greetings in the desert¹

Abstract

Tuareg men must frequently travel into the wilderness of the western Sahara. The stakes are high in encounters. The desert is vast and threatening; the solitary traveler is continuously reminded of man's—and his own—insignificance. The camel is the “ship of the desert,” and the sighting far off of another rider engenders tensions similar to those experienced by seafaring travelers in the days of ships of sail , viz, is the unknown stranger friend or foe? News and companionship are highly valued in the wilderness, but strangers may be or become enemies. Sensitivity to cues of identity has high survival value; adult males must also learn complex rules for the interpretation of verbal and other behaviors in the accomplishment of greetings and information exchange. Analogs to encounters and greetings in other settings are adduced. A concluding section propounds some tentative universals on the (1) form, (2) function, (3) conditions for, and (4) constraints on, encounters and greetings .