232 BULLETIN, PUBLIC MUSEUM, MILWAUKEE [Vol. 19 



Part Three 

 The Comparative Picture 



This report thus far has focused its attention upon a single tribe. It is 

 the intention in the following section to add comparative material through 

 an analysis of other primitive groups in the attempt to learn whether or not 

 the case of the Wisconsin Chippewa is a unique one. The problems to be 

 considered are: (1) are there other North American tribes which also exhibit 

 exaggerated health anxieties at the present time; (2) is there any correlation 

 between health anxiety and type of economic life; and (3) what generaliza- 

 tions can be drawn concerning the effect of health attitude upon the be- 

 havior of man? The search for an answer to the first problem will be 

 directed first to other bands of Chippewa outside of Wisconsin, and then 

 to other tribes of American Indians. 



Health anxieties are not restricted to the Wisconsin bands of Chippewa. 

 Both Landes and Hallowell report similar situations among the Canadian 

 Chippewa. Thus Landes (p. 179) reporting on the Chippewa of south- 

 western Ontario, states: 



"All the preoccupations of the Ojibwa can iind expression only with the limits 

 set by the individualistic attitude. Thus the general interest in physical well-being is 

 a concern of the individual alone; the group, the tribe are not considered. Every 

 Ojibwa is ridden with anxiety about his health. From birth, a child is provided with 

 curing rites by his parents. An adult continually hires doctors for himself, seeks 

 visions that promise well-being, participates in the curative Sun-Dance and Medicine 

 Dance. This concern with illness finds a complement in the cultural provision for 

 curers of several different sorts. The attention given to one's own illnesses, which is 

 based on a rather hypochondriacal self-preoccupation, matures into a relationship 

 between patient and curer in which the patient is interested only in improving his 

 condition, and the curer typically is interested only in demonstrating his power to 

 cure. The attitude of the shaman is extremely exhibitionistic — he wants to show off 

 power, miraculous tricks which have been given to him in a vision by a supernatural 

 who singled him out for this personal attention. Here again, the curer's success is 

 important to him largely because it ministers to his self-respect, not because he has 

 any serious stakes in alleviating the patients' suffering." 



One difference between this group and the Wisconsin Chippewa is that 

 among the former, ". . . the physical well-being is a concern of the indi- 

 vidual alone; the group, the tribe are not considered." (Landes, p. 179.) 

 While this concern is primarily an individualistic affair among the Wiscon- 

 sin Chippewa, it is certainly not exclusively so. Examples of group concern 

 for the physical well-being of the community were previously described in 



