Testing Victor Turners Ritual Process in Contemporary Ritual Behaviors R.

Christopher Feldman

If a theory is to be of use beyond the limits of the data upon which it is based, it needs to be usable as a template for testing other data. Victor Turners seminal work The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (Turner 1969) has garnered much attention, including both acclaim and criticism, since its publication. In examining his theory, I wanted to employ a proof of concept approach in order to: (a) test whether his theory was useful as a template for describing ritual, (b) test whether the criticisms leveled against it were supported in my test data, and (c) determine whether there were any ritual characteristics that my data indicated might be missing from Turners description. To perform my testing, I first needed to extract a set of verifiable empirical criteria from Turners work which could then be tested for accuracy in each of my test cases. The test subjects consisted of six different types of rituals drawn from disparate areas of contemporary society. For reasons of brevitythis is an extremely unscientific study, after allI chose not to work with historical or ethnographic data. Instead, I drew upon rituals for which descriptions were either already known to me personally, or readily accessible. Turners book covers quite a bit of ground in its ethnographic support for his hypotheses, and my reductionist synopsis of his theory on ritual will necessarily leave out areas which may be of greater importance in the field of comparative religions at large. Nevertheless, I summarized his view of ritual as follows: In ritual, individuals are taken outside normal space and time to a liminal state. There they undergo an embodied experience built up of multivalent symbol sets, in order that the ritual leaders may impart a particular worldview (or, more likely, a portion of such a worldview) and life lessons: how to behave, what principles to hold in life, etc. The ritual serves to either (a) elevate the candidates status, or (b) celebrate temporal cycles. The result, and the reason, of the ritual is to build

communitas i.e., to make the candidates members of a particular cohesive social group which continues to hold meaning for them after their return to everyday space and time. The ritual may be for the cohesion of society at large (structure), or for a sub- or counter-culture within the society

(anti-structure). The embodied experience within the ritual involves a variety of components, which may or may not include: Inversion of normal social structure; A hierarchical structure peculiar to the particular communitas; Shared breaking of taboo; Concepts of equality between candidates;1 Religious, supernatural, and/or magical explanations for the rituals; and Imbuing the candidates with religious, supernatural, or magical abilities or status.

Criticisms of Turners work seem to fall broadly within a few areas. The first is taxonomic, for instance that he erred in dividing between rituals involving elevation of status and those celebrating temporal cycles, or conversely that he ought not to have included the latter at all, or that he should have differentiated between rituals and celebrations. (e.g., Anderson 1970; DeFlem 1991) The second is a complaint that Turner wrongly asserts that ritual acts in a socially conservative manner, and is fundamentally a form of sublimation. (e.g., Alexander 1991: 262) Third is a feminist critique that alleges Turners approach to ritual is flawed by his own patriarchal thinking, and needs to be reconceptualized along feminist guidelines. (e.g., Frankenberry 2000; Prueitt 2000) A fourth is more general and alleges that the entire concept of ritual as a collective noun needs to be re-examined in light of post-modern and post-colonial theories. (e.g., Bell 1992; Smith 1992) Having generated a working description of ritual from Turners theories, and noting the criticisms leveled against it, I then turned to creating my data set, which may be summarized as follows: 1. Individual Magical Ritual: The Neophyte initiation ritual of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, an occult co-fraternity founded in the nineteenth century from which descendant groups still exist. (See Zalewski & Zalewski 1992) 2. Public Religious Ritual: The Gnostic Mass of the Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica. (See T Apiryon 1995) 3. Public Civic Ritual: A university graduation ceremony.

1 2

Though not necessarily to the directors of the ritual; the hierarchy of the communitas is normally retained. Note that Alexanders purpose in describing this criticism is in order to refute it.

4. Individual Religious Cyclical Ritual: The Niddah, rituals surrounding menstruation observed by certain orthodox Jewish sect members. (See Rich 1999) 5. Individual Civil Cyclical Ritual: A childrens birthday party. 6. Public Cyclical Ritual: The New Years celebration observed by many Japanese citizens. (See Reader 1991)

TEST RESULTS Golden Dawn Initiation Liminal State3 Embodied Experience Encoded Symbolism Impart Worldview/Life Lessons Elevate Status Celebrate Temporal Cycles Build Communitas for Society at
5

EGC Gnostic Mass Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y

College Grad. Y Y Y Y Y

Jewish Menstrual Ritual Y Y Y Y

Childs Birthday
4

Japanese New Years Y Y Y Y

Y Y Y Y Y Y Large5 Y Y
5

Y Y Y

Y Y Y Y
6

Y Y

Y Y Y

Y Y Y Y Y

for Sub- / Counter-Culture Social Inversion Particular Hierarchy Shared Breaking of Taboo Equality between Candidates Supernatural Explanation Supernatural Abilities Taxonomic Problem? Ritual is Not Socially Conservative? Gender Problem? Conceptual Problem? Something Missing?
3 4

Y Y

Y Y
7

Y Y Y

For simplicity, I am conflating both the liminal and liminoid used by Turner. Although the celebration ritual involves marking a temporal transition (and sometimes elevation of status, e.g., 18th or 21st birthdays), it seems tautological to call this a liminal state. The birthday party, while clearly ritualized, is generally not conceptualized as occurring in a liminal space or time. 5 The absence of corroboration for this function is quite likely a sampling artifact, given the evidence for it elsewhere. 6 Some stratification exists, albeit not between candidates of the same level (honors vs non-honors students, etc.). Although it is within the hierarchical structure of the communitas, it must still be noted as an exception. 7 The concept of religious vs social explanation of behavior is a matter of some difficulty in describing Japanese society. Many observed actions involve religious institutions or behaviors, but those actions are viewed by the actors themselves as entirely secular in nature. See, for example, Reader 1991; Reader & Tanabe 1998; Tanabe 1999; Traphagan 2004, etc. 8 Possibly. See footnote 4, and the discussion below this table.

The results are interesting in several ways. First, while Turners theory generally describes these rituals, it is not a perfect fit. In particular, the concept of liminality, so important to both Turner (and Van Gennep, upon whom Turner drew), seems problematic in describing one of the rituals examined the childs birthday party. Notably, this is a celebration of a temporal cycle. Other parts of his theory fit quite well, particularly the use of physical gestures and body positions, the presence of polysemous symbolism in constructing the rituals, the building of communitas, and the social leveling of candidates (with one exception). All of the test cases had considerable correlation with Turners theory as a whole, regardless of any gaps. Note that some ritual elements were nearly or altogether missing from the test data (e.g., social inversion); however, given the numerous examples elsewhere, I have read this as a sampling artifact. Second, no fatal limitations or theoretical failures were noted which could be attributed to any of the four areas of critique of Turners thesis. This does not mean, of course, that the criticisms are invalid, only that no fatal shortcomings were noted in applying his theory as given.9 The exception to this is the questionable application of the concept of liminality to at least one type of ritual of temporal cycles, as noted above. Third, in five of the six rituals examined,10 one potentially important concept was not present in Turners theory, namely the imparting to the candidates of particular signs of recognition by which other initiates might be subsequently recognized. These might consist of particular words or phrases, titles, physical gestures such as handgrips, or special items of clothing which only initiates are to wear. Obviously this subject might be explored at much greater length and in finer granularity of detail. Within the confines of this brief overview, I have attempted to show that my limited sampling revealed a much greater degree of confirmation than divergence with Turners theories. Additionally, the testing did not reveal a level of corroboration for Turners critics that would invalidate to an appreciable degree his work as a template for understanding ritual. Finally, the testing exposed a ritual element that might be argued for inclusion in this schema.

10

Whether some other theory might better fit the data is beyond the scope of this study. The one exception was the Niddah.

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