ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book discusses the customs and gods that are born again, some crib, some grill of lightclanged shut on us in bondage, and withheldus from that world below us and beyond, and in its swaddling cerements we're still bound. The situation is absurd enough to begin with, even though I spent a year among them as an English teacher in a secondary school in Tobago. A knowledge of one's own identity is something each individual spends a lifetime in chasing in the context of his fellows. A culture, said E. H. Erikson, must 'provide an early basis’ for the identity of a child. He needs to feel, as he grows towards adolescence, that there is a structure of ‘meaningful wider belongingness’ behind his relationship with himself and his family, some supporting social strength in which he can trust.
