The Politics of Ritual and Remembrance

The Politics of Ritual and Remembrance
Author: Grant Evans
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Total Pages: 244
Release: 1998-01-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9780824820541

Communist revolutions in this century have suppressed existing ritual and symbolic structures and invented new ones. Armed with new flags, new national celebrations, or new school textbooks, they have attempted to reconstruct social memory. This fascinating work of political anthropology examines the case of Laos from the heady days of the 1975 revolution to the more sober "post-socialist" present. Grant Evans traces the attempt at ritual and symbolic change in Laos, and the recent reemergence of older and deeper cultural structures, while identifying what has perhaps been irretrievably lost. In this challenging study of the cultural consequences of failed total revolution, Evans reaches some striking conclusions concerning the nature of social memory, cultural possibilities foregone, and the need for cultural continuity.

Ritual and Remembrance in the Ecuadorian Andes

Ritual and Remembrance in the Ecuadorian Andes
Author: Rachel Corr
Publisher: University of Arizona Press
Total Pages: 201
Release: 2010-03-15
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0816501114

Not every world culture that has battled colonization has suffered or died. In the Ecuadorian Andean parish of Salasaca, the indigenous culture has stayed true to itself and its surroundings for centuries while adapting to each new situation. Today, indigenous Salascans continue to devote a large part of their lives to their distinctive practices—both community rituals and individual behaviors—while living side by side with white-mestizo culture. In this book Rachel Corr provides a knowledgeable account of the Salasacan religion and rituals and their respective histories. Based on eighteen years of fieldwork in Salasaca, as well as extensive research in Church archives—including never-before-published documents—Corr’s book illuminates how Salasacan culture adapted to Catholic traditions and recentered, reinterpreted, and even reshaped them to serve similarly motivated Salasacan practices, demonstrating the link between formal and folk Catholicism and pre-Columbian beliefs and practices. Corr also explores the intense connection between the local Salasacan rituals and the mountain landscapes around them, from peak to valley. Ritual and Remembrance in the Ecuadorian Andes is, in its portrayal of Salasacan religious culture, both thorough and all-encompassing. Sections of the book cover everything from the performance of death rituals to stories about Amazonia as Salasacans interacted with outsiders—conquistadors and camera-toting tourists alike. Corr also investigates the role of shamanism in modern Salasacan culture, including shamanic powers and mountain spirits, and the use of reshaped, Andeanized Catholicism to sustain collective memory. Through its unique insider’s perspective of Salasacan spirituality, Ritual and Remembrance in the Ecuadorian Andes is a valuable anthropological work that honestly represents this people’s great ability to adapt.

Grassroots Memorials

Grassroots Memorials
Author: Peter Jan Margry
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Total Pages: 386
Release: 2011-08-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 0857451901

Grassroots memorials have become major areas of focus during times of trauma, danger, and social unrest. These improvised memorial assemblages continue to display new and more dynamic ways of representing collective and individual identities and in doing so reveal the steps that shape the national memories of those who struggle to come to terms with traumatic loss. This volume focuses on the hybrid quality of these temporary memorials as both monuments of mourning and as focal points for protest and expression of discontent. The broad range of case studies in this volume include anti-mafia shrines, Theo van Gogh’s memorial, September 11th memorials, March 11th shrines in Madrid, and Carlo Giuliani memorials in Genoa.

Death, Materiality and Mediation

Death, Materiality and Mediation
Author: Barbara Graham
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Total Pages: 174
Release: 2016-11-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 178533283X

In Death, Materiality and Mediation, Barbara Graham analyzes a diverse range of objects associated with remembrance in both the public and private arenas through ethnography of communities on both sides of the Irish border. In doing so, she explores the materially mediated interactions between the living and the dead, revealing the physical, cognitive, emotional, and spiritual roles of the dead in contemporary communities. Through this study, Graham expands the concept of materiality to include narrative, song, senses, emotions, ephemera and embodied experience. She also examines how modern practices are informed by older beliefs and folk religion.

The Rituals

The Rituals
Author: Natalie MacNeil
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Total Pages: 164
Release: 2019-11-05
Genre: Body, Mind & Spirit
ISBN: 1797200941

This stirring collection presents spiritual rituals from around the world and offers guidance on bringing the powerful practices into modern life. Filled with fascinating details on the history and meaning behind a wide range of sacred rituals for love, awareness, joy, and so much more, this timeless handbook guides readers through more than 40 empowering practices—including a candlelight ritual for renewal, a soothing ritual for unwinding, and a tea ceremony for fostering connection and gratitude. With evocative watercolors throughout, this book is a lovely invitation to nourish the mind, body, and soul through enduring rituals for well-being.

War and Remembrance in the Twentieth Century

War and Remembrance in the Twentieth Century
Author: Jay Winter
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 276
Release: 2000-08-27
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 9780521794367

How war has been remembered collectively is the central question in this volume. War in the twentieth century is a vivid and traumatic phenomenon which left behind it survivors who engage time and time again in acts of remembrance. This volume, containing essays by outstanding scholars of twentieth-century history, focuses on the issues raised by the shadow of war in this century. The behaviour, not of whole societies or of ruling groups alone, but of the individuals who do the work of remembrance, is discussed by examining the traumatic collective memory resulting from the horrors of the First World War, the Spanish Civil War, the Second World War, and the Algerian War. By studying public forms of remembrance, such as museums and exhibitions, literature and film, the editors have succeeded in bringing together a volume which demonstrates that a popular kind of collective memory is still very much alive.

Light from the Darkness

Light from the Darkness
Author: Deborah Fripp
Publisher: Behrman House Publishing
Total Pages: 48
Release: 2020
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9781681150116

"Filled with song and story, ritual and remembrance, this short and empowering guided experience helps us do what Holocaust survivors have always asked of us: to tell the story, to remember, and to act"--

Remembrance of Patria

Remembrance of Patria
Author: Roderic H. Blackburn
Publisher: Albany Institute of History and Art
Total Pages: 323
Release: 1988-01-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1438429908

How much of the Dutch world in America survived after the English? One hundred years after the English took control of New Netherland in 1664, New York retained many Dutch characteristics. The cultural milieu shifted abruptly, however, with population growth and increased affluence following the termination of the French and Indian Wars in 1760. British customs and tastes that were stylishly attractive to a new generation of moneyed colonists soon put Dutch culture in retreat in all but the most isolated areas. Some elements of the past persisted in ways never dreamed of by the Dutch West India Company officials, who oversaw their nation's colonization in America. These include caucus politics, separation of church and state, neighborly evening visits on the stoop, and Santa Claus. Even more striking is the similarity between principles and practices that emerged in the Dutch Republic four centuries ago and some of the precepts on which the American republic was founded. Much of the Dutch cultural and social history may be interpreted and understood through objects they brought with them and from those objects and structures they created in the New World. This landmark volume, originating in a major exhibit commemorating the tricentennial of the city of Albany, uncovers the range of Dutch colonial experience in America through some 350 objects: paintings, furniture, silver, gold, ceramics, textiles, prints, drawings, and architecture. The result is a rare and remarkable glimpse of New Netherland, a long-ago world that continues to resonate today. Roderic H. Blackburn is an ethnologist and architectural historian who has held positions as Director of Research at Historic Cherry Hill, Assistant Director of the Albany Institute of History and Art, and Senior Research Fellow at the New York State Museum. He is the author of Dutch Colonial Homes in America and Great Houses of New England. Ruth Piwonka is the author of A Portrait of Livingston Manor, 1686–1850 and the coauthor (with Roderic H. Blackburn) of A Visible Heritage: Columbia County, New York: A History in Art and Architecture.

Unburied Memories: The Politics of Bodies of Sacred Defense Martyrs in Iran

Unburied Memories: The Politics of Bodies of Sacred Defense Martyrs in Iran
Author: Pedram Khosronejad
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 184
Release: 2013-09-13
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1135711607

Today, almost a generation has passed since the Iran–Iraq war and the memory of it is set to diminish with each passing generation. The following questions emerge. Can we say that the gradual disappearance of war’s memory means that, increasingly, Iranians will see the Iran–Iraq war solely as an historical event? How can we defend or reject this idea? Today, with which elements and values should we look at the Iran–Iraq war memorials and ceremonies? To what extent will war museums and materials culture be influenced by these new values? In the period during and immediately after the Iran–Iraq war (1980-88), national bereavement and commemoration of martyrs was neither apparent in common state policy nor a social need. Even at the turn of the 21st century, anyone walking through Iranian cities, many of which had been the main scene of the bloody massacre and direct targets of the Iraqi Republican Guard, will have found traces of the terrible, almost unimaginable, human losses. However, today’s Iranians can see modern war memorials and monuments in many parts of the urban and rural landscape. Yet, at the same time, the changing landscape has separated Iranians from such remnants of the violence. It can be argued that many people, in their wish to look forward to a more hopeful future, do not wish to be reminded of this period in Iranian history. This book was originally published as a special issue of Visual Anthropology.