The Hidden Powers of Ritual
eBook - ePub

The Hidden Powers of Ritual

The Journey of a Lifetime

  1. English
  2. ePUB (mobile friendly)
  3. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub

The Hidden Powers of Ritual

The Journey of a Lifetime

About this book

The Hidden Powers of Ritual is an engaging introduction to ritual studies that presents ritual as an evolved form of human behavior of almost unimaginable significance to our species. Every day across the globe, people gather to share meals, brew caffeinated beverages, or honor their ancestors. In this book, Bradd Shore, a respected anthropologist, reaches beyond familiar "big-R" rituals to present life's humbler, overshadowed moments, exploring everything from the Balinese pelebon to baseball to family Zoom sessions in the age of Covid to the sobering reenactment rituals surrounding the Moore's Ford lynchings. In each ritual, Shore shows how our capacity to ritualize behavior is a remarkable part of the human story.

Encompassing both the commonly unlabeled "interaction rituals" studied by sociologists and the symbolically elaborated sacred rituals of religious studies, Shore organizes his conception around detailed case studies drawn from international research and personal experience, weaving scholarship with a memoir of a life encompassed by ritual. A probing exploration that matches breadth with accessibility, The Hidden Powers of Ritual is a provocative contribution to ritual theory that will appeal to a wide range of readers curious about why these unique repetitive acts matter in our lives.

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Yes, you can access The Hidden Powers of Ritual by Bradd Shore in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Social Sciences & Cognitive Neuroscience & Neuropsychology. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Contents
  3. Preface
  4. 1 Discovering the Power of Ritual
  5. 2 Rethinking Behavior
  6. 3 The Balinese Pelebon: The Ritual Dissolution of a Body
  7. 4 Do Nonhuman Animals Have Rituals?
  8. 5 Ritual Combat: Gift Exchange as Revenge
  9. 6 Ten Powers of Ritual
  10. 7 Nostalgic Commemoration: Salem Camp Meeting
  11. 8 Unforgettable: The Moore’s Ford Lynching Reenactment
  12. 9 Ritual Baseball
  13. 10 Family Zoom: Virtual Rituals in the Age of the Internet
  14. 11 Does a Ritual Always Have a Meaning?
  15. 12 Harnessing the Powers of Ritual
  16. Acknowledgments
  17. Notes
  18. References
  19. Suggested Resources in Ritual Studies
  20. Index