八糟。
• It contained a vast number of letters in great disorder.里面七零八落地装着许多信件。

20 mechanism   

n.机械装置；机构，结构

参考例句：

• The bones and muscles are parts of the mechanism of the body.骨骼和肌肉是人体的组成部件。
• The mechanism of the machine is very complicated.这台机器的结构是非常复杂的。

21 militant   

adj.激进的，好斗的；n.激进分子，斗士

参考例句：

• Some militant leaders want to merge with white radicals.一些好斗的领导人要和白人中的激进派联合。
• He is a militant in the movement.他在那次运动中是个激进人物。