372 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 196 



The value themes identified in plot construction center in four areas: the 

 maintenance of health; the acquisition of supernatural power; the maintenance 

 of harmony in family relationships; and the process of the young man's attain- 

 ment of adult status. [Ibid., p. 86.] 



Responsibility and self-reliance are valued character traits, but 

 self-assertion contains both beneficent and aggressive-destructive 

 components. The problem of aggression tends to be treated on the 

 basis of a "practical" morality. (Ibid., pp. 92-94.) 



PSYCHOLOGY 



Leighton and Kluckhohn (1947, especially chs. 4 and 8) have pre- 

 sented a more extended treatment of Navaho "psychology" than will 

 be possible here. The purpose of this section is to summarize some 

 of the material obtained in the past decade insofar as it appears to 

 constitute background relevant to an understanding of Ramah Navaho 

 values. The Navaho are not a very "open" people in dealing with 

 outsiders (cf. McAUester, 1954, pp. 76-77, 80-81). Even compared 

 with, say, the Western Apache, they are reticent and suspicious and 

 take a good deal of Imowing. This is due, I believe, at least in part, 

 to their having been so badly "seared" by their contacts with Whites. 

 This reaction and the accompanying withdrawal and defensiveness 

 appear more prominently at Ramah than in some other Navaho areas. 



Bruner (1953) administered the dart test to 152 Ramah Navahos 

 over 12 years of age. This experiment indicated that the Navaho 

 individual changes his own aspirations in the direction of the aspi- 

 rations of the Navaho gi'oup once the group's norms are made known 

 to him. The Navaho also tend to sit tight and do nothing in an 

 unfamiliar situation. Women were found to be less conforming than 

 men on the dart test. 



This last finding fitswith the demonstration by Hughes (MS., 1951) and 

 Rapoport (1954) that women have joined the Nazarene church in 

 greater numbers than men and play a more active role in singing and 

 other aspects of the services. It may also link with Strodtbeck's 

 (1951) discovery that when Navaho couples engage in a discussion 

 the wives win more decisions than the husbands, although the number 

 of their acts of participation in these small group situations is lower 

 than that of their husbands. The special psychology of Navaho 

 women may also be reflected in Edmonson's (MS.) finding that, in 

 contrast to both Hispano and Anglo culture, Navaho culture has a 

 type of "dirty joke" appropriate to each sex. 



Heath's (MS., 1952) study of drinking among the Eamah Navaho high- 

 lights many features both of psychology and of social structure. 

 Drinking parties are an occasion for sociabiUty but also for sexual 



