Studies of ritual continue to be of critical interest in anthropology. This course explores anthropological approaches to ritual as a universal feature of human social life. Attention will be given to key anthropological concepts of ritual (e.g. rites of passage, liminality, anti-structure, communitas, ritual as performance). Although ritual is sometimes considered as primarily related to religion, the anthropological approach requires that ritual be situated not only in religious but also in secular contexts, such as: politics and power relations, the construction of social identities and boundaries, the reproduction and invention of 'tradition' or social memory practices, globalization, commodification etc. We will also problematize the dichotomy of sacred and secular while discussing practices of today’s individualized spirituality. Special focus will be paid to the negotiation of sound dimensions of ritual practice.
Key words: ritual, practice, performance, anthropological theory
Requirements: Minimum 500 words annotations of 6 assigned readings uploaded in the moodle course page, here https://dl1.cuni.cz/course/view.php?id=8610 AND a 10 min powerpoint presentation of a selected ethnographic case of a ritual performance interpreted with the help of theoretical concepts from mandatory readings, uploaded in the moodle and orally presented by the student.
Focus group: Undergraduate students of Liberal Arts and Humanities in their 2nd or 3rd year of studies. (Certain CESS texts from anthropology included.)
Last update: Seidlová Veronika, Mgr., Ph.D. (07.09.2026)
