RITUAL

From: Turner, Victor, The Ritual Process, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1969

Formalised set of symbolic actions performed in particular time and place

May include singing, processions, drama, dance, use of sacred objects, poetry, chants, prayers, etc.

STRUCTURE of RITUALS

1. Separation / Departure

2. Margin / Liminality / Communitas àTransformation

3. Aggregation / Return

Key Stage: 2 – liminal, marginal stage

LIMINAL = threshold (Latin)

  = betwixt and between, neither here nor there

Outside law, convention, custom = ambiguous

Many symbols of liminal (inside ritual):

Death & birth (grave & womb): invisible, dark, bisexual, wilderness, eclipse of sun or moon

No status, property, insignia

THOSE involved emerge transformed, renewed, energized, ready for next stage, duties, etc. of life

      = Transformation (can be major or minor)

COMMUNITAS: from blend of lowliness & sacredness,

Homogeneity & comradeship (general social bond)

Normal structures of society changed, eliminated

New Mode of Social Relationship (neither low nor high)

Some try to stay in this stage (communes, intentional communities, religious groups – monasteries)

But hard to maintain (structure usually needed)

NEED rituals to keep dialectic of social life going:

      Homogeneity / Differentiation; Equality / Inequality

But structure of society also important to community

Return to structure usually inevitable

PURPOSE: to keep chaos at bay, confirm social values

RITES OF PASSAGE: from one stage of life to another

Usually involves typical three stages of all rituals

      à New stage of life (e.g. adulthood)

MANY SYMBOLS in rituals are DUALITIES

      Light/Dark, Male/Female, Hot/Cold, Raw/Cooked, etc

      Often confused during liminal stage

      But reaffirmed (as structure of society) at aggregation

MTYHS also often include such DUALITIES

Point of myths is to explain STRUCTURE of the universe

To show that what began in CHAOS ends in COSMOS

      CHAOS = disorder; COSMOS = order

Many images of light/dark, heaven/earth, other dualities

RITUALS similarly remind of this order, structure

      (through brief foray into lack of structure)

HEROIC QUESTS (in stories) contain same structure

1.    Hero departs on quest

2.    Hero is transformed during quest (often liminal)

3.    Hero returns transformed – may reaffirm society

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