Negotiating Rites (Oxford Ritual Studies)

Ritual has been long viewed as an undisputed and indisputable part of (especially religious) tradition, performed over and over in the same ways: stable in form, meaningless, preconcieved, and with the aim of creating harmony and enabling a tradition's survival. The authors represented in this collection argue, however, that this view can be seriously challenged and that ritual's embeddedness in negotiation processes is one of its central features.

UH: Professor of Sanskrit, University of Oslo and co-editor of the Oxford Ritual Studies series; FN: Assistant Professor of Religion, Universität Bern