SLFK 212 - RITUAL AND FAMILY LIFE
Spring 2004
Course description:
Is a baby fully human? When is a person a full member of society, with all appropriate privileges and responsibilities? What constitutes death and what happens to the human soul after the body has died? All cultures construct categories to make sense of a human life, to divide it into manageable units such as childhood, maturity and old age. At the same time, different cultures answer the questions of human existence in different ways. We will look at the Russian and Ukrainian understandings of the life of the human being and the position of humans in the cosmos. Russians and Ukrainians not only view the progress of a human life differently, they have ideas about the body and about the relationship between the sexes which differ markedly from our own, western ideas. Russian body beliefs and gender roles will be an important part of the course.
Course goals:
1) To explore the theoretical question of the necessity of categories and to examine the construction of categories.2) To learn about a culture that is different from our own. The cultures of Russia and Ukraine, especially in their rural, folk versions, are decidedly non-Western. Exploring these cultures teaches ways of thinking that are different, and thus fosters both sensitivity to cultural diversity and the ability to approach problems differently and in creative ways.
3) To practice data collection and analysis. Many students get no experience collecting their own data; they rely solely on published sources, the data collected by others. Yet, the ability to gather one's own material is vital. Folklore fieldwork provides an excellent opportunity for data gathering and analysis.
4) To develop the usual skills: critical thinking, oral and written presentation. I also like to foster work in digital humanities.
Course requirements: To get you to do this I will ask you to
1) Do the readings (see below)2) Attend lecture. Lectures will present data that is not in the readings. There has been a great deal of excellent folklore and ethnographic work done in Russia, Ukraine and other post-Soviet states, yet much of it has not been translated into English. I will use lectures to present materials that are not available elsewhere. Lectures will be supplemented by ethnographic photos and by videos. You will be responsible for all material presented in lecture.
3) Participate in surveys. In lecture, we will periodically conduct surveys to ascertain your attitudes toward American ritual.
4) Participate actively in discussion section. This will be your chance to discuss the readings and the material presented in lecture and to practice your oral skills.
5) Write a set of short response papers based on your readings and on a digital database.
6) Complete a collection project. You will either:
a) Participate in a life cycle ritual, document the ritual, and then analyze OR
b) Gather data about a life cycle ritual through interviews, present your data, and analyze it.
7) Take exams based on your work.
Reading List:
1. Olga Semyonova Tian-Shanskaia, Village Life in Late Tsarist Russia2. Mary T. Douglas, Purity and Danger
3. Roberta Reeder, ed., Russian Folk Lyrics
4. Christine Worobec, Peasant Russia, pp.3-75 and 118-221
5. Musya Glants and Joyce Toomre, Food in Russian History and Culture
Grade break-up:
Class participation, contributions to discussions in section - 20 % of gradeShort response papers - 15 %
Collection project - 35%
5-10 pages of discussion and analysis plus an appendix giving the ritual data collected, with full fieldwork documentation. Guidelines will be provided
Exams testing the materials presented in lecture and the readings:
Midterm exam - 10 %; exam date: March 4
Final exam - 20 %; exam date: May 1, 9AM
Second Writing Requirement:
This course does not automatically satisfy the Second Writing Requirement, but you may use it for that purpose, if you wish. To satisfy the Second Writing Requirement, you must write a research paper of at least 10 pages and submit it once in rough draft form (due March 25) and once in final form (due April 27). This paper will be IN ADDITION to the collection project; it will not be a substitute for the collection project or the short response papers. Rather, the paper will substitute for the final exam and will be worth as much as the final exam, or 20 % of your course grade. I will post a list of suggested topics no later than the middle of February.
Course Structure:
Unit one: Material culture, daily life and moresA human life takes place in cultural context. We will need to see how these people live, what they eat, what they consider valuable and proper, what they want for themselves and for their children.You will read Semyonova-Tianshanskaia's rather biased account and I will try to give you a more objective description. I will also ask you to do an exercise with my digital database.
Since ideas about the body are important to a culture's perception of what a person is and how his or her life develops, we will look at Russian and Ukrainian ideas about the body and compare and contrast to American body imagery.
Unit two: Order and disorder
We will begin with body ideas and the material culture examined in the previous unit and work on cultural constructs. What is order and disorder? What is "clean" and what is "dirty"? What is dangerous? As you might guess, you will be reading Douglas, Purity and Danger in conjunction with this unit. Again, the body is an important symbol and Douglas will guide us in seeing how understandings of the human body can mirror understandings of the social body and the body politic.Unit three: The rituals of marriage, birth, and death
I will go through Russian and Ukrainian wedding, baptism, and funeral customs. We will look at ideas about coming into this world and leaving it and the place of the human being in the cosmos. Gender roles are extremely important and Russian and Ukrainian ideas about relationships between the sexes, as reflected in wedding customs, are almost diametrically opposed to Western ideas. I will present a systematic survey of all life cycle ritual.You will have read something about life cycle rituals in Semyonova-Tianshanskaia. There is more material in Russian Folk Lyrics and you will read this book. Peasant Russia offers a different view of peasant family life and this will be part of your reading also.
We will also do some interpretive work, using Douglas' ideas about order and disorder.
After looking at Russian and Ukrainian life cycle rituals, we will discuss your data collection and get you ready for your projects. You will be working with American rituals or the rituals of ethnic groups in the United States. For your project, you will:
1) Make up a questionnaire or a plan of research (a description of how you will gather your data)2) Present a set of raw data
3) Present a preliminary analysis
4) Submit the final product: a research paper with the data in an appendix. You will also do either a real poster session or an abstract of your paper that is akin to a poster.
Unit four will be a summary using the Toomre and Glants book on food. Since we have dealt extensively with the body and since Slavic belief about the position of humans in the cosmos has a great deal to do with food, this will give us a chance to wrap up and summarize.
Unit five will be the collection project itself. I intend to stop lecturing somewhere around the middle of April, basically as soon as I have covered the data I need to present. At this point you will concentrate on your collection project. The project will be done in steps with each step scripted for you (see above). As you complete each step, you must see both the TA and me to present and discuss your work. These meetings are mandatory and are part of your project grade. We will then meet as a group during the last week of classes to sum up our work and to review.