ANTH 111 Lecture Notes - Lecture 20: Prayer Wheel, Liminality, Rosary
Ritual: stylized performances involving symbols that are associated with social,
political, and religious activities
Sacred rituals are the enactment of beliefs expressed in myth and doctrine
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Secular rituals have no connection to the supernatural realm
Sorority or fraternity rituals
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Some rituals mix sacred and secular
American Thanksgiving
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Periodic rituals - regularly performed
Mass, solstice celebration
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Non-periodic rituals occur irregularly, at unpredictable times, in response
to unscheduled events
Floods, birth, marriage
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Types of Ritual Practice
Pilgrimage
Round-trip travel to a sacred place or places for purposes of religious
devotion or ritual
Varanasi, Mecca (Hajj), Jerusalem
§
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Often involved hardship, with the implication that the more suffering
that is involved, the more merit the pilgrim accumulates
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Rituals of Inversion
Normal social roles and relations are temporarily inverted
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Time for social pressure to be released
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Provide a reminder about the propriety of normal, everyday roles
and practices
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Sacrifice
Offering of something for transfer to the supernaturals
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Has a long history
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One of the oldest forms of rituals
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May involve killing and offering animals, making human offerings, or
offering vegetables, fruits, grains, flowers, or other products
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Life Cycle Rituals or Rite(s) of Passage
Marks a change in status from one life stage to another of an
individual or group
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ROP rituals can include those for births, initiations, confirmations,
puberty, weddings, funerals
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Three phases of life-cycle rituals
Separation, transition, and reintegration
§
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Separation - separated physically, socially, or symbolically from
normal life. Leaves behind symbols and practices of previous
positions
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Rites of Passage
Transition, or liminal phase, when the person is no longer on
the previous status but it not yet a member of the next stage
Liminality often involves the learning of specialized skills
that will equip the person for the new status. Time of
ambiguity and perceived danger
□
Sleeping Beauty (Briar Rose), Snow White□
§
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Reintegration
Occurs when the initiate emerges, welcomed by
community as an individual occupying the new status
□
Graduation □
§
Seven Types of Religious Behaviour
Prayer - customary way of addressing the supernatural, usually by speaking
or chanting
Public, at a sacred location and with special apparatuses: incense,
smoke, objects (such as rosary beads or a prayer wheel)
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1)
Physiological exercise - physically manipulating the psychological states to
induce an ecstatic spiritual state
Four major kinds of manipulation
Drugsi)
Sensory deprivation ii)
Mortification of the flesh by pain, sleeplessness and fatigue iii)
Deprivation of food, water, or airiv)
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2)
Exhortation
Certain people - closer relationship with the supernatural
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Expected to use to help others, heal, comfort
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3)
Mana
A belief that sacred power adheres in certain high-ranking people,
sacred spaces, and objects
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Laying of hands on a sick person, power of a healer entering the
sick's body
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4)
Taboo
Objects or people that may not be touched
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Food can also be taboo
Pork, dietary laws, certain foods to be eaten or not eaten at
different times by different people
§
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5)
Feasts
Eating and drinking in a religious context is very common. Holy
Communion of Catholics and Protestants, Passover Seder for Jews
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Even everyday meals
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6)
Sacrifice
Many religious systems
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7)
Further Readings
Please make sure to read these sections in the text (since we did not talk
about them in class, but important)
"World Religions and Universal Understandings of the World"
(355-356)
World Religions: religions that claim to be universally
significant to all people
§
Examples - Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism
§
○
"How is Religion Linked to Political and Social Actions?" (363-366,
including all the information on Fundamentalism)
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Video: TEDTalks: Wade Davis – The Worldwide Web of Belief and Ritual
Professor of Anthropology and the BC Leadership Chair in Cultures and
Ecosystems at UBC
•
Explorer –in – Residence at the National Geographic Society •
Video can be watched at Films on Demand (click on the ‘Transcript’ tab to
get spellings)
•
http://fod.infobase.com/PortalPlaylists.aspx?wID=105077&xtid=48361•
Mentions the FARC in the video – a guerrilla movement, the Revolutionary
Armed Forces of Columbia – People’s Army
•
“The Elder Brothers: A Journey to the Heart of the World”, “Hunters of the
Northern Ice” and other ethnographic videos of his can be watched at
http://www.daviswade.com/
•
Religion
Week 11, Lecture 19
Thursday, March 23, 2017
2:27 PM
Document Summary
Ritual: stylized performances involving symbols that are associated with social, political, and religious activities. Sacred rituals are the enactment of beliefs expressed in myth and doctrine. Secular rituals have no connection to the supernatural realm. Non-periodic rituals occur irregularly, at unpredictable times, in response to unscheduled events. Round-trip travel to a sacred place or places for purposes of religious devotion or ritual. Often involved hardship, with the implication that the more suffering that is involved, the more merit the pilgrim accumulates. Normal social roles and relations are temporarily inverted. Provide a reminder about the propriety of normal, everyday roles and practices. Offering of something for transfer to the supernaturals. May involve killing and offering animals, making human offerings, or offering vegetables, fruits, grains, flowers, or other products. Marks a change in status from one life stage to another of an individual or group. Rop rituals can include those for births, initiations, confirmations, puberty, weddings, funerals.
