Does Genetic Memory play a role in folkish traditions?
"Archetypes are typical modes of apprehension… These archetypes dwell in a world beyond the chronology of a human lifespan, developing on an evolutionary timescale. Regarding the animus and anima, the male principle within the woman and the female principle within the man, Jung writes: They evidently live and function in the deeper layers of the unconscious, especially in that phylogenetic substratum which I have called the collective unconscious. This localization explains a good deal of their strangeness: they bring into our ephemeral consciousness an unknown psychic life belonging to a remote past. It is the mind of our unknown ancestors, their way of thinking and feeling , their way of experiencing life and the world, gods and men. The existence of these archaic strata is presumably the source of man's belief in reincarnations and in memories of "previous experiences". Just as the human body is a museum, so to speak, of its phylogenetic history, so too is the psyche.”
Jung also described archetypes as imprints of momentous or frequently recurring situations in the lengthy human past.
Wilder Penfield in his pioneering 1978 book, Mystery of the Mind, also referred to three types of memory. “Animals,” he wrote, “particularly show evidence of what might be called racial memory” (this would be the equivalent of genetic memory). He lists the second type of memory as that associated with “conditioned reflexes” and a third type as “experiential”. The two latter types would be consistent with the terminology commonly applied to “habit or procedural” memory and “cognitive or semantic” memory. The most intriguing Words comes from Michael Gazzangia. In his 1998 book, The Mind’s Past, he wrote:
“The baby does not learn trigonometry, but knows it; does not learn how to distinguish figure from ground, but knows it; does not need to learn, but knows, that when one object with mass hits another, it will move the object … The vast human cerebral cortex is chock full of specialized systems ready, willing and able to be used for specific tasks. Moreover, the brain is built under tight genetic control … As soon as the brain is built, it starts to express what it knows, what it comes with from the factory. And the brain comes loaded. The number of special devices that are in place and active is staggering. Everything from perceptual phenomena to intuitive physics to social exchange rules comes with the brain. These things are not learned; they are innately structured. Each device solves a different problem … the multitude of devices we have for doing what we do are factory installed; by the time we know about an action, the devices have already performed it.” There is no “blank slate” in human development.
How does all of this translate in regard to culture and tradition? Will a native american understand his cultural traditions ”better” and instinctively know things on a deeper level than a non- native? I believe this wholeheartedly. I have my own personal experiences when it comes to american natives different spiritual traditions, and I can only say, the spirits are often welcoming, but I can also say that we are different, very different. I can learn facts, become an ”expert” on their ways, but reality is, there is something missing; a relating, a connection that goes much deeper than just knowing things even to perfection. Their spirit world is part of them, it runs thru their veins, it resonates with them, it speaks to them.
I’ve noticed todays society where young abandon their folkish ways for a modern subculture. Will the folkish ways disappear from their genetic memories for good? I don’t think the memories disappear even generations down the road. I think that if someone someday pick up their folkish ways again it will come back to them naturally and intuitively.
Have you ever noticed that when a folkish song is played, lets say an irish one, it sounds like it was composed hundreds of years ago, but it could as well have been composed yesterday? I see young folks from my own country that compose new folk songs, and these carry the tone and the spirit just the same as the older ones. I’ll say it’s genetic memory at play.
Can a British composer write an alaskan inuit spirit song? I believe he can ”copy” the sound and energy almost to perfection. Will the alaskan inuit find the spirit of his folk speak to him when he listens to it? I’ll have to say no. Period.
Just as the Gods of our ancestors walked upon the earth and mixed with our ancestors, so too did the Gods of other folks and races, thereby creating a genetic memory that is not erasable. Everyone has their own ancestral Gods. Sometimes this memory needs bits and pieces to awaken from its slumber, one important piece is, if living abroad from your ancestral land, to travel back to your ”homeland”, plant your feet on it, walk in nature, visit sites, breathe the air. If you’re spiritual, you already know the wind carries the whispers of your ancestors and the ground you walk on has been walked on by them. It does something to memory, I promise you.
Something tells me that only a decendant can carry the true spirit of their Gods onward to the next generation.
