Discipline: Sociology
This micro-ethnography aimed to describe the ritual categories of the Dawak of the Kalingas. A thick description of these ritual categories is presented using the ethnographic data gathered and inferred from the researchers’ view. A Methodological Triangulation was employed in this study using the developmental research sequence (DRS) by asking ethnographic questions from key informants, causal and informal conversations with other participants, collecting and analyzing field notes of what people do, know and the things they made and used which they shared as a community. This study tried to elicit cultural patterns and their associated meanings from the actions, events, words and artifacts used by the participants. This study found that the purpose of the healing rituals and rites provide the avenues of opportunities for the transmission of values, beliefs and the way of life. Through these symbolic expressions, sentiments were intensified and became a significant part in the life of the people belonging to this ethnic community. In fact, they formed the anchor on which ways of life were built up and values transferred. In this age of globalization and liberalization, they are still significant and important at the very core of the ordinary lives of Kalingas in Tabuk City.