TOTEMISM (from totem, from Algonquin at' otcm, my family token). The worship of a totem. Primarily a totem is a natural object employed by the American Indians to designate a certain relationship between groups of human and non-human individuals. The relationship is always peculiarly close, but not always of the same sort. The only general characteristic of all forms of totemism is the belief in a closer connec tion between certain groups of men and certain groups of non-human objects than naturally ex ists between all men and all non-human objects. Thus totemism is distinguished from fetishism (q.v.), though the latter has frequently been confounded with it. In true totemism the ob ject of human regard is not an individual object, as it is in fetishism, but is the group of objects with which certain men (and women) as a group feel themselves to be related by a peculiarly close tie. Thus if a clan call the sun their broth er, they are not totemists in the strict sense of the word. On the other hand, the Hindu who calls the monkey his brother is also not a totem ist, although the monkey represents (as the sun does not) a group, for in this case the same Hindu calls other animals his brothers as well.
In totem-brotherhood, however, there is an im portant outer symbol, the name. Thus, when a savage names himself after an animal species, calls the individual animal of that species his brother, and refuses to kill it, the animal (spe cies) is his totem, which is generally tribal and hereditary. The reason why a tribe revere a par ticular species of animal or plant is, according to Frazer, that the life of each individual of the tribe is bound up with sonic one animal or plant of the species, and that his or her death would be the consequence of destroying that particular animal or plant. Hence Frazer defines the totem as the receptacle of the life of the totemist, "in which the individual deposits his soul." The same mysticism pervades the elaborate theories of other scholars who regard the connection with the totem as a blood-relationship between men and animals (imagined to be the ancestors and brothers of men), and the first totemic sacri fices as a renewal of the blood-bond between the divine animal ancestor and his human descend ants. According to this theory, the altar was
at first the bethel or home of the divine animal ancestor, on which blood was shed to renew the bond and so strengthen the human group of worshipers.
But while this theory explains certain forms of totemism, it fails to explain all, and here it must be admitted that the word totemism is not used either by Frazer or by others as if it stood for a well-defined conception. For a clan may have at the same time various totems; the totem, again, is not constant, but may be ex changed for another; the sexes in the same clan are credited with possessing different totems; any one family in a clan may have its special totem; any individual may have a private totem besides his clan totem; a totem may be no one group of objects, but be the odds and ends of any animal or vegetable group; the tribal totem may be divided, and each clan have as its totem a part; or, instead of a divided totem, there may be, besides the tribal totem, a number of 'hon orific' totems; and finally, totems may be nat ural phenomena. clouds, lightning, thunder, or even colors. These different sorts of totems are of course not found together. The 'honorific' totem, for example, is characteristic of some In dians of the Northwest; the totem of odds and ends, such as the tails of animals and pieces of string, is found in Samoa; the cloud and light ning totems, in Australia; and the color-totem, blue or red, among certain Indian tribes of the 1\liddle West.
Though these varieties seem to lack all co herence, there has been claimed for totemism this common bond, that in all its varieties it at least conditions the matters of bed and board. That a totemist must marry outside of his totem group and must not eat of his totem (if, as in most cases, this is an animal or a vege table) are the foundation stones of certain theories of totemism. But totemism can no long er be said to bear this implication, for neither has the eating of the totem nor exogamy anything to do with the most primitive forms'of totemism.