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Examines the history and purpose of political rituals, discusses examples from Aztec cannibal rites to presidential inauguration, and argues that the use of ritual determines the success of political groups.
Menarche and ritual defloration among the Arunta; elopement among the Tiwi.
In The Politics of Ritual Change, John Thames explores the intersection of ritual and politics in the zukru festival texts from Emar and suggests a new understanding of the Hittite Empire’s relationship to northern Syria in the 13th century BCE.
Referring, by way of example, to the chronicler's story about a dynastic conflict in medieval Poland, this book offers an insight into the modes of using ritual as an effective tool of political action in the Middle Ages—both in the practice of political entreprising, and on the level of narrative information about that practice—and then reflects about the nature of the relationship between the reality of the written account and the reality of the practical activities described in it. It demonstrates the ways in which the reality of the narrative account and the reality of practics—ritual-in-text and ritual-in-performance—overlaid and interlaced one another, and exercised a mutual impact, thereby jointly creating a framework within which, in the earlier and high Middle Ages, political activity took place.
Rites of Power provides a sweeping overview of the symbolism of power from tenth-century France to modern Britain. Approaching their topic from an eclectic range of intellectual traditions, the authors turn the study of politics, social relations, and cultural creation into a single endeavor. The essays begin with three assumptions: that all societies are ordered and governed by "master fictions" (divine right, equality for all) which make political hierarchy appear natural; that political rhetoric includes nonverbal communication (royal portraits, statistics on crop yields); and that common rhetoric can mean different things to various segments of a culture ("states' rights" during the American Civil War). Societies studied include France and Spain in the Middle Ages, post-Revolutionary France, the modern British monarchy, tsarist Russia, colonial Virginia, and industrial Germany. The essays were selected to provide methodological as well as historical coverage; the result is a comprehensive treatment along the cutting edge of several disciplines. This book will appeal to scholars and students in the fields of history, political science, sociology, anthropology, and art history.
Communist revolutions in this century have suppressed existing ritual and symbolic structures and invented new ones. Armed with new flags, new national celebrations, or new school textbooks, they have attempted to reconstruct social memory. This fascinating work of political anthropology examines the case of Laos from the heady days of the 1975 revolution to the more sober "post-socialist" present. Grant Evans traces the attempt at ritual and symbolic change in Laos, and the recent reemergence of older and deeper cultural structures, while identifying what has perhaps been irretrievably lost. In this challenging study of the cultural consequences of failed total revolution, Evans reaches some striking conclusions concerning the nature of social memory, cultural possibilities foregone, and the need for cultural continuity.
This book explores the importance of ritual and ritual theory to discourses of authenticity and originality, thereby deepening our insight into concepts of cultural heritage, identity and nation in a globalised world. The volume is the first interdisciplinary attempt to understand the significance of rituals and related performative traditions in the creation of grounded cultural identities, ‘home’ and heritage as geographically experienceable locations. It assembles perspectives from social and cultural anthropology, performance studies, education and arts that can deal with the politics of revitalisation and preservation of ritualised traditions. While some chapters in this book emphasise on the ritualisation of cultural heritage by concentrating on power relations and politics, as well as actual processes of identification, especially for marginalised ethnic groups or migrant communities, others explore how rituals as intangible heritage are strategically employed by different groups all over the world to make their claims public and to improve and negotiate their position on a local, national or global platform. This book recognises ritualised performances as transnational and cross-cultural phenomena, which are not only tied to and defined via national territories and identities but which also demand new theoretical and methodological approaches towards the discussion of rituals and heritage.
In Locating Politics in Ethiopia's Irreecha Ritual Serawit Bekele Debele gives an account of politics and political processes in contemporary Ethiopia as manifested in the annual ritual performance. Mobilizing various sources such as archives, oral accounts, conversations, videos, newspapers, and personal observations, Debele critically analyses political processes and how they are experienced, made sense of and articulated across generational, educational, religious, gender and ethnic differences as well as political persuasions. Moreover, she engages Irreecha in relation to the hugely contested meaning making processes attached to the Thanksgiving ritual which has now become an integral part of Oromo national identity.
Ritual and the Sacred discusses some of the most important issues of modern socio-political life through the lens of a neo-Durkheimian perspective. Building on the main lesson of Durkheim's Elementary Forms of Religious Life, this book articulates values and practices common to non-Western and religious traditions that have the capacity to shape our modern way of living. Central to this volume is the question of modernity and scepticism with regard to mainstream Western wisdom; Rosati focuses on the notion of societal self-reassessment and self-revision, illustrating a willingness to learn from ’primitive’ societies. This reassessment necessitates us to rethink the central roles played by ritual and the sacred as building blocks of social and individual life, both of which remain salient features within the modern world. This title will be of key interest to sociologists of religion, philosophy politics and social theorists.
Rituals and performances are a key theme in the study of nations and nationalism. With the aim of stimulating further research in this area, this book explores, debates and evaluates the role of rituals and performances in the emergence, persistence and transformation of nations, nationalisms and national identity. The chapters comprising this book investigate a diverse array of contemporary and historical phenomena relating to the symbolic life of nations, from the Yasukuni Shrine in Japan to the Louvre in France, written by an interdisciplinary cast of world-renowned and up-and-coming scholars. Each of the contributors has been encouraged to think about how his or her particular approach and methods relates to the others. This has given rise to several recurring debates and themes running through the book over how researchers ought to approach rituals and performances and how they might best be studied. The Cultural Politics of Nationalism and Nation-Building will appeal to students and scholars of ethnicity and nationalism, sociology, political science, anthropology, cultural studies, performance studies, art history and architecture.