Problemas con fonemas en e aprendizaje de idiomas

Tabla de consonantes pulmonares del AFI, para la conveniencia del lector. Para instrucción en cómo interpretarlo, véase el último post:

   Cuando estudiamos un idioma la pronunciación es un gran desafío, y para dominarlo viene bien estar al tanto de los fonemas. Para un hablante nativo de cualquier idioma es difícil identificar los fonemas de su idioma, pues éstos son sonidos diferentes sobre los que pensamos como uno mismo. Por ejemplo, los sonidos /d/ y /ð/ son fonemas en castellano. Pronuncia la palabra "dado" de forma natural. Pronúnciala repetidas veces lentamente y observa que las dos "d" son articuladas de forma distinta - la primera es una oclusiva alveolar sonora, mientras que la segunda es una fricativa dental sonora. Sin embargo, si decimos "mi dado", observemos que de repente las dos "d" son fricativas dentales. ¿Qué ha pasado? esto es por lo siguiente:
/ð/ > /d/ / #_
/ð/ > /d/ / [n, l]_

/ð/ > /ð/ / en otra parte

   Esto significa que el sonido /ð/ fricativo dental se convierte en /d/ cuando está a principio de palabra o está precedido por /n/ o /l/ - la primera "d" de "mi dado" está a principio de palabra pero es afectada por la "i" de "mi". En cambio, pronuncia "andar" o "enderezar", o "en Dinamarca", "el dado" o "el diccionario", y verás que todas son oclusivas alveolares. El mismo fenómeno se da con:

ɰ > g / #_

ɰ > g / [n]_

ɰ > ɰ / en otra parte
β > b / #_

β > b / [n]_

β > β / en otra parte
   En el aprendizaje de idiomas, esto es relevante porque el otro idioma puede no tener los mismos fonemas. Por ejemplo, en inglés d y ð no lo son, y los sonidos ɰ y β no existen. La /d/ se escribe como d, como en "diccionary" /'dɪk.ʃə.nə.ɹi/ (diccionario), pero /ð/ se escribe th, como en "there" /ðɛː/ o "thus" /ðʌs/ ("ahí" y "de este modo" respectivamente). Así, es común que una frase como "I had a bag", pronunciada /aɪ hæd ei bæg/ se pronuncie /ai hað a βaɰ/. Desde otros idiomas también sucede. En árabe el /g/ y el /ʒ/ son fonemas. Por ejemplo انجلترا/an'gel.tɾa/(Inglaterra) con جميع /ʒə'mjʕ/ (todos), y fíjate en la letra ج. Los árabes también suelen tener problemas con las vocales. En árabe sólo hay tres símbolos vocálicos: ا، ي، و. Y tienen pronunciación fonémica.

و: u, o

ا: a, e, æ

ي: i, e

   Así, a los árabes les cuesta distinguir entre éstos sonidos en español. Piensa por ejemplo en la palabra امير(príncipe o líder), que muchas veces se transcribe "Amir" pero no es raro verlo como "Emir". Sólo imaginalos aprender: ¿cómo se pronuncia "u"? و ¿cómo se pronuncia "o"? و. Y lo mismo nos pasa a nosotros: Cómo pronunciar خ? J. ¿Cómo pronunciar ح? J. Hispano hablantes aprendiendo árabe suelen confundir los sonidos /h/ y /x/. En castellano estos no son precisamente fonemas, sino pronunciaciones dialécticamente diferentes de la "j". Verbos como صبح /sˤɒ'bah/ suelen pronunciarse /sa'bax/.

¿Qué no es un fonema?

   No es un fonema una letra que suena diferente por motivos ortográficos. Por ejemplo, la letra "c" o la letra "g" no son fonemas, aunque suenen diferente, en los siguientes casos: "cerca" /'θeɾ.ka/ y "gigante" /xi'ɰan.te/. Esto es porque somos conscientes de que son sonidos diferentes. Para citarme a mí mismo en éste mismo post, los fonemas "son sonidos diferentes sobre los que pensamos como uno mismo".

Así, recomiendo practicar la identificación de la articulación de los sonidos para poder identificar los fonemas y así mejorar nuestra pronunciación. Gracias por leer, y si crees que le puede ser útil a algún conocido o amigo, compártelo.

How to use the IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet)

   The International Phonetic Alphabet is a set of symbols representing every sound that the human physiology can produce. It is used to write the pronunciation of any language, natural or otherwise. In this post I will be teaching you the basics of how to read the pronunciation of pulmonic consonants (which are the most common). For speakers of a language written with the Latin alphabet it's good news that the creators of the IPA are English speakers, and thus most symbols will look familiar. The pronunciations I will be showing (/…/) are not official, but my educated guesses. Syllables will be separated with dots (.) and an apostrophe (') marks the stressed syllable. The next table is the IPA's collection of pulmonic consonants:

   The following image, if rather incomplete, is a guide as to the position of the tongue for most of the PLACES of articulation. Note that while for most you only use your tongue, for bilabial it is your lips that matter, and for labio-dental your lower lip and upper teeth.

   Let's discuss MANNER of articulation. This section will be interactive (fun!).

   Nasal consonants are pronounced letting air escape your nose. For example, try to pronounce /m/ as in "Manhattan" /mæn'hæ.tən/, or /n/ as in "nose" /nəʊz/, or /ŋ/ as in "singer" /'sɪ.ŋə/. Note as well how your tongue and lips move to the positions shown in the second image.

   Stop consonants are pronounced by stoping the flow of air through the mouth and then bursting it out. For example, pronounce "pound" /pæʊnd/ and "bottle" /'bo.təl/, noting how your lips go in the same position as when your pronounced /m/. More examples: "deny" for /də'naɪ/ and "time" for /taɪm/ (which are alveolar, like /n/). Say "car" and "kettle" for /kaː/ and /'kɛ.təl/ and Google for /'gu.gəl/.

   Fricative consonants leave a small space for the air to pressure itself out. Pronounce "far" for /faː/, "vet" for /vɛt/, ·"three" for /θɹiː/, "though" for /ðəʊ/, "seven" for /'sɛ.vən/ and "shark" for /∫ aːk/.

   For sibilants you will have to get your tongue in a concave shape. Try to notice this subtlety in "seven" for /'sɛ.vən/ vs "three" for /θɹiː/, or "zip" for /zɪp/ vs "though" for /ðəʊ/.

   An approximant consonant is similar to a non-sibilant fricative only the tongue doesn't quite touch anything. For example, compare, in the word "three" /θɹiː/, the "th" /θ/ vs the "r" /ɹ/.

   Flaps are only shy touches with the tongue/lip(s)/teeth on the PLACE of articulation. For example, look at the American pronunciation of "water" /'wɔ.ɾa/.

   Trills are a struggle for English speakers. Try to pronounce the Spanish word "perro" (dog) /'pe.ro/, compared to "pero" (but) /'pe.ɾo/.

   Lateral consonants are pronounced by letting air flow through the sides of your tongue. For example, say "language" for /'læŋ.gwɪʤ/.

   Lateral fricatives are rare, non-existent in English. Welsh, though, has the /ɬ/ sound, as in "Llantwit" /'ɬan.twit/. To pronounce it, put your tongue in alveolar position (as in /n/, /t/, /s/ or /ɹ/) and blow – remember it's fricative!

E.Bernays, Bulimic society and celebrity culture

   Edward Bernays was the nephew of Sigmund Frued, son to his sister Anna Freud. He used his uncle's theories of the subconscious mind in the world of business to make money. In his day, the mass media presented products based purely on their practical advantages, so that a car, for example, would be presented on grounds of its speed, useful life and materials. Rather, Bernays found that by linking the product to one of the innate desires of the subconscious, like power and liberty. Thus, it is common today to see cars being promoted as pathways toward these ideas. The first trial Bernays conducted was with a sale of cigarettes: at the time there was a taboo against women smoking, and the owner of a cigarette company, George Hill, asked him to solve this, as that would increase his sales. Bernays took advantage of the feminist movements, and in one propaganda for Hill's cigarettes, where he got female actors to smoke, he presented the product as torches of freedom. Thus, the cigarettes were made into a symbol of the fight against male oppression, and sales of them, specially the brand featured in the propaganda, shot up. More strategies to appeal to the subconscious mind include emitting a sense of urgency (This product is exclusive and can't be bought anywhere else after the following 15 seconds!) and social conformity (Everyone is buying this product. What are you waiting for?).

   I think we can all agree, even smokers out there, that cigarettes are not necessary, however much desirable a person might find them, and it is exactly this on which the paradigm of consumerism is based: people must want to buy things even when they don't need them. Bernays' approach is the best profitability-wise, but it requires a culture of desire, and this leads to what Young calls social bulimia (see Bulimic society, 07/06/2020). In this culture of desire, there is a hierarchy where the highest and more valued are those who consume more and more expensive products, especially if they share these products and experiences on social media – show yourself to be someone. With the introduction of Neo-liberalism, the free market economy (offer and demand), Fordism, the mass production of standardised goods, becomes Post-Fordism, which is the production of personalised goods for niche, specialised markets. Thus, for example, there are now many brands of clothing for all tastes and styles, while not long ago the options would have been limited. Moreover, businesses were able to use to their advantage something that had been created relatively recently: celebrity culture. Celebrities, defined simply as someone who is widely known, have always existed – you can even think of Achilles and Agamemnon, in the XIII - XII century BC – but the mass media, by focusing heavily on famous people, have created a culture of celebrity worship. In his book the Science of Celebrity – Is Gwyneth Paltrow Wrong about Everything?, T. Caulfield presents various studies where primary school children report that their primary life goal is being famous – they don't even note how, as in rock star or actor, just being famous, and this is rated even over being rich. A para-social relationship is one where one of the parties involved invests tremendous amounts of effort on the other, but the other knows little to nothing about them. For example, a person might claim that they have an intimate romantic relationship with their favourite singer, but they have only communicated with them via Twitter (social media messaging creates the illusion that there is contact). However extreme this might be, the tendency to follow well-known people is a human thing. It has been speculated that it stems from tribal structures, where the leader, who got his position through being noted as the best hunter, is to be imitated so that others too become better hunters. Businesses use this to their advantage: adverts that feature celebrities using new products highly increase their consumption by the general public, because they want to feel similar to that celebrity, as this gives them the feeling that they too are successful. However, Caulfield notes, even the idea of success is an illusion: people think that being a movie star is the highlife, but in fact Hollywood actors are subject to tremendous pressure to remain fit, thin and attractive and, for women, their career tends to be over by the time they are 40.

   Thus, Bernays created, using psychoanalytical theory, the system of propaganda that would lead to the consumerist and bulimic society, where the economy is maintained by making people want things they don't need and, in truth, are not as desirable as painted. However, as it seems, if people didn't consume so much, businesses would go bankrupt and the economy would crush, as this is no simple question.

   Thank you for reading, if you found it interesting share it with you friends and family. To investigate further ron the topic, I would recommend Timothy Caulfield's book the Science of Celebrity – Is Gwyneth Paltrow Wrong about Everything?, and the documentaries the Century of the Self and Starsuckers Documentary, both available on YouTube.

Review on the Gift by Marcel Mauss

   This week I've finished reading the book the Gift by Marcel Mauss, who seems to have worked with Durkheim, a sociologist whom we've spoken of before in this blog (look at: Definitions of Religion, 04/05/2020, and Changes Brought by Industrialisation, 15/06/2020). The book looks into the institution of gift giving, primarily in indigenous cultures of North West America, Alaska and Siberia and Melanesia, an archipelago near Australia, but it further comments on how these practices are still vacant today (by today he means the 1920s and 30s). I must say that I enjoyed this book and found many of its concepts fascinating, so if you decide to read it, I hope it will have the same effect.

   Mauss focuses on the obligations to give and to receive, which, he explains, are masked selfless generosity. For example, in the Hindu tradition, of which, due to the limited availability of sources, only the culture of the cast of the Brahmins is commented, he explains that objects are seen to have in their nature the tendency to be shared, so that if someone keeps food, for example, for themselves, s/he "kills its essence for others and for himself", and this, following a doctrine of magic, can lead to death. Similarly, in a myth of the Melanesians, in one tribe a princess gives birth to an otter who makes them rich in food (as he is a better hunter than any human), and they invite all surrounding tribes, except one which they forget about, to taste their food. This sharing of their riches gives them immense status, but the tribe which has not been invited kills the otter and assaults the village. Indeed, Mauss notes that refusing to give or refusing to receive is equivalent to a declaration of war, because gift exchange reinforces commercial links and alliances between tribes. In most cultures, there is an idea of debt, where every gift had to be reciprocated with interest, and this was frequently accompanied by magic: for example, the Trobriands have the concept of hau, which is the spirit of the thing given that is always attached to the primary owner. It works thus: I give a gift to my neighbour, and thus he is burdened with the hau of the object; then my neighbour gives my gift to his cousin, and she, burdened with my neighbour's hau, reciprocates this gift. Now that my neighbour has been paid back, he can't keep the gift because he is still burdened with my gift's hau, so he must give it over to me. In this way, Mauss notes, many Germanic languages use the same word for gift than for poison. This institution of gifting and reciprocating he calls system of total prestation.

   In Melanesia, the author describes an economy of gifts where vaygu'a, which he describes as types of money or standardised trading goods, circulate the islands. There are two types of vaygu'a: the mwali are armshells, and they are crafted in the islands of the west and are gifted from tribe to tribe toward the east; the soulava are necklaces, and their motion has the opposite direction. These exchanges happen in intertribal meetings called kula, in which, each year, there is a host tribe in whose village all tribes congregate. The host tribe will be the giver of gifts, but the next year, when it is invited by the next hosting tribe, it will receive reciprocation with interest. Mauss notes how there is a sense of legitimacy of contract within the public exchange: since there is no writing, he says, a contract can only be validated by making it public. In this way, any tribe could negate that they had received a gift from another tribe and not reciprocate, but by having other witnesses in theory unbiased they ensure this doesn't happen. The North American peoples have an institution similar to the kula called potlatch, and he stresses the obligation to accept gifts in relation to status; a clan who does not want to accept a gift is seen as being afraid to having to reciprocate and thus losses status and power within the tribe. In a similar way, when one fives a gift away, one must give the impression that one does not wisher care to have it reciprocated, even though it is known by all members that it must. Mauss explains that this custom is still vacant today (first publication of the book in 1923). In my experience, in XXI century Europe it is no longer an important thing, probably due, I speculate, to anomie (see last post: 15/06/2020), but I have evidence that it was for my own grand- and great grandparents: the other day, commenting the book to my grandmother, she recalled her mother say "why are they [other people in town] giving me gifts? Like I have enough [money and resources] to give any back!" Although not taken with pleasure, this view proves that there was until then an obligation to reciprocate. Moreover, I myself experienced the obligation to accept: when I was a child, my other grandma gifted me, out of the blue, a black jacket with purple straps; it was the ugliest jacket you could imagine, and I believe it had belonged to an older cousin, so I, a naïve kid unknowledgeable of cultural customs, rejected it. "One never rejects a gift", my grandma said. Similarly, there is a traditional saying in Spanish, which further illustrates this point: a caballo regalado no le mires la dentadura – "don't check the teeth of a gifted horse".

   Thanks for reading, if you liked it share it with friends and family, and tell me in the comments any personal anecdote where you experienced the system of total prestation.

Changes brought by industrialisation

   In preindustrial Europe, the Catholic Church had the monopoly of truth – it was the only powerful source of truth and therefore its claims went unchallenged. It believed in what Weber calls the Enchanted Garden, where everything that happens in the world is the result of God's will and action. This monopoly, argues Durkheim, helped establish an absolute moral and ethical* law based on divine command, and people were effectively socialised into shared norms and values, a dominant culture. He calls this social solidarity, where we can function finely in community because we all hold the same values. This was reflected on the form of punishment: retribution was the norm, because, when there was an offence, the entire community was offended, which led to public hysteria and corporal punishment as a sort of vengeance. Parsons argues that the orientation of people was communal, meaning that they put the needs of the group before their own. From this, we get phenomena such as punishing a relative for staining the name of the family. In this extended rural family*, they had ascribed status, meaning that the position in which you were born (e.g. primogeniture, or first born male descendent) was the position in which you most likely would die. Their rural lifestyle meant also that they were a unit of production which cultivated its own nutrients and grew its own animals for food and clothing etc. Parsons also notes that in preindustrial society people had immediate gratification, that they preferred to obtain now a minor good than work for a future greater good, diffuseness, that relations were wide and multi-teleological (with many purposes), and particularism, were each individual was judged by people not on a standardised criteria but on personal whim – for example, you would employ someone in your farm only because they or someone in their family are your friend.

* Ethics vs Morality: morality refers simply to the distinction between good and evil, while ethics is about how we should live our lives. Thus, the Catholic Church, having monopoly over the view of morality, was able to impose an absolutist ethical doctrine.
*Extended family: a family unit with three generations. Children + Parents + Grandparents

   Nevertheless, Weber argues that with the Protestant Revolution in the 1500s starts the process of rationalisation. Calvinism, a branch of Protestantism, introduced this-worldly asceticism and the idea that God favours the hardworking. The former doctrine argues that one should not seek luxuries and rather live a life of modesty and contemplation, and thus people, who wanted to be saved after their death, began businesses like sales of crops but did not invest their gainings on luxuries, reinventing them on their business. Thus, they grew richer and richer, and this, eventually, led to industrialisation. In this process large cities gain power because work becomes centred in factories. Parsons, in his theory of the functional fit, argues that it is this that gave origin to the nuclear family (two parents and their children). In rural communities families were extended, but when they had to move to cities grandparents had to be left behind because the voyage had to be done by foot and their health wasn't sufficient for such endeavour.

   Now, in large cities under these circumstances, people became isolated because they encountered new communities and in any case they were made to inhabit small apartments in buildings. Thus, he argues, the communal orientation begins to fade and give place to self-orientation or individualism, meaning they have more freedom of choice. In factories workers were alienated from their work, that whatever they produced they didn't own or have any rights upon, and rather had to buy it if they wanted it. Thus the family ceases to be a unit of production and becomes a unit of consumption, beneficial for the capitalist dynamic. Moreover, relations cease to be diffuse to become specific, meaning that each relation has a single purpose, for example boss – employee, shopkeeper – customer. Isolation from the community also results in the abandoning of particularism to adopt universalism, in which people are treated (at least in theory) according to standardised criteria. In this way, any person has the same chances of being employed by any employer who only judges them for their ability, and not their family. Both in the family and in the workplace, social mobility, the ability to climb up the social hierarchy, increases, so that status ceases to be ascribed and become achieved. In this way, people get used to working toward goals, and immediate gratification becomes deterred gratification. Additionally, the family looses most of its functions: rural extended families were responsible for nurture, education, health, employment etc, but, through the process of structural differentiation, where the emerging institutions (schools, hospitals, etc) absorbe these functions.

   Durkheim notes that since so many cultures are mixed in one place, social solidarity is weakened, leading to a state of anomie in which moral standards are unclear. He blames this on the breakdown of the family and on the excess of hope: propaganda aiming to attract workers form rural areas exaggerated social mobility, and thus people arrived in cities with much too high and unrealistic expectations. Furthermore, multiculturalism removed the Church's monopoly of truth, because many cultures and worldviews met. Thus, the ethical and moral code imposed by the Church also loses credibility and is abandoned by many – atheism begins to grow in society. With no shared God that dictates to all members of society how to behave, argues Durkheim, people fail to be socialised so rigidly into social solidarity. All these factors lead to anomie. This had effects on the type of punishment: when there is an offence, there no longer is public hysteria, and thus retribution no longer works; moreover, the effect on which retribution bases its functioning for deterring re-offending, namely shame, also looses power, because due to higher geographical mobility the offender can simply move some place else where s/he is not known; rather, the punishment now practiced is restitution, where efforts are made to reintegrate the offender into society so s/he can make a living within the law.

   I hope you found this useful. If so, please share with friends and family, and don't hesitate to leave a comment!

Bulimic society

   In his Vertigo of Late Modernity, Jock Young proposes that today's society is bulimic, unhealthily consumerist. It has two important consequences: one for crime and the other for nature. In a bulimic society, the mass media bombards us with the idea that to be someone or to be part of society, you have to constantly consume products and experiences and , most importantly, share them on social media. Thus a new hierarchy is born, where those who consume more, or have more, and with more frequency, are higher and more 'important'.

   This society is culturally inclusive but structurally exclusive. It's being culturally inclusive means that all people are welcomed into the norms and values that it holds, that all people come to value consumerism and present consumerist conducts. In sociology, whenever you see the word structural you can be pretty confident that it has to do with social class, and a structurally exclusive society is no exception. What it means is that although everyone is given these bulimic values, the lower classes are excluded from the possibility to satiate them, because they are socially marginalised, and if they don't abbey to the norms of consumption, they are not in the community. This causes relative deprivation, which means that they feel, in comparison to others, that they lack something important. Thus, they will come together with other working class people and form subcultures (a group of people that hold norms and values different from those of the mainstream society). Cloward & Ohlin argue that there are different types of deviant subcultures. Conflict gangs commit non-utilitarian crime - crime that doesn't provide financial benefit, which may include 'turf wars', where they fight other gangs for territory - and criminal gangs commit utilitarian crime. Moreover, A. Cohen would argue that some may too invert these values, so that their status frustration* is able to be satiated through deviant activities valued within the subculture. For example, a conflict gang may value edge-work and thus its members will climb up their own hierarchy by graffitiing a wall, rather than unsuccessfully try to climb the bulimic hierarchy by getting the last model of Nikes. However, Young notes that the w/c, being the most structurally excluded, are the most bulimic and will spend lot's of time, money and effort in trying to appear wealthier than they are in order to seem higher in the social hierarchy. Thus, a bulimic society causes crime because it subjects people to strain.

   Merton argues that strain, which he defines as the tension between that which one desires and ethical and moral limitations, causes anomie, which a state of ambiguity where these limitations become unclear - or perhaps they are abandoned. Bauman adds that in such conditions, and in an individualistic society, we are left alone to make our decisions on our conduct, and these will be based on our own personal desires. All this leads to anthropocentric values, where we see humans as the centre of the universe and are keen to trample nature for our benefit. In Neo-liberalism, the free-market economy, more demand means more production. Bulimia and anthropocentric values lead to over consumption, where people buy things they don't need only to show others that they can consume it. As we saw in the post on the Theories of Today's society (25/05/2020), Goffman argues that, through the image that we show others, we get the sense of being that which we want to be. In an era of disembedding (Giddens, same post), of liquid identity (Bauman), we must constantly reassure ourselves that we are this illusion, even if it is by creating an avatar of ourselves. Large corporations, who provide us with the products necessary to satiate our social bulimia, will over-produce their products, and consequently they will deforest, pollute and exploit nature and workers ever more. Thus, the tension we experience from the sickly hunger for goods and the pressure put on us by the media causes that we become blind to the damage it causes, and this perpetuates harm against nature.

* A. Cohen's concept of status frustration comes from a theory on education, arguing that w/c children, lacking cultural capital, aren't able to gain status from their teachers (More on this in future posts)

How does stress affect my body?

   Stressful situations activate the sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system (ANS), also known as SNS. Stress activates the fight or flight response, thus making you more able to combat the stressor, but if the situation is stretched for long periods of time, it can have negative effects on the health, including ulcers and a weakened immune system. Let's have a closer look at what this means and how it happens.

Index:
- Autonomic Nervous System (ANS), SAM and HPA
- General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS)
- Stress on heath
- Stress through life changes
- Daily hassles
- Evaluation of the studies


AUTONOMIC NERVOUS SYSTEM (ANS), SAM  and HPA
   The ANS is a part of the Nervous System which serve the task of controlling involuntary actions, such as the functioning of organs. It is subdivided into the Sympathetic and Parasympathetic Nervous Systems (SNS and PsNS). The SNS is involved in the fight or flight response, which prepares the organism for a reaction to a danger, be it by fighting it or escaping from it (i.e. running), and when this is over, the PsNS will make everything go back to normal.

   SAM is the sympathomedullary pathway, and it is the response to immediate stressors. When a danger is detected by the senses, the SNS (S) alerts the adrenal medulla (M) through signals sent via the Central Nervous System (CNS) - which consists of the brain and the spinal-chord. The adrenal medulla is the middle part of the adrenal gland, located just above the kidneys, and in response to this signal it will secrete adrenaline and noradrenaline (A). These hormones will travel through the bloodstream, stimulating specific organs. For example, the heart will beat faster to pump more blood, respiration will accelerate in order to have more oxygen in the blood, and blood pressure increases so that muscles get more energy that readies them to respond to a threat.

SNS > CNS > adrenal medulla > adrenaline and noradrenaline > fight or flight

   The HPA is the response that the body has for long term or ongoing stressors, and it stands for hypothalamic pituitary-adrenal axis. Like the SAM, it begins activating the SNS, specifically the hypothalamus (H), which is located in the brain, close to the amygdalas. The hypothalamus secretes corticotrophin-releasing hormone (CRH), which travels to the pituitary gland (P), also known as the mother gland of the endocrine system*, and stimulates it to produce adrenocorticotrophin hormone (ACTH). The ACTH hormone will travel through the bloodstream and stimulate the adrenal cortex (A), which will release various stress related hormones, including cortisol, which, if out in the brain for too long, can literally shrink its size.

Hypothalamus > CRH > pituitary gland > ACTH > adrenal cortex > stress-related hormones

*Endocrine system: the system formed by all the glans in the body. The hypothalamus is the sensory register that connects it to the real world, and the pituitary gland is called its mother gland because from it the instructions of the hypothalamus are communicated to all other glands.

GENERAL ADAPTATION SYNDROME (GAS)

   The Hungarian researcher Hans Selye was the proposer of this model. It is divided into three stages:

Stage 1 is where the hypothalamus detects the danger and the SNS is activated. This leads to Stage 2, in which the body will be in the fight or flight response. Here the adrenal gland is secreting adrenaline and noradrenaline to provide energy to the muscles. However, it is when the stressor elongates for long periods that we enter Stage 3. Throughout Stage 2, the organism has adapted to the environment, meaning that, in the knowledge that some kind of danger is imminent, the adrenal gland perpetually secretes stress-related hormones, to maintain the body in a stable state of readiness. However, to do this it needs of resources - sugars, proteins, neurotransmitters, hormones - and when these run out, the individual will again experience the initial symptoms of stress, including dizziness, exhaustion, sweating. Selye proposes that further damage to the health is caused by damage to the adrenal gland, which is now like an old car engine: overused and exhausted. However, Sheridan & Radmacher found that the body does not at any point run out of resources (given diet is maintained steadily), but in Stage 3 the adrenal gland begins to work faster and it is this overuse of it that causes harm, including ulcers or psychological issues such as depression.

STRESS ON HEALTH
   Kiecolt-Glaser found that ongoing stress has a negative effect on the immune system. Natural Killer cells (NKs) are a type of white blood cells that detect and destroy antigens such as viruses. In her study of 1984 (Kiecolt-Glaser et al), she took a sample of 75 medical students, and took two blood samples: one a month before their exams (low stress) and one during their exam period (high ongoing stress). She also had them complete a Social Readjustment Rating Scale (SRRS)* to measure their general levels of stress and a loneliness scale to assess their social circles. They found that for all student, there were less NKs in the second blood sample, and the effect was worse for those who had scored high in the SRRS and the loneliness scale. This suggests that there is a correlation between life change, healthy relationships and ongoing stressors with the immune system.

*The SRRS is a scale that lists a series of events that would change significantly a person's life, such as the death of a spouse or close relative, or being fired from work. Each event has a life change unit (LCU) attached to it. These are like points. Death of a relative gives 100 LCUs, while being fired from work gives 47. It is completed for an agreed time period, for example for events within the last three months.

   Furthermore, Williams et al (2000) investigated the effects of anger of cardiovascular health. Like stress, anger activates the Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS). In their study they had 13 000 complete an anger scale, asking them to describe how they acted when angry - the questions explored whether the person got annoyed when not given recognition for some accomplishment, or whether they had violent thoughts when they were angry. Six years later, they found that 256 out of the 13 000 people had had heart attacks, and there was an important positive correlation between score in the anger scale and likelihood to be in this group. People who scored high were up to 2'5 time more likely to suffer a heart attack.

LIFE CHANGE
   Rahe & Kanner et al conducted a study on US Navy officials with a variant of the SRRS called Schedule of Recent Events (SRE). In this questionnaire they were asked to self-report about their life for the past two years (the SRE was adapted to be relevant for their profession). This was done just before they boarded on a trip for 8 months overseas, and during this time each was monitored on how many times they attended the sick bay and how severe their illness was. They found that frequency of visits and severity of illness was positively correlated to SRE score. The SRE includes not only negative events, such as the explained above in the SRRS* section, but also positive ones like Christmas. This suggests that stress is not only caused by negative things, but can stem from the simple change of lifestyle. For example, a parent will get stress from having to find time to buy Christmas presents for his or her children. This is due to what they called psychic energy, which is extra mental and emotional effort.

DAILY HASSLES
   These are minor stressors in everyday life, like traffic on your way to work, but evidence suggests that daily hassles actually more impact on levels of stress than major life changes. Kanner and Lazarus et al (1981) conducted a study in which 100 participants, male and female, took an SRRS of the past six months, and every month for the next 9 months they took a Hassles and Uplifts scale (HSUP). At the end of the 9 months they took another SRRS and two scales measuring their psychological well-being (Hopkins Symptom Checklist and Bradburn Morale Scale). They found that the correlation between hassles and well-being was much more important than that between life-change and well-being. Moreover, hassles were a better predictor of well-being than uplifts. Flett et al (1995) suggest that this might be due to hassles attracting less moral support than major life-changes. Lazarus argues that daily hassles generate large stress because they accumulate over time. Another explanation for this phenomenon is amplification, where someone who is undergoing a life-change becomes more sensitive to minor hassles. For example, a worker who has just divorced is likely to be more disturbed by inconveniences due to traffic than he or she normally would.

EVALUATION OF THE STUDIES
   Most of these studies are correlational, rather than focusing of causation. This means that they only find that when A happens, B tends to happen. They tell us nothing of whether A causes B or B causes A or if C causes both B and A. It could be that those who reported more negative events turned out as the ones who presented more symptoms of depression and anxiety because being depressed and anxious gave them a negative worldview and they remembered more the negative things that happened.
   There are a number of individual differences. For example, the SNS is not equally sensitive for all people, and thus some might have more dramatic responses of the adrenal medulla from the same stressor. In this way, Lazarus and Folkman (1984) argue that there is a cognitive stage before any response to danger is enacted. In this stage, the individual assesses and compares the perceived demands and his or her perceives ability to meet them, in such way that if an individual feels able to overcome the danger, there will be no response, or a lesser one. Taylor et al (2000) found that females respond differently to danger than males. They don't use the fight-or-flight response, but rather a tend-and-befriend approach. They suggest that this might be due to a desire to keep violence away from their offspring. Until then, most research on the topic had been done on male non-human animals, because it was a concern that hormonal cycles in females might affect negatively the validity of studies.
   Furthermore, the SRRS has been criticised because not everyone will value and be affected in the same way by the life changes listed, so a point system is too simplistic. For example, being fired from work affects differently a person who liked their job and feels unable to find another one compared to someone who hated their job and think they will be employed soon in something else. More methodological issues concern the use of self-report techniques, which are methods where the participants report about themselves, as in questionnaires. For a start, these always run the risk of being biased, because they are subjective and vulnerable to social desirability - the participant modifies their answers to match what's socially acceptable or praised. This reduces their validity, but there is also a problem with reliability. Lazarus (1995) conducted test re-test* on SRRS and found that the longer the period participants had to report about, the lower the reliability/consistency of their answers, because the method relies heavily on memory.

*Test re-test is a way to measure the reliability of a research method which involves giving participants the test one first time and then retaking it after a time-lapse sufficient for them to have forgotten their answers, for example three weeks.

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Theories of today's society: Cultural, social and economic changes

   There are many theories on the society of the XXI century, and in this essay I'll be exploring and evaluating postmodernism, late modernism and postmodernist Marxism.

Index
· Characteristics of XXI century society & changes that led to it
· Postmodernism
· Late modernism
· Postmodern Marxism

   Society of the XXI and mid and late XX centuries is distinguished from other societies by four main characteristics. The first is the notion of a nation-state, where territories are divided into nations that generally share a same culture and language, and which are led by one central government. The second is the use of rationality and science to obtain knowledge, whereas in other societies such as pre-industrial European society superstition is the main means for this end. People become more individualistic, meaning that they have a greater personal freedom and rely less on tradition. Finally, society is dominated by capitalism, where the proletariat majority sells their workforce to the bourgeoisie owners of the means of production.

   Four main changes are the ones that have led to these characteristics, the most obvious of which is technological change. Technological development has led to space-time compression, because the effects of space and time on our lives are less noticeable thanks to machines. For example, a journey from Europe to South America on a plane takes less than a day, whereas on a ship it would have lasted months, and before that it would have been impossible. Economic change is seen in the way we handle money. Increasingly the way to do this is more digital, and even the products sold have shifted from being solely material goods to including, as an important part of them, information such as films, music or games. A great part of the money we handle is managed virtually, through global networks of banking and online transactions. Political change is seen in transnational corporations (TNC), such as Nike, which sell standardised goods worldwide, having factories and shops in multiple countries. These corporations now have more power than governments, because in the free-market economy they are the ones who truly appeal to people. This standardisation of the product of sale has the effect of creating the same tastes worldwide. For example, Nike designs a model of trainers they think will be successful based on American tastes, but when they sell the same thing in other countries people in those countries will begin to acquire these American tastes, simply because in many cases there isn't an equivalent design for their culture's tastes. This leads to social and cultural changes, where increasingly the world's cultures are being absorbed and mixed in one global culture. Another thing that leads to this is the mass media, which promote role models such as music superstars that radiate and spread these cultural traits.

POSTMODERNISM
   This said, postmodernists believe that the modern era has ended and we are now in a postmodern era. Postmodernism is based on the principle of anti-foundationalism, which argues that there is no absolute truth. This has two consequences: the Enlightenment project, which claimed that humans are capable of bringing a better society through the use of rationality and science, is dead, because we can't use objective knowledge if such thing does not exist; all theories which claim to have an absolute truth, such as Marxism or feminism, are now a waste, they are meta-narratives that have to be forgotten. Lyotard (1992) argues that, because of this, the only thing that exists are views and opinions, and all are equally valid. He believes that, despite the end of the Enlightenment dream, this is preferable to having an objective truth imposed on us. Baudrillard, like Lyotard, argues that there is no objective knowledge, but because economy now is based on the selling of information in the form of images, a new type of signs appears: simulacra (singular: simulacrum), which are signs that stand only for themselves, such as cartoons or the logo of a bank, this unlike symbols, which represented things in the physical world. This simulacra create a hyper-reality, in which people are trapped and thus separated from the real reality. Since we are more individualistic, tradition is less important in our lives and losses its power to guide our actions and define us. Now identity has become unstable, and it can be changed only by changing our way of consumption, because it is the simulacra that with which we present ourselves that give us identity.

   However, postmodernists have criticisms. For example, most non-postmodernists would argue that Baudrillard is simply wrong in suggesting that people can't distinguish between hyper-reality and the real reality, and, as we will see, other theories argue that while it may be true that science can't lead us to absolute truths, it can get us near enough that we can indeed change and improve society. Moreover, why would you take as a truth a theory that says that there aren't truths? If all views are equally valid, the view that the Holocaust never happened becomes just as valid as the posture that it did, despite having tones of evidence against it, thus legitimising neglect to the victims. Thus, this perception can have not only theoretical but moral issues associated with it.

LATE MODERNISM
   Late modernism argues that we have not moved on from the modern era, but are just on the late stages of it. Giddens argues that we are undergoing disembedding, which is the process where we become distant from tradition and its ethical guidelines. Due to individualism we are more free to decide how t act, but this leaves the question: "how to make this decision?". What we do is jump to reflexivity, where we monitor, reflect upon and modify our behaviour constantly. Under these two principles, late modern society becomes fragile and ephemeral, always subject to rapid change. Beck argues that today's society is characterised by manufactured risks, human-made hazards such as global warming or economic instability. We humans, due to Giddens' principles, pay special attention to these risks when making our choices on how to act. For example, if you see on the internet that a certain food is bad for the health, you will change your diet. He calls this risk-consciousness. Beck is optimistic about the Enlightenment position. He is sceptic of science, because it is technological development mainly that has brought a large number of the manufactured risks, but he believes that empirically observing the world can change society for the better. For example, new political movements such as environmentalism are largely based on scientific understanding of our condition.

   Some sociologists reject Beck's optimism, because they argue that political movements like Extinction Rebellion are too fragmented to make an important impact. Moreover, Marxists oppose to the idea that we can freely change our lifestyle based on our decisions, because there are structural factors that restrain us. For example, a working class person who wishes to stop consuming fast food and each mor healthy organic food is faced with the fact that fast food shops are more common in w/c areas, thus exposing him or her to more temptation, and that organic food is more expensive.

POSTMODERNIST MARXISM
   Marxists agree with postmodernists in that we have moved to a new era different from modernism, but take sides with late modernism in their acceptance of the Enlightenment project. Harvey notes that capitalism has an ethos of profitability, and thus it constantly replaces old ways to acquire benefit with new ones, leading to more specialised and efficient workers.  Harvey agues that the present system of production is one of post-Fordism; Fordism is the mass production of standardised goods in factories that is characteristic of the industrial era, whereas post-Fordism is the mass production of personalised products for small, niche markets. For example, Nike now allows the consumer to design their own pair of trainers from templates via online websites. This leads to the creation of more diversity: people are more able to translate their own personal tastes and preferences into the real world, and thus more trends of fashion emerge. Moreover, drawing on Baudrillard's notion that consumption makes identity, identity in post-Fordism becomes commodified and commercialised; identity and culture become consumable products. For example, if a person likes rap music, they only have to consume 'rap music products' (clothing and gadgets that are commonly used by rap stars) to create that identity, and souvenirs of countries you visit, like key chains with the Eiffel Tower, are the epitome of the commodification of culture. Jameson suggests that postmodernity is the highest point of capitalism, because it is able to commodify all aspects of life.

Summary:

PoMo: Lyotard - anti-foundationism; Baudrillard - simulacra and hyper-reality
LateMo: Giddens - disembeddeding and reflexivity; Beck - manufactured risks and risk society
Marx PoMo: Harvey - post-Fordism; Jameson - the capitalist peak

Thanks for reading. If you found it useful or interesting, share it with your friends and family, and I should want to leave with a meme depicting one of the criticisms agains postmodernism that I always find hilarious.

Marxism: historical materialism

   Marx was a materialist is the sense that he believed we humans need material goods to survive, such as food and shelter. Different societies have different ways of obtaining these material goods. Marx believes that it is the necessity to satisfy these material needs, as opposed to the development of new ideas, that is the primal engine for the advancement of history. This is because humans will come together in groups in order to be more effective at obtaining material goods - it is self interest that motivates social relations - and therefore changes to social structures are impulsed by the same goal; when a better way to produce goods is found, this causes relations to change, but, as we will see, a "better way to produce" is not necessarily "better" for all individuals.

   Tribal societies had what he calls primitive communism, a system where all members work to obtain their necessities, which are shared more or less evenly because all goods were owned communally, since there was no concept of private property. They would do this through hunting or gathering. Marx views humans as animals that create instruments as a force of labour. These would include tools such as spears and axes, but with the emergence of private property the means of production become privatised, and this gives place to a ruling class that dominates over villagers. Colonial expansion then creates a new type of society: Marx calls it the ancient society, and it's the first to have exploitation; in its case, of slaves. Legally, the slaves are owned by the nobles and aristocrats, and they are seen as the means of production, instruments to produce material goods. For example, they'd build houses and castles and cultivate the land. In feudalism the exploited class would be the serfs who are legally owned by the feudal lords who own the land. In all societies, Marx argues, there is alienation: an alienated worker is set apart from the final product of his or her work and has little to no control over what this work is. In this way, a slave is forced to produce for the aristocrat and the serf for the lord, not for themselves. Nevertheless, since their owners want to preserve them healthy enough to continue working, they will provide them with basic necessities which they'll take from what they produced themselves, so in this sense they are not totally separated from their work. In capitalism, on the other hand, workers are the most alienated; the exploitation is from the bourgeoisie, who own the factories, to the proletariat, who although legally free, are obliged to sell their force of labour to the bourgeoisie in their pursue of subsistence. Division of labour has reached its maximum expression, so that each worker is a meaningless piece of a larger system of meaningless pieces that do the same over and over each day. They are stripped away from their humanity because they are only machines. Moreover, it is in capitalism that workers are completely separated from the product of their work. For example, a worker who participates in the creation of a watch doesn't receive anything from the watch: they are working for a salary with which they can buy whatever they want, and even if it is the watch they built, at the time of purchasing it they are consumers no different from anyone else who did not participate in its creation.

Definitions of Religion

   Sociologists don't agree on what is meant by religion, and there are different approaches to this definition. To understand the difference between them, we must understand the difference between a functional and a substantive definition. A functional definition is one that defines a thing through what it does or is used for; for example in defining a vehicle, it would say that it's the thing that takes you to work or to school. A substantive definitions, on the other hand focuses on what the thing is, on its substance; in defining a vehicle, it would focus on its structure: wheels, seats, engine.

   Weber provides a substantive definition of religion. He says that religion is an organised belief in the supernatural, including, but not limited to, gods and angels. This belief, he emphasises, cannot be confirmed by science. In this way, Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, ancient Greek and Norse mythology are religions, because they affirm the existence of supernatural beings. This definition comes handy when researching about religion, because it marks a clear difference between what is and what is not religious belief; for example, in later editions of the 1851 UK Census, some people marked as their religion Jedi Knights or Heavy Metal. This clearly is not what the researchers were going for, but with Weber's definition they could easily select out what didn't fit in. However, this definition is exclusive, meaning that it restricts what can be seen as a religion, and this makes it Eurocentric. Eurocentrism is the belief that European values are the standard against which all values should be weighted, but this excludes Eastern traditions which don't believe in a supernatural God, like Buddhism and Confucianism, that we would regard as being religions. Thus, a substantive definition provides clear distinction and criteria for religion but excludes many non-Western faiths.

   Durkheim provides a functional definition. For him, religion integrates individuals into the norms and values of society to create social solidarity and harmony. For example, by calling all its followers to church every Sunday, Christianity creates a sense of community and of duty. This definition is more inclusive: it recognises non-Western traditions, as clearly there is too social solidarity in Buddhist temples. However, it is too inclusive. The criteria for being a religion becomes so vague that even going to school and studying for tests fits the definition. In football fandom, followers of a team may gather weekly to watch the games of their team and conduct rituals such as chanting hymns, but, although there are regular rituals, just like Sunday prayers or the five daily prayers of Islam, it is hard to accept football fandom as a religion. Moreover, Yinger argues that religions provide answers for 'ultimate questions': for example, where do we come from, where should we go, how should we behave. However, there are other, secular sources for these questions; science aims to explain where we come from and where do we go (in terms of the future of the universe), and there are plenty of ethical philosophical theories that don't include, or require, the existence of a God, like Kant's Categorical Imperative, Aristotle's Virtue Ethics or Bentham's Utilitarianism. Thus, functional definitions tell us how religion is used in society and to what end it functions, but they need of substantive definitions to differentiate themselves from other things that move toward the same goal.

Sociology of the Secret Missionaries

   This essay analyses the sociological theories in the Secret Missionaries. If you haven't read it, I would recommend that you did before reading this post. You can easily find it on the archive on the date of the 6th of April 2020. Enjoy.

   The church of Minaura feeds to its followers the divine order of God, represented by the magical tree above the organ. Gramsci argues that religion is used by the powerful to impose a hegemony, that is, a view on how society should be run and how things in general should be. It is thus that Norbert's friends initially try to persuade him into accepting that that is the order God decided for them and shouldn't be changed because 'He knows best'. Gramsci says that a hegemony is a form of ideological control that moulds people's behaviour in such way that cohesion, the use of force, is not necessary to maintain the power relations as they are. Moreover, Althusser argues that religious belief can act as an ideological state apparatus (ISA): it is an institution that justifies the existence of inequality: Marx called it the divine right of the King. Similarly to Gramsci, Althusser believes that ISA replaces repressive state apparatus (RSA), the use of the police or military forces, to maintain the status quo. In the narrative, when ideological control fails and Norbert and Bertrand are caught countering the Church, Lord Jeremy uses cohesion in the form of corporal punishment: this works as a deterrent which acts as boundary maintenance. Boundary maintenance is the process by which the norms and the values of a society are reminded to its members so that their culture can prevail. For functionalists such as Durkheim this is a positive thing because it allows us to function effectively in cooperation, which we'd struggle to do if we had distinct norms and beliefs; on the other hand, Marxists believe this is negative because it perpetuates class inequality and exploitation. Boundary maintenance is also seen in the divine tree and in the paintings of the crucified heretics at the base of the side walls of the church. Thus, the church of Minaura uses ideology to make people accept the feudal structure where land owners exploit labourers 'from dawn to dusk', by justifying it as the will of God, and if anyone should deviate from this schema, they have available the use of deterrent punishment to maintain boundaries.

   Althusser argues that, despite this, ideas have relative autonomy, meaning they are not completely conditioned by institutions. A real life example are Willis's Lads, a group of working class boys who rejected school's norms and values and had created their own anti-school subculture, which included active challenge of authority. In the Secret Missionaries, Norbert and his fellows are able to discern from the Church's hegemony and visualise their own God. This is what Ernst Bloch calls the principle of hope: religion provides with a view of a better world, and it is this faith that allows us to challenge oppression. Gramsci puts it in this way: the oppressed can create a counter-hegemony that is inspired by their belief that God really wants them to be in good conditions, in the way that Norbert persuaded his friends that all that was not the true kingdom of God. A real life example are the Cargo Cults, which were cults in the colonised island of Milenesia who believed that the Europeans were unjustly taking for themselves all the material goods (cargo) that arrived, which had been sent by God and was aimed at them, the natives, and that consequently their power had to be challenged. Engels believed that this was the first example of the working-class acquiring class consciousness. Thus, although religion generally works for the ruling-class, it can also be an inspiration of hope to battle oppression; as Engels puts it, religion has a dual character.

   [In this essay, it must be remembered that Marxists focus on a capitalist society, whereas the one of Minaura is a feudal one. For this, I have tried to avoid using terms such as bourgeoisie or proletariat, as these are specifically parts of capitalist dynamics.]

*The Secret Missionaries (Part 1 of The Sectarian Cycle)

INTRODUCTION:
   In this story I've tried to illustrate Stark & Bainbridge's Sectarian Cycle, which aims to explain how religious sects and cults are formed. I didn't get to write the entirety of it, because in designing the plot I came to a conclusion half way through the cycle that worker too nicely as to ignore it. Consequently, I will write another part finishing it off. I'd like to give my acknowledgement to my father, who contributed ideas and his decent knowledge of the feudal system, and assumed the role of beta reader.
STORY:
   Under the burning sun, under the heavy rain and inside the unforgiving sand storms, the workers of Minaura worked the infertile lands of the orchards, seeded large plantations of tubercles and vegetables and accumulated crops on rusty wheelbarrows, all for the favour of whimsical feudal lords who rarely recalled their names. Monday to Saturday, from dawn to dusk, that was the mechanical code in which they worked like a field of windmills in the most unchanging weather. On Sunday the lords would come out to the orchard in elegant suits of the finest silk and take their workers to town in a rigid straight line of disciplined soldiers, and in the square in front of the Church they gave discrete glances around, commenting on the size of each other's company of subjects, which was the sign of their status. It was only the most presentable lords who were allowed a seat before the sacred performance of the Priest, and all workers remained at the back and said their prayers in standing positions. Norbert always stood with his hands crossed in front of him and stared for the entire mass at the painting on the spacious wall over the organ, depicting the divine order of things: in the hands of God was a sphere of the purest light one could imagine, and in it was a tree of naked branches, the top one holding a portrait of the Pope called Fredrick, who was held by the priests, and these by their disciples; the trunk was the place for the feudal lords that owned and grew the land, and in the roots lay those who handled the tools for them. That was how God had created things; it was how things had always been and how things would always be, for God had designed it and thus it was the most perfect model there was. Luckily for all, there were paintings at the lower parts of the side walls depicting heretics crucified, eaten by the flies and dried by the sun, to stop any curious one who may want to step on wronged grounds and crushing apart the divine tower that held them close to Heaven. The painting of the tree had been ordered by Priest Edgar, the man who stood on the plateau with a tunic of purple and a mask that covered his face and ears and ended in a long point whose weight incurved it and spoke lengthy sermons in the tongue of God, which was uninterpretable for any mortal except those close to His house, like himself and the most skilled of his disciples.

   Norbert had arrived in the farm of Lord Jeremy four years ago. He had been to several farms before in different towns and villages; the looping nature of time had emptied him of the exploratory enthusiasm that once had moved him, and his extroverted spirit had been reduced to a circle of three fellows. "It is always the same," he used to say to them, "we are doomed to be treated like animals". "Just let it go," they told him, "God knows why he put us where we are." "You don't speak seriously," he replied, "God is a loving father, He wishes not any of His children nor their children to be treated like dogs; Jeremy, on the other hand, would be very interested in keeping things that way." His fellows jumped back in their seat at one corner of the orchard, away from the other groups of workers during the scarcely thirty-minute long break allowed to refill their stomachs. "Lord Jeremy!" they corrected him.

   One Sunday morning, at the end of the month of July, Norbert shovelled a line of small wholes in the soil while his friend Bertrand carried a bag of seeds and behind him he put one in each individual orifice, closing it up with the earth that had been left aside, when Lord Jeremy stepped out of his house in his new suit of blue cotton linen and clapped his hands, calling for volunteers to accompany him to Church. Norbert and Bertrand headed his way, and so did Rowan the carpenter and Vincent, the other two of their little group, but ere anyone else arrived, Thomas stood with their Lord; it was a good idea to accompany Lord Jeremy in his Sunday trips, because being part of the group that got him status among the feudality of Minaura resulted in his gratitude, and more often than not this invited them to the inn after the mass, where they were treated to cups of beer to share among twos. Thomas always volunteered, always was the only worker to know the exact numbers of crops planted and produced each day, and always was the one to walk beside Lord Jeremy on their way to town. Standing at the back of the hall, while Priest Edgar spoke his indecipherable verses, Norbert whispered to Bertrand his disgust about their sole idea of going to that place. "What a hypocritical way to kiss his arse", he moaned. Vincent elbowed his hip, an act of caution for the clearness of a whisper in the quiet. Norbert went back to fixating on the painting over the organ that played long notes in harmonious synchrony with the Priest's sermon and his disciples' choir. The mass finished, and everyone turned on their hills to exit, but a rigid hand grabbed Norbert's elbow. It was Thomas, who pulled him close. "If I was you I would be more careful with my words," he said, and nodded toward the paintings at the bottom of the side walls, "that's what happens to people who speak of your God without a divine order, and let me remind you that Lord Jeremy will hear me before you". With these words, he left him with a rage that froze him. Their feudal Lord called Rowan, who grabbed the chair he'd been making over the last two weeks from the corner where he'd left it, and they walked together to the Priest of the hidden face. "My humble greetings, Priest Edgar," said Lord Jeremy while Rowan bowed behind him, "I would like to offer to your grace a chair of the finest wood that my carpenter Ronald crafted. I thought you might make good use of it, as I know the Church is having complications lately, and that chair," he lifted an eyebrow toward the tacky bench of the organ, "is likely to need a replacement." Priest Edgar laughed, and placing a hand on Lord Jeremy's shoulder said: "Indeed we are in difficult times, good man, I thank you for this gesture of kindness". The Priest headed toward Rowan, who handed him the chair. "And I thank you too, noble carpenter," he continued, "I trust this will improve the aesthetics of our performances". The Priest and the feudal continued a friendly conversation, but this became blurred to Rowan's hearing as he identified two voices that murmured somewhere in the hall. He searched them with his vision, and discovered two of the Priest's disciples in front of the gate to the backyard of the Church, just behind the large instrument. In the voracious inquisitiveness of wonder, he gave subtle steps toward them, until he could hear some of the words and work out the others. "Our brother returned this morrow from Gindade with news of the Koether, they have agreed on the price and want to proceed". Rowan was interrupted by his feudal, who made him bow to the Priest that now headed to his chamber. Koether?, Rowan wondered.

   The following day, in the half hour to eat, Rowan called his fellows with especial rashness to the hidden nook of the orchard and sat them in a circle so enclosed the space inside it was fully shaded although the sun felt like an oven on their backs. He asked if anyone knew what the Koether were, and was met with faces of ignorance. "Where did you hear of this?", asked Norbert. Rowan explained the incident of the Church. "Price of what?", asked Bertrand. "Proceed?", said Vincent. The break ended and they were forced back to work, but the rest of the day Norbert tired up a soup of ideas on what the Church had in hand. What were they going to buy? Or were they selling something? Who were the Koether? Every Sunday since then Norbert volunteered to go to Church again, and in the mass he kept an eye of prudence on Thomas. On the third Sunday, he saw Albert, the inn keeper, who was in his midday break, join two of the Priest's disciples, who were in theirs, in friendly conversation at the back of the inn, and found the same thing the following week. Norbert's popularity of the unfriendly old worker had made him lose any connection with other workers, but Vincent kept a decently wide circle of friendships; "We need to be many to make Jeremy happy - we must get some more time in town while the rest are in the inn",  he told him repeatedly, and under his insistence Vincent used his dexterous rhetoric to convince many to volunteer the next Sunday. Indeed, when Lord Jeremy saw the immense proportion of his company compared to that of other lords, his grin was as wide as no one in Minaura had seen on his face for many months, and after the lengthy mass, in which Norbert didn't separate his gaze from the faceless Priest on top of the plateau, he took his workers to the inn and treated them one jug of beer between two. Distant in his thoughts, Norbert took only a small sip and left the rest for Bertrand. He exited the building in silent steps and walked round its perimeter to the backyard. His back rested on the wall and his ear loomed out of the sharp wooden edge of the corner, spying on the murmurings that came from there. Two disciples stood in a circle around a basket whence they picked up bread and fruit; they joked with Albert and laughed, but minutes later, when the inn keeper left, their faces became dark. "What have you learnt?", said one of them.
   "Nothing, I'm supposed to be within the company the entire day, it's not easy to overhear things", replied the other. "Loui, Charles and Tuck were always the Priest's closest".
   "It is not their closeness that bothers me. I believe something murky is happening. I can smell it"
   "Come on, Seth, you always wanted to be ascended to Priest, it's obvious that the elections have you out of your mind because them three have a greater chance of ascending than you. And let me tell you that your sick pawn on this nonsense can cost you your place in the Church. God alone decides the order of things."
   "I still have more chances of being elected by the Pope than the rest of you."
   "You see? That's all you care for. A one like you heading the Church and Minaura descends into the likes of the Koether."
   Seth held a threatening finger in front of his companion's face. "You'll take that back! I'm a good son of God and you know that." His fellow didn't reply, only frowned and swallowed, and there was a brief silence of tension. In a more relaxed tone, Seth returned to speaking: "If my suspicions are right and something ungodly is happening within the gates of the Church, we are already in that decline." He sighed. "You're right, there's no way of overhearing them while we are stuck with the rest of the group. It's like only the Priest and them three can go wherever they please. Argh, I'd pay whoever could give me answers!"

   "Pay how much?", said Norbert, who had stepped well into the yard.
   The disciples turned rapidly. "What are you doing there? How much have you heard?"
   "You should be issued by your Lord. Whom do you work for?"
   Norbert ignored the question: "You said you'd pay whoever could give you answers."
   "Is this man deaf?"
   "Get out of our sight before our patience runs out, peasant", said Seth, turning away.
   "I heard two disciples say something of an agreement with the Koether." Seth stoped abruptly and turned his head. "They said that a brother of theirs had returned with news. This was just over a month ago."
   Seth inspected the man. "Who are you?"
   "Norbert Whitehill, I work in Lord Jeremy's farm." Seth didn't say anything, and his companion alike. Norbert tried not to show his fear, his belief that he had made the most unwise choice of his life in going there. "Who are the Koether?", he asked.
   "They are a Church who live in the village of Gindade. They practice sacrifices of chicken and sheep. They don't have a physical temple like us, so they preach in occult meeting points in the woods. Pope Fredrick and their so-called Pope Darios have had disputes for power for years. ... How did you come to learn this?" Norbert told them in first person the story Rowan had explained to him and their fellows. "Were the men you saw a saw a tall, brown-bearded and a bald of blue eyes?" Seth's friend kissed his teeth to the imprudent speaker.
   This caught Norbert: Rowan hadn't described them. "Yeah, they were", he said.
   The disciples looked at each other. "Loui and Tuck", they said. "Charles must be the traveller. It makes sense, he was missing for a week."
   "What price were they talking about?", asked Norbert.
   "I don't know", said Seth, thoughtful. "Would you be able to get solid evidence of what you're saying, Norbert Whitehill?"
   "How much do you pay?"
   "I could arrange it so you could get your own farm and workers."
   "This is blasphemy!" cried the other.
   "Sounds tempting. Why should I trust that you'll keep your word, though?"
   "Do you believe in God?"
   "I go to Church."
   "We both know that doesn't mean anything for a labourer."
   Norbert thought his next words. "Not in your God. I believe in a God that is just, as the one I've heard about since I have memory, not one who says he loves all His children but draws a fucking tree between them."
   "We are on equal grounds, your disagreement is with Edgar. If I become Priest, I will impose bills that lords'll have to pay and we'll spend in public interest."
   "I don't believe a word of that, but it doesn't bother me. I only want to get out of here with my family. I can get you your evidence in exchange of the farm", said Norbert.
   Seth held out his hand. "I swear the words I say on my life before the God of the equals."
   Norbert saw his hand, and shook it like a pact of blood.

* * *

In the hidden corner of the orchard, in the lunch break, Vincent gave in to exhaustion, fell to his knees and lay down on the soil while the other three sat on their chairs. "When they find out," began Rowan to Norbert, "they will wonder who could have seen them. They will review in their memories who was inside the Church at the time they spoke of Koether, and you're gonna have me killed." Norbert spoke to his fellows about his agreement with Seth. He asked them for their collaboration: they needed to get longer stays in town, they needed Jeremy to be distracted while they conducted their investigations, and they had to pay close attention to every word anyone in Minaura said.

   "How rash was this of you, Norb," said Bertrand, "you have absolutely no clue what they meant, nor whether it's anything they shouldn't be doing. What if we get into this and it turns out that they're doing something for the people?"

   "And now what? Did Fredrick and Darios suddenly make peaces?" protested Norbert.

   "You don't know this man Seth. And what kind of priest apprentice has lunch in the backyard of an inn?"

   "One who want to discuss murkiness in the Church."

   "I don't know, pal," said Rowan, "We could get into a lot of trouble. Remember Maxen, the guy was whipped for sticking his ear where he shouldn't have."

   "That's true", said Bertrand.

   Norbert sighed, and remained thoughtful for some time. "I know that this is a mission that God has sent." His fellows took their hands to their heads. Vincent now sat on the ground and looked attentively. "This is the opportunity to make things right. Bertrand, you have two sons; Rowan, two daughters, one son; Vincent you have nephews and nieces; we can now save them from the same fate as us. Imagine a farm for us all, where our children and wives live away from all this, no more Minaura, no more divine trees. We can work the land - I think we know pretty damn well how to do that. But let's do it outside the shade of a whip. God loves us all, isn't that what they say all the time? Well then, let's make it look like it. We can be the group that starts the true kingdom of God on Earth."

   Bertrand's and Rowan's eyes looked restless, nervous, and they repeatedly eyed each other. Vincent scratched his chin, and drops of sweat emerged from Rowan's hair. Norbert inspected Vincent, who sat immobile in deep seriousness.

   "I'm in", said Bertrand. "I won't see my sons as slaves and my wife freeze at night." He put a hand in the middle of the circle. Norbert put his on top.

   Rowan's eyes were those of the one who walks to the guillotine, and his hands covered his mouth and nose. "Oh, what the hell, you already got me into this", and he placed his hand on top of theirs.

   "Vincent?", called Norbert.

   Vincent stood from his seat on the soil and approached them in patient steps. Tranquil, he pulled the empty chair, sat on it and fixated his gaze on Norbert. "Norb, you are insane", and he placed his hand on top of the pile of associates, "I'm in." And they lifted their hands in unison, like a team of disciplined soldiers.

   The following Sunday they got the same people to go to Church, but this week Lord William, Lord Jeremy's greatest rival in the world of business, had come prepared with an army next to which Jeremy's company was a handful of lads hanging out. The secretive rebels shook their heads in the negative, and in the mass, Norbert found a place next to Vincent: "Next week, I need you to find a way to bring all the workers." Bertrand broke in: "There's no way we can beat Lord William every week, Norb, and even if there was Lord Jeremy wouldn't take us to the inn all the time; after the second consecutive week he'd forget about it. We have to find a way to move during the mass." This week the four fellows held their hands behind their backs and a straight posture, like four deserters before the firing squad; they examined the choir of disciples behind the Priest who spoke in the tongue of a fake God, who now appeared like a virus a building of corruption; they noticed among them Seth watching the Priest, and his friend watching them. Kneeling between the bunch of kneeling lords and ladies, they watched Lord Jeremy sing to the sacred tree over the organ, and the paintings at the bottom of the side walls walked in circles below them like a group of sharks that wait for their pray, smelly of blood. The mass ended, and all turned, but Bertrand's motion was interrupted by the sight of Thomas, whose posture of a walking corpse between the crowd filled his veins with ice.

   The following week, to avoid suspicions, they agreed that only Norbert and Bertrand would volunteer to go to church. They minded to be at the back of the mass hall, so that the way to the circular stairs in the corner could be done in the highest of subtlety. They waited until Priest Edgar had been preaching for a while and everyone else was distracted saying their prayers, and Norbert elbowed Bertrand, who slid like water into the gigantic cylinder that contained the stairs. Before he disappeared behind the walls of it, he noticed Thomas spying on him, his eyes moving between him and Norbert, the believer of the God without an order. He swallowed saliva and moved on - it was too late now, the sole attempt to infringe the corridors of the church was enough to incriminate him. He climbed the spiral with a bent back, fearing in every step that in the next he'd run into a couple of disciples or nuns climbing down, and he maintained in his mind the descriptions Norbert had given him: a tall, brown-bearded and a bald of blue eyes, those are the guys Seth suspects. Loui and Tuck, he repeated in his mind, and bloody Charles. He arrived to the second floor. Crawling on the floor, his head crossed the invisible line that joined the opposing frames of the doorway, looked on way and then the other. There was a corridor that led to a balcony whence one could see the Priest and all the adepts at a five meter fall; the corridor elongated itself behind the wall behind the organ, where the tree was painted, and it got dark. Bertrand thought to see a door on the wall that led to a room just behind the organ. His breath became faster, his hands were battled by forces that moved forward to the corridor and backward to the burrow-like stair-case. This is suicide, he thought, I'm going to get caught. At full speed he crawled to the wall and clung to it as though trying to escape the opposing railing. Rage filled his muscles: Why did I do that? Why would anyone have done that? He pushed himself to his feet and with a back almost parallel to the floor he ran to the end of the corridor on steps smooth as feathers - hills, toes. He changed sides once he had crossed to the darkness of the areas behind the tree, and hinted his nose and eyes through the mysterious door. He saw a man, tall, with a large beard the colour of polished wood, reading a paper on an arm chair; he faced the other way, and was in front of a long table, many chairs around it, like to host the Priest and all his disciples. Behind him there were many shelves full of books, and at the further-most corner a stair-case going down, possibly to the backyard. Bertrand kept looking back at the balcony, imagining the disciples coming to get him, but the sound of a horse came through the stair-case. The man of the beard left the paper on the table, circled the room and disappeared down the stairs. Bertrand was pushed by his instincts into the room; he grabbed the paper and crouched below the top of the long table. The ink was dry: "I write to confirm the payment of the House will be done by mid November, to coincide with the elections of the new Priest. We agree to your required payment of half a tone of gold, and have ready your requested lands at the coast of Idheri. - Hector Ulrichsen, in representation of Pope Darios."

   Steps that climbed sounded. Bertrand left the letter where it was and exited the room in desperation. He crossed the balcony in smooth steps, climbed down the circular stairs and with stealth, that nobody should turn around, stood himself by Norbert. After work, when the sun was down and they headed to their houses through the lone road, Bertrand explained what he'd seen to his fellows. "I believe they are intending to sell the Church".

   "Isn't that against the law of the Church?".

   "It is, but no one has ever seen Edgar's face. Make the change, be good at pretending, and nobody in Minaura will ever hear the name Darios."

   It was the perfect plan: the people would notice nothing, Darios would get a good taste of the power he so much desired, Edgar and his three closest disciples would go off to Idheri, and Minaura, being a marginalised village of infertile lands and lords only humble in comparison to most, was in no risk of Pope Fredrick inquiring anything. Priest Edgar had three farms that produced for charity, although it was intriguing that they only produced three halves of what they produced in Lord Jeremy's farm alone. The trick, obviously, was that the food that produced there was sanctified by God - a spell whose vitamins and minerals provided eternal health until He should make up to take your life, but only if one knew how to perform correctly the ritual of preparation, for which there were some vague instructions on a plaque at the entrance of the orchards. This food was valued and envied, scarce and precious, like gold plated copper, and this was reflected in its cost. The Priest of Minaura often brought blacksmiths from various villages around to remodel his carriages and riders to train his horses. It was not hard to imagine why a man who preaches in the forest would want those privileges.

   Bertrand decided the next week he wouldn't go to town: "It's risky, suspicious". Norbert went accompanied by Vincent; they needed to speak to Seth, he would be interested in these unlawful news, but that day they weren't invited to the inn, and during the mass he was trapped in the choir. They returned and cursed between breaths, followed by a week of incessant labour at the orchard under the ruthless sun of late summer, but the following week they passed from the church to the farm, and the week after, and the one after that. "Hell!", they said, "if November kicks in, that's the payment date, and it'll be over". Every time they exited the Church, Norbert felt a tumour of incompetence, in seeing the backyard of the inn so close but having his wrists tied to Lord Jeremy with an invisible thread of titanium. Some weeks Vincent when, some Rowan, some Bertrand, but Norbert always went, as he was the only one that knew Seth. Some weeks he went alone, and he couldn't get Thomas's eyes off him however he tried to camouflage between the rest of the group. It was the end of October and Norbert had gone to Church with Bertrand. The preaching of the faceless man, whoever it was this time, went slowly and painfully. They were the fourth largest group of seven, and thus Lord Jeremy wasn't happy. They were heading back to the farm, when Norbert planted himself staring at the backyard of the inn; Bertrand returned a few steps to join him. "You'll have to invent a lie about where I am," said Norbert to his friend, "we can't depend on Jeremy's will anymore." And thus he ran and hid between the tall plantations of the nearby farms until the group was gone. When the village seemed to have returned to their routine, Norbert exited his bidding place and run around the Church to the inn, where he found that Seth and his friend on their way out. "Hey!" he called. Seth looked in the direction of the voice and jumped in recognising him. "Whitehill! Thank God. Any news?" "Interesting ones", he said. Seth looked around; at this time they should be rejoining the other disciples in the Church. "Let's not talk here, follow me. ... Cover us", he told his friend. They went inside the inn, and Seth walked straight to the innkeeper, Albert, to whose ear he whispered something. Albert nodded and gave him a key, and with a sign of the head Seth indicated Norbert to go up the stairs. They entered a room with a bed in it. "This is where travelling couples do their stuff," said Seth, "I'm sorry we couldn't go somewhere more serious, but this is where no one will think we are. Plus, Albert is an old friend, he'll cover us. What did you find?" Norbert told him of his team of missionaries, of Bertrand's odyssey to the letter of the mysterious room, and of their suspicions about buying the House. "The House, could that be the Church itself?" "We think so", said Norbert. "This is great," continued the other, "selling a church is a serious crime, and when Pope Fredrick finds it's to the Koether, Edgar will fall." "And we'll get our farm"; said Norbert. "Not just yet, you give me information, but we need solid evidence." He walked around the room in nervous and long steps, and looked out the window through small spaces between the curtains, like a madman persecuted by ghosts. "Do what you can to steal the letter, I'll see what I can do myself." "You spend more time in the church, it'll be super easy for you." "Don't you think that," said Seth, "the Priest wants all his disciples like a colony of wasps from dawn to dusk, and they hide things from us." They decided that if they took longer to return they'd call unwanted attentions. Thus, they exited, climbed down the stairs and nodded discretely at Albert. "Stay here for five minutes," ordered Seth, "we don't want to be seen together. If you find new things, you can find me after nine pm in Number 37, East Road", and thus said, he exited through the back door. Five minutes later, Norbert came out, trying to hide his face behind the collars of his shirt. He walked past the church without directing one sole gaze to it, and turned the corner of the plantations. Not several yards away, he run into Lord Jeremy, who was accompanied by Thomas and faceless Priest Edgar, the three waiting like a frozen wall, holding Bertrand from a set of cords that tied his hands to the back of his head, from which blood licked. His shirt, his trousers, all his body had signs of blood, and the look on his eyes was the one old Maxen had had when he was whipped for heresy.

   "Selling the House, Norbert?" began Lord Jeremy. Norbert didn't reply: he knew not what was wise in this moment.

   "I heard him speak blasphemies of the Priest", said Thomas. "They have been undermining the God-given divine order."

   Lord Jeremy stepped forward in a walk that seemed demonic, and his walking stick a trident. He stood with a straight back and a monocle, in a blazer of black linen, facing the side of the man with the shaggy squared shirt and the crooked back, and said:
   "Priest Edgar has explained to us that the House is the colloquial name given to the House of Chestnuts, the northern most farm of Minaura. The Church is selling it to the villagers of neighbouring Gindade, which as you know, is very poor." He stepped forward yet once more, and slowly pronounced these words: "Did you have any associates other than Mr Bertrand Hitch?"
   With grief, Norbert sighed. He shook his head from side to side, and whispered: "No"
   "I don't hear you", insisted Lord Jeremy.
   "No, I did not", Norbert repeated.
   Lord Jeremy started to walk around him with a patience that lit up short strings all around Norbert's body, cremating the cord until tones of dynamite. "You have committed an act of treason to the Church, to God and to the Crown. This crime will have the name of Lord Jeremy's farm, and that I don't like a single bit." Norbert could feel his warm, humid breath on his neck as he stopped again and stood facing his side. "You will be punished. For eight days, twelve whips in the back, and if I happen to be in a bad day, I'll pour salt on the wounds. If there are other associates, the length of the sentence you'll share with them in equal parts, and I tell you now, I'm more likely to be in a bad day if there aren't any. I'll ask again, did you have any associates other than Mr Bertrand Hitch?"
   Norbert could feel the lines of blood on his back, he could see Bertrand lie dead on the soil under the fierce flies. He saw himself hide outside his house, hearing his wife with the children, not wanting to let them see him like that. He looked up at Thomas, rejoicing himself like a vampire smiling to the blood draining from a hanged corpse. He looked at the faceless Priest, standing motionless, expressionless with the cross of God on his chest, indifferent to any words that had been said. "No", he repeated.
   Lord Jeremy looked away; he nodded to the Priest, who nodded back at him. Thomas carried Bertrand, almost dragged his body.

* * *

   Hours felt like months and days like years. As warned, Lord Jeremy was in very bad days most days. They had been given rooms to stay in for the eight days that the punishment lasted: they were four walls of cheap wood with a sheet of rusted iron for a ceiling. They were separated from the rest, whom they saw through the spaces between each table of their huts, and for one hours a day were forced to peak rocks that were of no use before and would be of no use after. They were only allowed in their four walls in the night; during the day they had to stay outdoors, almost naked and with burning backs under the sun. "Lucky summer's over", told them Lord Jeremy. They hadn't the force to speak to each other, although they would have had things to say, and rather remained lifeless on the soil all day with aching wounds, watching the flies approach, drawing vague images of their families, wondering what they were doing, how were they feeding themselves. They observed the workers work, and thought to themselves about the God of Priest Edgar, about His tree, and about the millions that worked in the dirty roots of it day after day, and the phrase 'the order of things' bounced back and forth in their heads, creating shields that isolated it from the kingdom of hatred that was being born, and the command to keep it away with spears and swords propagated with a voice that echoed in the darkness. On the sixth day, the crops next to the small area shook. They jumped back in the expectancy of Lord Jeremy with a whip or a machete, but the heads of Vincent and Rowan showed up. They jumped the fence and ran to them. The surprise on their faces was infinite, a horror of the one who sails the river to the gates of Hell. Bertrand's confusion alone demanded an explanation for their knowledge of their location. "I believe we know this orchard better than Jeremy, and have hid things in it more often." Rowan and Vincent crouched before their friends, forming a perfect circle like the one they formed in the hidden corner of the orchard.

   "It is mid November now", said Vincent.

   "I don't want to... continue", replied Bertrand between breaths. Norbert didn't say anything, didn't move, his eyes filled with tears. 

   Their friends didn't protest, they only looked at each other and down to the soil. Vincent sighed, and Rowan cleared the tears off his eyes.

   "It ... filled me to believe ... that we had a chance", said Norbert. He laughed, but it ended with a cry.

   The silence continued, even the wind had given up its prospects to reassemble the fallen leaves, and rested tranquil in a fresh breeze.

   "What did they tell you? What is the House, then?"

   With infinite labour, Bertrand pulled himself to seat up against the wall. "A farm. The Koether are buying a farm. The House of Chestnuts."

   Rowan's attention was woken. "That can't be right." Eyes turned to him. Vincent made a grimace. "If they were purchasing it they wouldn't be writing to the Church, because the House of Chestnuts does not belong to the Church. My cousin works there, they sold it to Mr Danielson three years ago."

   Now even Norbert jumped to his feet. The image of the immobile Priest returned. The words of Lord Jeremy. The way the choir had sang to the organ like a firing squad below the roots of a synthetic tree aiming at a couple of heretics. He approached Rowan, held his shoulders in his hands. No words were required to make a meaning. Vincent stood, "we have to run to the bloody Church right now, Rowan". He helped Bertrand up, so they all stood in a closed circle, and put his hand in the middle. Norbert was next, and Rowan, and Bertrand. "We'll get us out of here", said Vincent, "on the real God." Rowan led the lifting of their hands, in unison, perfectly synchronised.

   Vincent and Rowan ran between the crops, stealthy like a panther but fast like an eagle. Rowan's coat of big pockets and metallic buttons ringed like castanets with every violent step, and faster than a hummingbird moves its wings they crouched behind a short wall beside the church of Minaura. The sun set behind the mountains of the West, and a horse neighed from the backyard. A carriage arrived, and a disciple, bald and with eyes so blue that their sight froze in the night, came out to greet him. The arriver looked for something in his bag while pronouncing a polite greeting with the accent of Gindade. The room above their backyard is their office, had said Bertrand. Vincent and Rowan crawled around the wall and into the area roofed by the office, and being next to the gate to the stair-case, Vincent threw a rock at the horse's leg, making it jump back and neigh, that the visitor was busy maintaining balance and the bald disciple was captivated by the scene. The missionaries climbed the stairs and wasted no time to inspect the long table. There were two letters: one was from the Pope to Priest Edgar, convoking him in the capital to discuss with the other priests the ascensions; but the other one ... the other one read thus: Priest Edgar has expressed his wish to invite you to a meeting at the gates of the forest of Minaura, to proceed with the payment, exchange those materials that you'll find necessary, like the Priest's uniform, and close definitively the negotiation regarding the Church of Minaura. - Louis Jones, on behalf of Priest Edgar of Minaura. Bingo, the missionaries felt they'd made it, but from the stair-case emerged the bald disciple and the hooded visitor. Rowan pushed both letters into his pocket, and seconds later missionaries of a God who didn't believe in trees ran through the corridors of the Church persecuted by two fierce defenders of organs and crosses; they climbed down the circular stairs, broke out a window by the locked gates, crossed the central square of Minaura in screams and yells. They ran as fast as they could, but a day of forced labour lay upon their shoulders, and the visitor moved nimbly. They headed for the central roundabout, whence to turn to the East Road to find door 37. The visitor passed them, and his arms extended wide like a barrier; behind them was the bald disciple, and to their side the wall. With their backs pressed against the flat surface, Vincent and Rowan watched the walking roots of the divine tree approach like corpses that crave brains, with shadowed faces like vampires in hoods of bat-skin. The distance between those men's feet and their own was a fading torch in a cave without exit, and Vincent imagined the farm: Norbert digging wholes, Bertrand seeding lentils, children playing in the gardens and their mothers chasing them with their vegetables. Like a ray, Vincent shot his hand in Rowan's pocket, grabbed the papers and pushed the man to the ground; he turned to the disciple and, punching his face out of the way, ran across the roundabout, the hooded visitor chasing him with agile movements, and the disciple soon woke and joined the persecution. Rowan lay on the ground, with painful muscles, and he eyed the second paper, which hung from the side of his pocket. He took it and unfolded it. It had the sign of Louis, representing Pope Edgar of Minaura. Rowan lifted his gaze to Vincent, the man of the thin arms that was chased by a hooded Gindadean and a disciple of Priest Edgar into the West Road. His blood flux accelerated; his tortured muscles pushed his to an impecable posture and in limbing but light steps led him to the Road of the East, fixating his interior eye on a 37 the colour of purity. In the distance, he saw it; in the distance, there it was: the door, the farm, his friends and his family. But a heavy body appeared from one side and took him from his ribs, again to the ground, and suddenly Thomas was on top of him, lifting his arm where he held a dirk to where it should gain the impulse to pierce steel; his arm came down like a meteorite, but Rowan blocked it with his, the sharp point of the weapon touching his chin. He came again, and again his arms were like a rampart of un-cemented bricks receiving the impact of the rage of God. Thomas put all his weight on his arm; the knife began to cut Rowan's cheek. In his gaze, Thomas had gone, and what was left was a cold, lifeless shell: "I belong to the tree", he said, but a bag covered his head and pulled him away. Seth and his friend held the assassin who kicked like a capricious child, tied in the arms of Seth's friend. "Help me with this, Seth!" said the man. But Rowan stood and grabbed his elbow. "Are you Seth, the disciple of Edgar?". Seth looked confused. "I am." "I'm Rowan, Norbert's companion", said the man with desperation, and he handed him the letter. Seth read it with analytical eyes, and raised his gaze in a thunder. "Where is Whitehill?" Battling between pity, shock and hurry in the face of Rowan's reply, he said: "I will get him out of there, I promise I will", and he headed to his horse.

* * *

   In Minaura, for many years, people enjoyed the tales of the day Pope Fredrick came into town with his company, and the afternoon when Priest Edgar left the Church chained up. It was the first time anyone had seen his face, but they knew it was him because the Pope repeatedly cursed such name; they would remember this as they sang with the preaches of Priest Seth of Minaura. They remembered the secret missionaries of the farm of Lord Jeremy, who was charged by the church of the capital for torture. And especially they liked the story where Vincent Matthews, under the shadow of a guillotine, laughed to the face of the fooled bald disciple of blue eyes. A new farm had been founded near the far mountains; it was said that they didn't mix themselves with outsiders, that they were an enclosed isle in a remote nook of the forest. For them, it was the rest of the world that hid behind a circle of shields, separated from them with spears and swords, alien to their kingdom of hatred. Yearly, on the 16th of November, Rowan Smith would stand alone on the side of the orchard, and he would watch Norbert Whitehill dig wholes, and Bertrand Hitch pour seeds into them, and their children run and their wives gather crops, and he would remember a noble sacrifice.

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