การทำนายชีวิตด้วยกระดูกไก่ของกลุ่มชาติพันธุ์ต่าง ๆ ในจังหวัดเชียงราย

Abstract

This research aims to study chicken bone divination among various ethnic groups, i.e. Lahu, Karen, Yao, Hmong, Yunnanese Chinese, Akha, and Lua (Plang) in Chiang Rai province by comparing the manuscripts concerning chicken bone divination of Lua (Plang) with that of in daily life. The information herein has been obtained through interviews with some authoritative sources, the participation of the ethnic groups, and translation from written manuscripts. The research conducted between 2004 and 2007 showed that chicken bone divination was used in communities entitled “the hunter-gatherer and swidden agriculture”. The complexity was reduced when the communities became “intensive agriculture communities”. Moreover, when the truth through was explained through a religious process, chicken bone divination would be left as a written record. It was also shown that ethnic groups focused on the transformation of the status as well as the physical area. Therefore, the result revealed that “the hunter-gatherer and swidden agriculture” community has generated an overlap between human beings and wild faunas, especially wild fowls; thus human beings were closely related to fowls. The imagination of fowls manifested the inter-relationship among fowls, human beings, and nature. This inter-relationship has been used to explain the truth of unknown situations by members of “the hunter-gatherer and swidden agriculture” community until they have become the intensive agriculture. Instead of nature, they applied religious approaches to explain the truths. Chicken bone divination, therefore, became the recorded myth and belief.