Anthropology 3510 Ritual

Winter 2011
Instructor: Prof. Eric Henry

Office: Loeb D786 (7th Floor D Tower)

Email: eric_henry@carleton.ca
Phone: 613 520 2600 x3724
Office Hours: Tues. 10-12

Course meets: M 2:35-5:25, Southam 402

Course website: lms.carleton.ca/webct/logon/1817238864041
Prerequisites: ANTH 1001 and ANTH 1002, or ANTH 1003 [1.0],
or SOCI 1001 and SOCI 1002, or SOCI 1003 [1.0], and third year
standing.

Course Description and Objectives

What is ritual, and how might we go about studying and

understanding it from an anthropological perspective? This class
approaches ritual as a form of culturally embedded social action
which has religious or cosmological significance for the
participants. We will look at ritual as a cross-cultural phenomenon,
using examples from many different places around the world. In
doing so, we will also examine the various theoretical perspectives
that anthropologists have developed for understanding the meaning,
purpose and form of ritual.

By the end of this course, students should be able to:

Describe the types and features of ritual
Apply insights from anthropological studies of ritual to
contemporary life
Analyze and evaluate ethnographic materials that illustrate
rituals
Perform independent research on a defined topic
Write a scholarly paper analyzing a ritual performance

Textbooks and Readings

There are two required textbooks for this class. Both are available for purchase at the Carleton
University Bookstore (Unicentre) and Haven Books (43 Seneca St. - see www.havenbooks.ca for
directions if necessary):

1) Bell, Catherine. 1997. Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

2) Fiskesj, Magnus. 2003. The Thanksgiving Turkey Pardon, The Death of Teddy's Bear, and the
Sovereign Exception of Guantanamo. Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press.

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In addition, we will make use of several articles and book chapters which are available on the course
website. You will need your Carleton Central login and password to access them. Please consult the
class schedule on the last page of this syllabus for details on which readings will be discussed and when.

Evaluation

Your grade in this course will be calculated on the following basis:

Critical Film 15% Each student will write a critical review of one of the films screened in this
Review class. Instructions for the review are detailed below. Reviews are due by
the end of semester
Topic 5% A topic proposal for your essay will be due in class Jan. 31. Guidelines for
Proposal the proposal are detailed below.
Midterm 20% A 1-hour midterm examination will be written during class on Feb. 14. It
Examination will consist of a series of short answer and essay questions, covering
material from lectures and readings up until that week.
Essay 30% The essay for this class will be due March 28. The topics and guidelines
for the essay are detailed below.
Final 30% There will be a 2-hour examination scheduled during the final
Examination examinations period. The exam will cover content from the entire course.
While similar in structure to the mid-term, it will include a greater number
of essay-based questions.

Note on the Preparation of Assignments:

All written work should be prepared in accord with the conventions of scholarly writing.
Assignments should:
be properly formatted (1 margins, 12pt. readable font,
double-spaced, numbered pages).
be rigorously checked for spelling and grammar
include a title page with the title, your name, student #,
course # and the name of the professor
provide citations for all sources and quotations see the
departmental style guide for guidelines
(http://www2.carleton.ca/socanth/anthropology/undergraduat
e/style-guide/) or use one of the style guide tip sheets
available in the library
(http://www.library.carleton.ca/howdoI/citing.html)
include a bibliography at the end

Submission Policy:
Assignments can be submitted on the day they are due either in class or through the Department of
Sociology and Anthropology Drop Box in Loeb B750 (see www2.carleton.ca/socanth/ current-
students/drop-box-policy for more details). Assignments submitted through the drop box should be
clearly marked with your name and the name of the professor.
Late assignments are subject to a deduction of 10% of the total grade per week beginning the day
after they are due unless the student has a documented medical or personal emergency.

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In accordance with the Carleton University Undergraduate Calendar (p 45), the letter grades assigned in
this course will have the following percentage equivalents:

A+ = 90-100 B+ = 77-79 C+ = 67-69 D+ = 57-59

A = 85-89 B = 73-76 C = 63-66 D = 53-56
A - = 80-84 B - = 70-72 C - = 60-62 D - = 50-52
F = Below 50 WDN = Withdrawn from the course
ABS = Student absent from final exam
DEF = Deferred (See above)
FND = (Failed, no Deferred) = Student could not pass the course even with 100% on final exam

Academic Regulations, Accommodations, Plagiarism, Etc.

University rules regarding registration, withdrawal, appealing marks, and most anything else you might
need to know can be found on the universitys website, here:
http://www.carleton.ca/cu0708uc/regulations/acadregsuniv.html

Requests for Academic Accommodations

For Students with Disabilities: Students with disabilities needing academic accommodations are
required to contact a coordinator at the Paul Menton Centre to complete the necessary letters of
accommodation. The student must then make an appointment to discuss their needs with the instructor at
least two weeks prior to the first class or ITV test. This is to ensure sufficient time is available to make
the necessary accommodation arrangements. The deadlines for contacting the Paul Menton Centre
regarding accommodation for final exams for the December 2010 exam period is Nov 12, 2010. The
deadline for April 2011 examinations is March 11, 2011

For Religious Obligations: Students requesting academic accommodation on the basis of religious
obligation should make a formal, written request to their instructors for alternate dates and/or means of
satisfying academic requirements. Such requests should be made during the first two weeks of class, or
as soon as possible after the need for accommodation is known to exist, but no later than two weeks
before the compulsory event. Accommodation is to be worked out directly and on an individual basis
between the student and the instructor(s) involved. Instructors will make accommodations in a way that
avoids academic disadvantage to the student. Students or instructors who have questions or want to
confirm accommodation eligibility of a religious event or practice may refer to the Equity Services
website for a list of holy days and Carleton's Academic Accommodation policies, or may contact an
Equity Services Advisor in the Equity Services Department for assistance.

For Pregnancy: Pregnant students requiring academic accommodations are encouraged to contact an
Equity Advisor in Equity Services to complete a letter of accommodation. The student must then make
an appointment to discuss her needs with the instructor at least two weeks prior to the first academic
event in which it is anticipated the accommodation will be required.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is the passing off of someone else's work as your own and is a serious academic offence. For
the details of what constitutes plagiarism, the potential penalties and the procedures refer to the section
on Instructional Offences in the Undergraduate Calendar.

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What are the Penalties for Plagiarism? A student found to have plagiarized an assignment may be
subject to one of several penalties including: expulsion; suspension from all studies at Carleton;
suspension from full-time studies; and/or a reprimand; a refusal of permission to continue or to register
in a specific degree program; academic probation; award of an FNS, Fail, or an ABS.

What are the Procedures? All allegations of plagiarism are reported to the faculty of Dean of FASS and
Management. Documentation is prepared by instructors and/or departmental chairs. The Dean writes to
the student and the University Ombudsperson about the alleged plagiarism. The Dean reviews the
allegation. If it is not resolved at this level then it is referred to a tribunal appointed by the Senate.

Assistance for Students

Student Academic Success Centre (SASC): www.carleton.ca/sasc

Writing Tutorial Services: www.carleton.ca/wts
Peer Assisted Study Sessions (PASS): www.carleton.ca/sasc/pass_home/index.html

Important Information

- Students must always retain a hard copy of all work that is submitted.
- All final grades are subject to the Deans approval.
- Please note that you will be able to link your CONNECT (MyCarleton) account to other non-
CONNECT accounts and receive emails from us. However, for us to respond to your emails, we need to
see your full name, CU ID, and the email must be written from your valid CONNECT address.
Therefore, it would be easier to respond to your inquiries if you would send all email from your connect
account. If you do not have or have yet to activate this account, you may wish to do so by visiting
https://portal.carleton.ca/

Class Schedule

The table below indicates which day we will be discussing various readings in class. The table below
indicates the topic and readings for each class. Come prepared each week having already done the
readings, and the lectures will make a lot more sense.

Date Topic Readings/Videos

1 Jan. 3 Introduction What
is Ritual?
2 Jan. 10 Sacred and Profane Bell (Ch. 1)
Durkheim, Emile. 1915. A Definition of the Religious Phenomenon
and of Religion. In The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life,
pp. 37-63. London: Unwin.
3 Jan. 17 Materialist Bell (Ch. 2)
Perspectives Harris, Marvin. 1980. Indias Sacred Cow. In Conformity and
Conflict: Readings in Cultural Anthropology, pp. 201-207. P.
Spradley and D.W. McCurdy (eds.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.
Rappaport, Roy. 1967. Ritual Regulation of Environmental
Relations among a New Guinea People. Ethnology 6(1):17-30.
Film: Goddess and the Computer

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4 Jan. 24 Symbolic Process Bell (Ch. 3)
and Rites of Passage Turner, Victor. 1969. Liminality and Communitas. In The Ritual
Process, pp. 94-130. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
5 Jan. 31 Shamanism and Bell (Ch. 4)
Curing Kendall, Laurel. 1996. Korean Shamans and the Spirits of
Topic Proposal Due Capitalism. American Anthropologist 98(3):512-527.
Film: An Initiation Kut for a Korean Shaman
6 Feb. 7 Embodiment Asad, Talal. 1993. Pain and Truth in Medieval Christian Ritual. In
Genealogies of Religion, pp. 83-124. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
University Press.
Banks, Marcus. 1997. Representing the Bodies of the Jains. In
Rethinking Visual Anthropology, pp. 216-39, Marcus Banks and
Howard Morphy (eds.). New Haven: Yale University Press.
7 Feb. 14 Ritual Experience Film: Kataragama
Midterm
Examination
8 Feb. 28 Sacrifice Hubert, Henri and Marcel Mauss. 1964. Definition and Unity of the
Sacrificial System. Sacrifice: Its Nature and Function, pp. 9-18
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Willerslev, Rane. 2009. The Optimal Sacrifice: A Study of
Voluntary Death among the Siberian Chukchi. American
Ethnologist 36(4):693-704.
9 Mar. 7 Secular Rituals Bellah, Robert. 2005. Civil Religion in America. Daedalus
134(4):40-55.
Gusterson, Hugh. 1996. Nuclear Weapons Testing: Scientific
Experiment as Political Ritual. In Naked Science:
Anthropological Inquiry into Boundaries, Power, and Knowledge,
pp. 131-47. Laura Nader (ed.). New York: Routledge.

10 Mar. 14 Political Ritual and Fiskesjo

the State
11 Mar. 21 Change, Invention Bell (Ch. 7)
and Appropriation Klassen, Pamela. 2005. Ritual Appropriation and Appropriate
Ritual: Christian Healing and Adaptations of Asian Religions.
History and Anthropology 16(3):377-391.
Film: White Shamans and Plastic Medicine Men
12 Mar. 28 Conclusion and Bell (Ch. 8)
Review
Essays Due
13 April 4 Overflow There are 13 weeks scheduled for this class rather than the usual 12.
This class will be used should one need to be rescheduled.

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ANTH 3510 - Assignment Guidelines

The major assignment for this course is an essay which will provide an anthropological analysis of a
ritual. It is divided into two parts: a topic proposal and the essay itself.

Topic Proposal (2-3 pages - 5% of final grade)

Due: Jan. 31

Describe a ritual that you propose to analyze for your essay. You can draw on both textual and/or
observational materials. You do not, at this point, need an argument or an essay outline all you need to
do is provide a detailed description.

As we will discuss in class, the definition of ritual activity can be quite broad, including but not limited
to: religious rituals, political rituals, healing rituals, initiation or transitional rituals (weddings, funerals,
etc.), and ethnic or group celebrations (graduations, festivals, etc.). The ritual you choose should be open
to description (ie. it cannot be secret) and provide ample material to analyze (ie. be longer than a few
minutes).

The description of the ritual should be accompanied by an annotated bibliography of at least three
scholarly sources (articles, chapters or books) which you will use in your analysis and are relevant to the
ritual or to your interpretation of it. This will require some preliminary research, and the bibliography
should go beyond the course readings and textbooks. For each source, provide a citation (check the
formatting guidelines on the course website) and a brief (3-4 sentence) description of the sources
content, the evidence it uses, and its relevance to your essay.

Sample Annotated Reference:

Fiskesj, Magnus
2003 The Thanksgiving Turkey Pardon, The Death of Teddy's Bear, and the Sovereign Exception of
Guantanamo. Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press.

In this book, Fiskesj presents an analysis of the annual presidential Thanksgiving Day turkey
pardon in the United States. He argues that, far from being an innocuous joke, the turkey pardon
is a ritual representation of the power of the U.S. president to decide life and death. Fiskesj
draws upon historical sources to illustrate the symbolic context surrounding turkey pardons and
also Teddy Roosevelts refusal to kill the teddy bear. I will use this article as a model for how
political rituals use ceremony to conceal real relations of power.

To find appropriate scholarly sources, there are several resources you can take advantage of in the
library:
The Anthropology Subject Guide on the library website (http://www.library.carleton.ca/subjects/
anthropology/index.html) has links to many useful resources
Several books have been placed on reserve at the library which may help begin your search
Browse the bibliography in the course textbook and search the library catalogue
Articles on ritual are prominently featured in The Journal of Ritual Studies and many of the
journals available through the American Anthropological Associations Anthrosource (www.
anthrosource.net)
Do not be afraid to ask for help. Visit the librarys Research Help desk if you have questions

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Essay (8-10 pages 30% of final grade)
Due: March 21

In this essay, you will provide an anthropological analysis of the ritual from your proposal. This essay
should draw upon knowledge and perspectives from the course, and may address questions such as:
what are the social and cultural functions of the ritual? How does the ritual reflect, oppose, subvert or
reproduce the values of the broader culture in which it is embedded? How do anthropological theories
allow us to understand the rituals meaning? What is the source of similarities and/or differences
between this ritual and comparative examples from other cultures or contexts? Successful essays will
demonstrate familiarity with the course themes and materials along with evidence of independent
research on the topic in providing an insightful and original analysis of the ritual.

At this point in your academic career, your writing should be maturing to the point where citation,
formatting and proper use of style are becoming second nature. If you do not feel comfortable writing in
an essay format at this point, bring any questions or concerns to me as soon as possible. The Bookstore
and Library also carry The Brief Penguin Handbook, a writing handbook that covers all of the skills and
information needed to write a successful essay. Pay attention to the Late Paper Policy and Note on
Preparation of Assignments in the course syllabus - essays which do not conform to these guidelines will
be penalized.

For information on formatting citations, refer to the Dept. of Soc/Anth Style Guide (www2.carleton.ca/
socanth/anthropology/undergraduate/style-guide/) or use one of the style guide tip sheets available in the
library (http://www.library.carleton.ca/howdoI/citing.html) - essays must consistently use one of these
citation styles to properly credit the use of sources. Many different forms of bibliographic software
currently exist (RefWorks, EndNote, Zotero) which can help you organize and format citations and
some of them are free to install and use. A few other quick thoughts:

I will not have your proposal with me when I read your essay make sure you are clear about
what happens during the ritual
Since this essay may be based on personal observation, it is acceptable to use I, me, my, etc.
The foundation of any essay is a clear thesis statement make sure that early in your essay you
state your argument
Remember that the types of sources should match their purposes scholarly books and articles
provide well-supported data and arguments, while newspapers, magazines and blogs can act as
first-person accounts
Always cite the original source citing a general textbook, newspaper account (studies show
that) or a class lecture is not research
Leave time to edit your essay. Read it aloud or have someone edit it for you this will help
catch relatively simple errors that can affect my ability to understand your writing

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Critical Film Review (3-4 pages 15% of final grade)
Due: Any time until the last class of the semester

The course syllabus includes four films that we will view during the semester:

Goddess and the Computer

An Initiation Kut for a Korean Shaman
Katargama
White Shamans and Plastic Medicine Men

While some of these are available in Carletons library collections, others have to be brought in from
other universities they may not be easily available for viewing outside of class.

A critical film review is an opportunity for you to respond to the questions raised by a film, and link it to
the themes and scholarly ideas discussed in the course. In other words, a critical film review is more
than a plot synopsis and judgment about the films quality (excellent or best film Ive ever seen) it
evaluates a film as an ethnographic and theoretical document.

Choose one of these films and write a short critical review of it. Your review should:
briefly summarize (at most two paragraphs) the main narrative of the film and its overall focus
or argument
explain the relevance of the film to topics and themes in the course how does the film illustrate,
support or challenge what we have talked about in the course (be sure to include clear citations to
texts or readings you discuss)
evaluate the films effectiveness and your own critical reaction to it how does the film succeed
and/or fail within the context of an anthropological view of ritual.

Refer to the Note on the Preparation of Assignments and Late Paper Policy in the syllabus. Critical Film
Reviews are due by the last class of the semester. Papers should conform to the conventions of scholarly
writing and provide citations for all sources and quotations, as well as a bibliography. If you do not yet
feel familiar with these academic practices, please consult one of the research librarians or come speak
to me.