The Cultural Representation of the Social Harmfulness of Inaćenje: A Proverb on the Relationship between the “Priest” and the “Village”

Abstract

This article examines the Serbian proverb Naljutio se pop na selo, pa odsekao sebi kurac (“The priest became angry with the village and cut off his own dick”), conventionally interpreted as describing a person who acts against their own interests to their own detriment. I argue that the meaning of the proverb is more complex than such an interpretation suggests, as it points to a cultural model of sociality, that is, to a culturally specific conception of the principles governing interpersonal relations within a human community at the most general level. The three principal elements of the proverb, the priest, the village, and the dick, should likewise not be understood literally, but rather as metaphorically employed cultural representations of the micro-social community, its leaders, and the public expression of what should be regarded as their sociocultural personas, whose semantic synergy gives rise to a cultural lesson about how people should or should not behave in their interactions with the people they live with, namely, with the members of their own community. The key analytical expression in the proverb is “became angry”. It depicts the relationship between the community leader and his sociocultural environment and explains the action that this relationship has brought about. This notion integrates the cultural representations of the village, the priest, and the male sexual organ into a coherent semantic structure that conveys a distinct cultural message. Cooperation within a community, understood as goal-oriented activity, need not be directed exclusively towards material objectives. It may also possess a moral dimension, in the sense that it may insist on socially desirable forms of behaviour, and this is precisely what the proverb postulates. This saying concerning the village, the priest, and the self-removal of his own sexual organ is devoted to inaćenje (defiant behaviour), specifically, to its absurdity and even its harmfulness as a mode of sociocultural interaction. The proverbial priest represents an aberrant individual whose conduct deviates from the moral standards of the community, as manifested in his poor relations with its members, all of which is contrary to the principles of sociality and functional coexistence within a social setting. Inaćenje, for its part, constitutes a means of the self-production of an individual into a socially aberrant person. By cutting off his own sexual organ, the proverbial priest not only ceases to be a priest and, as such, can no longer lay any claim to leadership within the community in any sense, but also excludes himself from the community. In this respect, the message of the proverb is also that individuals who engage in inaćenje, that is, those who do not respect the opinions of others, acknowledge no justification other than their own, believe themselves always to be right, and generally exaggerate their personal importance within a social environment, are socially undesirable members of the community.