Editing Ritual (section)

==Anthropological theories==
{{See also|Ritology}}

===Functionalism===
[[File:B._Bober.jpg|thumb|300x300px|A priest elevates the host during a [[Mass (Catholic Church)|Catholic Mass]], one of the most widely performed rituals in the world.<ref>{{cite book|last=Harkins|first=Franklin T.|title=Thomas Aquinas: the basics|year=2021|publisher=Routledge|location=London and New York |isbn=978-0-367-34986-8 |page=166 |quote=It is estimated that in our times more than 350,000 Masses are celebrated each day on planet earth!}}</ref>]]
{{main|Structural functionalism}}

Nineteenth century "[[History of anthropology|armchair anthropologists]]" were concerned with the basic question of how religion originated in human history. In the twentieth century their conjectural histories were replaced with new concerns around the question of what these beliefs and practices did for societies, regardless of their origin. In this view, religion was a universal, and while its content might vary enormously, it served certain basic functions such as the provision of prescribed solutions to basic human psychological and social problems, as well as expressing the central values of a society. [[Bronislaw Malinowski]] used the concept of function to address questions of individual psychological needs; [[A.R. Radcliffe-Brown]], in contrast, looked for the function (purpose) of the institution or custom in preserving or maintaining society as a whole. They thus disagreed about the relationship of anxiety to ritual.{{sfnp|Lessa|Vogt|1979|pp=[https://archive.org/details/readerincomparat00less/page/36 36]–38}}

[[File:Three people 'kowtowing' to an altar, one woman crying, othe Wellcome V0015171.jpg|thumb|Kowtowing in a court, China, before 1889]]

Malinowski argued that ritual was a non-technical means of addressing anxiety about activities where dangerous elements were beyond technical control: "magic is to be expected and generally to be found whenever man comes to an unbridgeable gap, a hiatus in his knowledge or in his powers of practical control, and yet has to continue in his pursuit."{{sfnp|Lessa|Vogt|1979|p=[https://archive.org/details/readerincomparat00less/page/38 38]}} Radcliffe-Brown in contrast, saw ritual as an expression of common interest symbolically representing a community, and that anxiety was felt only if the ritual was not performed.{{sfnp|Lessa|Vogt|1979|pp=[https://archive.org/details/readerincomparat00less/page/36 36]–38}} [[George C. Homans]] sought to resolve these opposing theories by differentiating between "primary anxieties" felt by people who lack the techniques to secure results, and "secondary (or displaced) anxiety" felt by those who have not performed the rites meant to allay primary anxiety correctly. Homans argued that purification rituals may then be conducted to dispel secondary anxiety.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Homans|first=George C.|title=Anxiety and Ritual: The Theories of Malinowski and Radcliffe-Brown|journal=American Anthropologist|year=1941|volume=43|issue=2|pages=164–72|doi=10.1525/aa.1941.43.2.02a00020|doi-access=free}}</ref>

A.R. Radcliffe-Brown argued that ritual should be distinguished from technical action, viewing it as a structured event: "ritual acts differ from technical acts in having in all instances some expressive or symbolic element in them."<ref>{{cite book|last=Radcliffe-Brown|first=A.R.|title=Structure and Function in Primitive Society|year=1939|publisher=Cohen and West|location=London|page=143}}</ref> [[Edmund Leach]], in contrast, saw ritual and technical action less as separate structural types of activity and more as a spectrum: "Actions fall into place on a continuous scale. At one extreme we have actions which are entirely profane, entirely functional, technique pure and simple; at the other we have actions which are entirely sacred, strictly aesthetic, technically non-functional. Between these two extremes we have the great majority of social actions which partake partly of the one sphere and partly of the other. From this point of view technique and ritual, profane and sacred, do not denote ''types'' of action but ''aspects'' of almost any kind of action."<ref>{{cite book|last=Leach|first=Edmund|title=Political Systems of Highland Burma|year=1954|publisher=Bell|location=London|pages=12–13}}</ref>

====As social control====
[[File:Bali panorama.jpg|thumb|Balinese rice terraces regulated through ritual]]
{{see also|social control}}

The [[Structural functionalism|functionalist]] model viewed ritual as a [[homeostatic]] mechanism to regulate and stabilize social institutions by adjusting [[social interaction]]s, maintaining a [[social group|group]] [[ethos]], and restoring harmony after disputes.

Although the functionalist model was soon superseded, later "neofunctional" theorists adopted its approach by examining the ways that ritual regulated larger ecological systems. [[Roy Rappaport]], for example, examined the way [[Moka exchange|gift exchanges of pigs]] between tribal groups in [[Papua New Guinea]] maintained environmental balance between humans, available food (with pigs sharing the same foodstuffs as humans) and resource base. Rappaport concluded that ritual, "...helps to maintain an undegraded environment, limits fighting to frequencies which do not endanger the existence of regional population, adjusts man-land ratios, facilitates trade, distributes local surpluses of pig throughout the regional population in the form of pork, and assures people of high quality protein when they are most in need of it".<ref>{{cite book|last=Rappaport|first=Roy|title=Ecology, Meaning and Religion|url=https://archive.org/details/ecologymeaningre00roya|url-access=registration|year=1979|publisher=North Atlantic Books|location=Richmond, CA|page=[https://archive.org/details/ecologymeaningre00roya/page/41 41]}}</ref> Similarly, [[J. Stephen Lansing]] traced how the [[Pawukon|intricate calendar]] of [[Balinese Hinduism|Hindu Balinese]] rituals served to regulate the vast [[irrigation system]]s of Bali, ensuring the optimum distribution of water over the system while limiting disputes.<ref>{{cite book|last=Lansing|first=Stephen|title=Priests and Programmers: technologies of power in the engineered landscape of Bali|url=https://archive.org/details/priestsprogramme0000lans|url-access=registration|year=1991|publisher=Princeton University Press|location=Princeton, NJ}}</ref>

====Rebellion====
While most Functionalists sought to link ritual to the maintenance of social order, South African [[Functionalism (sociology)|functionalist]] anthropologist [[Max Gluckman]] coined the phrase "rituals of rebellion" to describe a type of ritual in which the accepted social order was symbolically turned on its head. Gluckman argued that the ritual was an expression of underlying social tensions (an idea taken up by [[Victor W. Turner|Victor Turner]]), and that it functioned as an institutional pressure valve, relieving those tensions through these cyclical performances. The rites ultimately functioned to reinforce social order, insofar as they allowed those tensions to be expressed without leading to actual rebellion. [[Carnival of Venice|Carnival]] is viewed in the same light. He observed, for example, how the first-fruits festival (''[[incwala]]'') of the South African [[Bantu peoples|Bantu]] kingdom of [[Swaziland]] symbolically inverted the normal social order, so that the king was publicly insulted, women asserted their domination over men, and the established authority of elders over the young was turned upside down.<ref>{{cite book|last=Gluckman|first=Max|title=Order and Rebellion in South East Africa: Collected Essays|year=1963|publisher=Routledge & Kegan Paul|location=London}}</ref>

===Structuralism===
{{main|Structuralism}}

[[Claude Lévi-Strauss]], the French anthropologist, regarded all social and cultural organization as symbolic systems of communication shaped by the inherent structure of the human brain. He therefore argued that the symbol systems are not reflections of social structure as the Functionalists believed, but are imposed on social relations to organize them. Lévi-Strauss thus viewed myth and ritual as complementary symbol systems, one verbal, one non-verbal. Lévi-Strauss was not concerned to develop a theory of ritual (although he did produce a four-volume analysis of myth) but was influential to later scholars of ritual such as [[Mary Douglas]] and [[Edmund Leach]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Bell|first=Catherine|title=Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice|year=1992|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford|pages=42–43}}</ref>

===Structure and anti-structure===
[[Victor Turner]] combined [[Arnold van Gennep]]'s model of the structure of initiation rites, and Gluckman's functionalist emphasis on the ritualization of social conflict to maintain social equilibrium, with a more structural model of symbols in ritual. Running counter to this emphasis on structured symbolic oppositions within a ritual was his exploration of the liminal phase of rites of passage, a phase in which "anti-structure" appears. In this phase, opposed states such as birth and death may be encompassed by a single act, object or phrase. The dynamic nature of symbols experienced in ritual provides a compelling personal experience; ritual is a "mechanism that periodically converts the obligatory into the desirable".{{sfnp|Turner|1967|p=[https://archive.org/details/forestofsymbolsa00turn_1/page/30 30]}}

[[Mary Douglas]], a British Functionalist, extended Turner's theory of ritual structure and anti-structure with her own contrasting set of terms "grid" and "group" in the book ''Natural Symbols''. Drawing on Levi-Strauss' Structuralist approach, she saw ritual as symbolic communication that constrained social behaviour. Grid is a scale referring to the degree to which a symbolic system is a shared frame of reference. Group refers to the degree people are tied into a tightly knit community. When graphed on two intersecting axes, four quadrants are possible: strong group/strong grid, strong group/weak grid, weak group/weak grid, weak group/strong grid. Douglas argued that societies with strong group or strong grid were marked by more ritual activity than those weak in either group or grid.<ref>{{cite book|last=Douglas|first=Mary|title=Natural Symbols: Explorations in Cosmology|year=1973|publisher=Vintage Books|location=New York}}</ref> (see also, [[#Ritual as a methodological measure of religiosity|section below]])

====Anti-structure and communitas====
{{main|Communitas}}
In his analysis of [[Rite of passage|rites of passage]], Victor Turner argued that the liminal phase - that period 'betwixt and between' - was marked by "two models of human interrelatedness, juxtaposed and alternating": structure and anti-structure (or ''communitas'').{{sfnp|Turner|1969|p=96}} While the ritual clearly articulated the cultural ideals of a society through ritual symbolism, the unrestrained festivities of the liminal period served to break down social barriers and to join the group into an undifferentiated unity with "no status, property, insignia, secular clothing, rank, kinship position, nothing to demarcate themselves from their fellows".{{sfnp|Turner|1967|pp=[https://archive.org/details/forestofsymbolsa00turn_1/page/96 96]–97}} These periods of symbolic inversion have been studied in a diverse range of rituals such as [[pilgrimage]]s and [[Yom Kippur]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Bell|first=Catherine|title=Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice|year=1992|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford|page=128}}</ref>

====Social dramas====
Beginning with Max Gluckman's concept of "rituals of rebellion", Victor Turner argued that many types of ritual also served as "social dramas" through which structural social tensions could be expressed, and temporarily resolved. Drawing on Van Gennep's model of initiation rites, Turner viewed these social dramas as a dynamic process through which the community renewed itself through the ritual creation of communitas during the "liminal phase". Turner analyzed the ritual events in 4 stages: breach in relations, crisis, redressive actions, and acts of reintegration. Like Gluckman, he argued these rituals maintain social order while facilitating disordered inversions, thereby moving people to a new status, just as in an initiation rite.<ref>{{cite book|last=Kuper|first=Adam|title=Anthropology and Anthropologists: The Modern British School|url=https://archive.org/details/anthropologyanth0000kupe|url-access=registration|year=1983|publisher=Routledge & Kegan Paul|location=London|pages=[https://archive.org/details/anthropologyanth0000kupe/page/156 156–57]|isbn=9780710094094 }}</ref>

===Symbolic approaches to ritual===
{{rquote|right|Arguments, melodies, formulas, maps and pictures are not idealities to be stared at but texts to be read; so are rituals, palaces, technologies, and social formations.|{{harvp|Geertz|1980|p=[https://archive.org/details/negaratheatresta00geer_1/page/135 135]}}}}

[[Clifford Geertz]] also expanded on the symbolic approach to ritual that began with Victor Turner. Geertz argued that religious symbol systems provided both a "model of" reality (showing how to interpret the world as is) as well as a "model for" reality (clarifying its ideal state). The role of ritual, according to Geertz, is to bring these two aspects – the "model of" and the "model for" – together: "it is in ritual – that is consecrated behaviour – that this conviction that religious conceptions are veridical and that religious directives are sound is somehow generated."<ref>{{cite book|last=Geertz|first=Clifford|title=The Interpretation of Cultures|url=https://archive.org/details/interpretationof00geer_1|url-access=registration|year=1973|publisher=Basic Books|location=New York|page=[https://archive.org/details/interpretationof00geer_1/page/112 112]|isbn=9780465097197}}</ref>

Symbolic anthropologists like Geertz analyzed rituals as language-like codes to be interpreted independently as cultural systems. Geertz rejected Functionalist arguments that ritual describes social order, arguing instead that ritual actively shapes that social order and imposes meaning on disordered experience. He also differed from Gluckman and Turner's emphasis on ritual action as a means of resolving social passion, arguing instead that it simply displayed them.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bell|first=Catherine|title=Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice|year=1992|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford|pages=66–67}}</ref>

===As a form of communication===
Whereas Victor Turner saw in ritual the potential to release people from the binding structures of their lives into a liberating anti-structure or communitas, Maurice Bloch argued that ritual produced conformity.<ref>{{cite book|editor-last=Hughes-Freeland|editor-first=Felicia |title=Ritual, Performance, Media|publisher=Routledge|location=London|page=2}}</ref>

[[Maurice Bloch]] argued that ritual communication is unusual in that it uses a special, restricted vocabulary, a small number of permissible illustrations, and a restrictive grammar. As a result, ritual utterances become very predictable, and the speaker is made anonymous in that they have little choice in what to say. The restrictive syntax reduces the ability of the speaker to make propositional arguments, and they are left, instead, with utterances that cannot be contradicted such as "I do thee wed" in a wedding. These kinds of utterances, known as [[performatives]], prevent speakers from making political arguments through logical argument, and are typical of what Weber called [[traditional authority]] instead.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Bloch|first=Maurice|title=Symbols, Song, Dance and Features of Articulation: Is Religion an Extreme Form of Traditional Authority?|journal=Archives Européennes de Sociologie|year=1974|volume=15|issue=1|pages=55–84|doi=10.1017/s0003975600002824|s2cid=145170270 }}</ref>

Bloch's model of ritual language denies the possibility of creativity. Thomas Csordas, in contrast, analyzes how ritual language can be used to innovate. Csordas looks at groups of rituals that share performative elements ("genres" of ritual with a shared "poetics"). These rituals may fall along the spectrum of formality, with some less, others more formal and restrictive. Csordas argues that innovations may be introduced in less formalized rituals. As these innovations become more accepted and standardized, they are slowly adopted in more formal rituals. In this way, even the most formal of rituals are potential avenues for creative expression.<ref>{{cite book|last=Csordas|first=Thomas J.|title=Language, Charisma, & Creativity: Ritual Life in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal|year=2001 |orig-year=1997|publisher=Palgrave|location=Basingstoke|pages=255–65}}</ref>

===As a disciplinary program===
[[File:Skriptorium Holzschnitt.jpg|thumb|[[Scriptorium]] monk at work. "Monks described this labor of transcribing manuscripts as being 'like prayer and fasting, a means of correcting one's unruly passions.{{'"}}{{sfnp|Asad|1993|p=64}}]]

In his historical analysis of articles on ritual and rite in the ''[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]'', [[Talal Asad]] notes that from 1771 to 1852, the brief articles on ritual define it as a "book directing the order and manner to be observed in performing divine service" (i.e., as a script). There are no articles on the subject thereafter until 1910, when a new, lengthy article appeared that redefines ritual as "...a type of routine behaviour that symbolizes or expresses something".{{sfnp|Asad|1993|pp=56–57}} As a symbolic activity, it is no longer confined to religion, but is distinguished from technical action. The shift in definitions from script to behavior, which is likened to a text, is matched by a semantic distinction between ritual as an ''outward sign'' (i.e., public symbol) and ''inward meaning''.{{sfnp|Asad|1993|pp=58–60}}

The emphasis has changed to establishing the meaning of public symbols and abandoning concerns with inner emotional states since, as [[E. E. Evans-Pritchard|Evans-Pritchard]] wrote "such emotional states, if present at all, must vary not only from individual to individual, but also in the same individual on different occasions and even at different points in the same rite."{{sfnp|Asad|1993|p=73}} Asad, in contrast, emphasizes behavior and inner emotional states; rituals are to be performed, and mastering these performances is a skill requiring disciplined action.

{{blockquote|In other words, apt performance involves not symbols to be interpreted but abilities to be acquired according to rules that are sanctioned by those in authority: it presupposes no obscure meanings, but rather the formation of physical and linguistic skills.|{{harvp|Asad|1993|p=62}}}}

Drawing on the example of Medieval monastic life in Europe, he points out that ritual in this case refers to its original meaning of the "...book directing the order and manner to be observed in performing divine service". This book "prescribed practices, whether they had to do with the proper ways of eating, sleeping, working, and praying or with proper moral dispositions and spiritual aptitudes, aimed at developing virtues that are put 'to the service of God.{{'"}}{{sfnp|Asad|1993|p=63}} Monks, in other words, were disciplined in the [[Discipline and Punish|Foucauldian sense]]. The point of monastic discipline was to learn skills and appropriate emotions. Asad contrasts his approach by concluding:
{{blockquote|Symbols call for interpretation, and even as interpretive criteria are extended so interpretations can be multiplied. Disciplinary practices, on the other hand, cannot be varied so easily, because learning to develop moral capabilities is not the same thing as learning to invent representations.|{{harvp|Asad|1993|p=79}}}}

=== As a form of social solidarity ===
Ethnographic observation shows ritual can create social solidarity. Douglas Foley Went to North Town, Texas, between 1973 and 1974 to study public high school culture. He used interviews, participant observation, and unstructured chatting to study racial tension and capitalist culture in his ethnography ''Learning Capitalist Culture''. Foley refers to football games and Friday Night Lights as a community ritual. This ritual united the school and created a sense of [[solidarity]] and community on a weekly basis involving pep rallies and the game itself. Foley observed judgement and segregation based on class, social status, wealth, and gender. He described Friday Night Lights as a ritual that overcomes those differences: "The other, gentler, more social side of football was, of course, the emphasis on camaraderie, loyalty, friendship between players, and pulling together".<ref>{{Cite book|last=Foley|first=Douglas|title=Learning Capitalist Culture: Deep in the Heart of Tejas.|publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press|year=2010|pages=53}}</ref> In his ethnography ''[https://www.berghahnbooks.com/title/HadziMuhamedovicWaiting Waiting for Elijah: Time and Encounter in a Bosnian Landscape]'', anthropologist [https://www.divinity.cam.ac.uk/directory/dr-safet-hadzimuhamedovic Safet HadžiMuhamedović] suggests that shared festivals like [[Saint George's Day|St George's Day]] and [[Elijah|St Elijah's Day]] structure interfaith relationships and appear as acts of solidarity against ethno-nationalist purifications of territory in [[Bosnia and Herzegovina|Bosnia]].<ref name=":0" />

===Ritualization===
{{Main|Ritualization}}

Asad's work critiqued the notion that there were universal characteristics of ritual to be found in all cases. [[Catherine Bell (religious studies scholar)|Catherine Bell]] has extended this idea by shifting attention from ritual as a category, to the processes of "ritualization" by which ritual is created as a cultural form in a society. Ritualization is "a way of acting that is designed and orchestrated to distinguish and privilege what is being done in comparison to other, usually more quotidian, activities".<ref>{{cite book|last=Bell|first=Catherine|title=Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice|year=1992|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford|page=74}}</ref>

===Sociobiology and behavioral neuroscience===
Anthropologists have also analyzed ritual via insights from other behavioral sciences. The idea that cultural rituals share behavioral similarities with personal rituals of individuals was discussed early on by Freud.<ref>Freud, S. (1928) Die Zukunft einer Illusion. Internationaler Psychoanalytischer Verlag.</ref> [[Dulaney, Kentucky|Dulaney]] and [[Alan Fiske|Fiske]] compared ethnographic descriptions of both rituals and non-ritual doings, such as work to behavioral descriptions from clinical descriptions of [[obsessive–compulsive disorder]] (OCD).<ref>Dulaney, S.; Fiske, A. P. Cultural Rituals and Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: Is There a Common Psychological Mechanism? Ethos 1994, 22 (3), 243–283. https://doi.org/10.1525/eth.1994.22.3.02a00010.</ref> They note that OCD behavior often consists of such behavior as constantly cleaning objects, concern or disgust with bodily waste or secretions, repetitive actions to prevent harm, heavy emphasis on number or order of actions etc. They then show that ethnographic descriptions of cultural rituals contain around 5 times more of such content than ethnographic descriptions of other activities such as "work". Fiske later repeated similar analysis with more descriptions from a larger collection of different cultures, also contrasting descriptions of cultural rituals to descriptions of other behavioral disorders (in addition to OCD), in order to show that only OCD-like behavior (not other illnesses) shares properties with rituals.<ref>Fiske, A. P.; Haslam, N. Is Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder a Pathology of the Human Disposition to Perform Socially Meaningful Rituals? Evidence of Similar Content. J. Nerv. Ment. Dis. 1997, 185 (4), 211–222. https://doi.org/10.1097/00005053-199704000-00001 {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221118160807/https://journals.lww.com/jonmd/Abstract/1997/04000/Is_Obsessive_Compulsive_Disorder_a_Pathology_of.1.aspx |date=2022-11-18 }}.</ref> The authors offer tentative explanations for these findings, for example that these behavioral traits are widely needed for survival, to control risk, and cultural rituals are often performed in the context of perceived collective risk.

Other anthropologists have taken these insights further, and constructed more elaborate theories based on the brain functions and physiology. Liénard and [[Pascal Boyer|Boyer]] suggest that commonalities between obsessive behavior in individuals and similar behavior in collective contexts possibly share similarities due to underlying mental processes they call hazard precaution. They suggest that individuals of societies seem to pay more attention to information relevant to avoiding hazards, which in turn can explain why collective rituals displaying actions of hazard precaution are so popular and prevail for long periods in cultural transmission.<ref>Liénard, P.; Boyer, P. Whence Collective Rituals? A Cultural Selection Model of Ritualized Behavior. American Anthropologist 2006, 108 (4), 814–827. https://doi.org/10.1525/aa.2006.108.4.814.
</ref>

===Ritual as a methodological measure of religiosity===
{{further|Theories about religions}}
According to the sociologist [[Mervin F. Verbit|Mervin Verbit]], ritual may be understood as one of the key components of religiosity. And ritual itself may be broken down into four dimensions; content, frequency, intensity
and centrality. The content of a ritual may vary from ritual to ritual, as does the frequency of its practice, the intensity of the ritual (how much of an impact it has on the practitioner), and the centrality of the ritual (in that religious tradition).<ref>Verbit, M.F. (1970). The components and dimensions of religious behavior: Toward a reconceptualization of religiosity. American mosaic, 24, 39.</ref><ref>Küçükcan, T. (2010). Multidimensional Approach to Religion: a way of looking at religious phenomena. Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 4(10), 60–70.</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Küçükcan |first1=Talip |year=2000|title=Can Religiosity be Measured? Dimensions of Religious Commitment: Theories Revisited |url=http://www.eskieserler.com/dosyalar/mpdf%20(1135).pdf |website=Eski Eserler}}</ref>

In this sense, ritual is similar to [[Charles Y. Glock|Charles Glock]]'s "practice" dimension of religiosity.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |last1=Glock |first1=Charles Y. |author-link=Charles Y. Glock |year=1972 |title=On the Study of Religious Commitment |editor1-last=Faulkner |editor-first=J.E. |series=Religion’s Influence in Contemporary Society, Readings in the Sociology of Religion |location=Ohio |publisher=Charles E. Merril |pages=38–56}}</ref>