Ritual in Its Own Right

Exploring the Dynamics of Transformation

Don Handelman, Galina Lindquist

• Publisher: Berghahn Books
• Year: 2005
• Print ISBN:
  9781845450519
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9780857458889
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Religion
• Index: Social Sciences

Historically, canonic studies of ritual have discussed and explained ritual organization, action, and transformation primarily as representations of broader cultural and social orders. In the present, as in the past, less attention is given to the power of ritual to organize and effect transformation through its own dynamics. Breaking with convention, the contributors to this volume were asked to discuss ritual first and foremost in relation to itself, in its own right, and only then in relation to its socio-cultural context. The results attest to the variable capacities of rites to effect transformation through themselves, and to the study of phenomena in their own right as a fertile approach to comprehending ritual dynamics.

Table of contents

• Ritual in Its Own Right
• Contents
• Preface
• INTRODUCTION
• PART I: THEORIZING RITUAL
• CHAPTER 1. RITUAL DYNAMICS AND VIRTUAL PRACTICE
• CHAPTER 2. OTHERWISE THAN MEANING
• PART II: EXPERIMENTING WITH RITUAL
• CHAPTER 3. THE RED AND THE BLACK
• CHAPTER 4. PARTIAL DISCONTINUITY
• PART III: RITUAL AND EMERGENCE
• CHAPTER 5. RELIGIOUS WEEPING AS RITUAL IN THE MEDIEVAL WEST
• CHAPTER 6. ENJOYING AN EMERGING ALTERNATIVE WORLD
• PART IV: HEALING IN ITS OWN RIGHT
• CHAPTER 7. BRINGING THE SOUL BACK TO THE SELF
• CHAPTER 8. TREATING THE SICK WITH A MORALITY PLAY
• PART V: PHILOSOPHICALLY SPEAKING
• CHAPTER 9. THE TACIT LOGIC OF RITUAL EMBODIMENTS
• EPILOGUE
• NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS
• Index