Taboo zone
The taboo zone or the taboo area is an area that, for certain reasons, should not be touched or entered. It can present itself as a place or terrain to which access is prohibited. However, it can also be a human intimate area that makes a person vulnerable and therefore denied access to others.
term
The term “ taboo ”, which comes from the Polynesian-speaking area , describes something that is forbidden. Originally used primarily in the religious field, it denotes what has to be considered sacred and inviolable without further justification and is guarded by the spirits. The traditional customs and laws stipulated what were regarded as such sacred objects, rooms or places that were not allowed to be touched or entered. Breaking taboos was promised severe penalties. The Indians of North America , for example, understood the sacred area of their dead as a taboo area and marked it with magical symbols that forbade any foreigner entry.
Areas of application
Premises / grounds
Areas or rooms to which general access is denied or only a certain group of people are permitted are declared taboo zones in public life. These can be nuclear sites, industrial sites, factories, building ruins or private properties of any kind. Those who are not authorized to enter can be shielded from the designated area for reasons of liability in the event of hazards, but also for security concerns or to protect property rights. For example, a traffic area, a driveway, a street or the entire city center can be blocked for certain vehicles. In the living area , particularly sensitive and therefore worth protecting corners and rooms for children or pets can be declared taboo in order to avoid danger, destruction or contamination.
Traffic education
In traffic education, the taboo zone plays an essential role in training the inner brake , for example for school beginners : In the 'taboo zone game ', a marked area on the edge of the playing field is declared a forbidden district, which may not be entered even during the liveliest game activity. If the ball rolls into the taboo field, it may only be retrieved from the outside. The taboo zone may only be crossed over a specified safe route, for example in the form of a zebra crossing, and only under certain guidelines. The rules of the game provide for traffic-compliant, sensitive penalties for violations. For example, for every violation there is a risk of a 'penalty point on the points account' of the respective party or even a 'break from the game to recovery in the hospital'. The game is about the " ability to self-control " and the " practicing of braking mechanisms ", which should also work in dangerous situations while being distracted by the game.
medicine
The medical treatment by doctors and nurses often inevitably leads to intimate parts of the human body, through socialization are felt or social tradition as a taboo area for foreign eyes and actions. The intrusion into this private sphere by strangers is experienced as embarrassing. It requires a high degree of sensitivity and empathy from the medical staff , which is not always a given. The genital area is one for most people to their particularly sensitive and worthy of protection intimate zone. Complaints in the urological or proctological examination field such as hemorrhoids , genital herpes or irritable bowel disease are therefore often suppressed and withheld from treatment.
Social ethics
After the media presence, the willingness to use violence and the extent of brutality and criminal energy in human interaction seem to have increased. The Constance criminologist Wolfgang Heinz comments: “ The crime registered by the police (without state security offenses and without offenses in road traffic) has increased over the long term, as in all western industrialized countries. The strongest increases occurred in the 1970s and 1980s. Registered crime has stagnated at a relatively high level since the mid-1990s. “On the one hand, taboos are being broken in the form of cruel attacks, in which children and defenseless elderly and disabled people are tortured, robbed and raped. On the other hand, sexual, physical and psychological violence, especially in the family environment, is largely covered with a taboo. Such shifts of mistakes and experiences into the taboo zone can be identified in the psychological and socio-ethical sector on different levels:
For example, the Polish scientist Dorota Sośnicka has taken up the problem area of “death and dying” as a restricted area of communication in an anthology entitled “Taboo zones and taboo breaks in German-speaking Swiss literature” and exposed the speechlessness and the difficulties of removing taboos, which are particularly restrictive when there is unprocessed family guilt.
The museum researcher Thomas Thiemeyer has dealt with the topic and problem of publicly exhibiting disturbing images and documents on warfare and violence for sensitive minds. Although death and its terrible images are part of war, their presentation is often perceived as offensive and accordingly avoided. Under the government of Anwar as-Sadat, for example, the mummy room of the pharaohs in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo was withdrawn from a wide audience for reasons of piety .
A similar museum taboo - in contrast to the Italian, British or French museums - can be observed in the German museum landscape with regard to the exhibition of war toys : For example, the game scientists Siegbert A. Warwitz and Anita Rudolf during their research into the historical inventory of toys in German museums, especially of the world-famous Nuremberg Toy Museum , the almost complete lack of war toys. Demand showed that the objects declared after numerous protests of visitors to the museum taboo area and into the magazine were outsourced.
An anthology edited by Barbara Bojack deals with the rejection of traumatic experiences due to sexual violence from childhood and adolescence, which have been moved unprocessed into the taboo zone of the subconscious out of shame and desperation at the lack of understanding of the social environment.
After all, taboo areas that are often hidden from view of others also include embarrassing psychosocial disorders and mental illnesses such as depression , suicidal tendencies or dementia .
literature
- Manfred Albrecht: Taboo zones. From the practice of a gynecologist . Daniel-Peter-Verlag, Schnaittach 2016.
- Barbara Bojack (Ed.): Violence in the taboo zone . Publishing house for psychosocial media. Höchberg 2019, ISBN 978-3-947502-94-3 .
- Dieter Kleiber, Sabine Grüsser, Nina Knoll, Elmar Brähler (eds.): Taboo zones in women's and men's health . Psychosocial Perspectives. Psychosozial-Verlag, Giessen 2009.
- Dorota Sośnicka (Ed.): Taboo zones and taboo breaks in German-Swiss literature , Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2020.
- Siegbert A. Warwitz: The learning fields of traffic education. In: Ders .: Traffic education from the child. Perceiving - playing - thinking - acting. 6th edition. Cutter. Baltmannsweiler 2009, pp. 119-135. ISBN 978-3-8340-0563-2 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Taboo zone for taxi drivers: open main road?
- ↑ The city center becomes a taboo zone
- ^ Siegbert A. Warwitz: Playing at the taboo zone. In: Ders .: Traffic education from the child. Perceiving - playing - thinking - acting. 6th edition. Cutter. Baltmannsweiler 2009. pp. 119, 121, 134.
- ↑ Dieter Kleiber, Sabine Grüsser, Nina Knoll, Elmar Brähler (eds.): Taboo zones of women's and men's health . Psychosocial Perspectives. Psychosocial Publishing House. Giessen 2009.
- ^ Manfred Albrecht: Taboo zones. From the practice of a gynecologist . Daniel-Peter-Verlag, Schnaittach 2016.
- ↑ Taboo subjects
- ↑ Wolfgang Heinz: Crime in Germany with special consideration of juvenile and violent crime . University of Konstanz 2005.
- ↑ Christoph Birkel, Helmut Thome: The development of violent crime in the Federal Republic of Germany, England / Wales and Sweden in the second half of the 20th century , The Hallesche Graureiher 2004–1, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Institute for Sociology, 2004.
- ↑ Dorota Sośnicka (Ed.): Taboo zones and taboo breaks in German-speaking Swiss literature . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Goettingen 2020.
- ^ Thomas Thiemeyer: Border posts of the taboo zone. The difficult handling of war, violence and dead bodies in museums . In: Historical Anthropology . Böhlau publishing house. Cologne 18 (2010) pp. 220-231.
- ^ Siegbert A. Warwitz, Anita Rudolf: Controversial forms of play. In: The sense of playing. Reflections and game ideas. 4th edition. Schneider publishing house. Baltmannsweiler 2016. p. 126.
- ↑ Barbara Bojack (ed.): Violence in the taboo zone . Publishing house for psychosocial media. Höchberg 2019.