SLFK 214, March 25, 2004
Martin Prechtel versus Bogatyrev
Bogatyrev - has to be relevant to the here and now
Have meaning here and now
Survivals - practices that used to have meaning, but have no meaning now - just don't exist
Things may LOOK LIKE old practices
People may have no idea what a practice is - they do it because "that is how it is done" (unmotivated magical act)
But, still, this act will have meaning
American meaning tends to be money - display of wealth
Prechtel - cultures close to the soil share certain beliefs, imagery
And he is right
Mayans and Slavs have nothing in common
No WAY one culture could influence the other
Yet similar ideas about house
About body in the cosmos
He claims this is natural imagery, available to all people should they get in touch with the earth
And in a sense this fits things like Jungian theory and some anthropological theory like Mary Douglas
Body is what you know and body will provide the imagery for all sorts of things
Nature is the environment, and it too will provide basic imagery, imagery to which people respond emotionally and powerfully
In favor of Prechtel - the football as fall ritual
The stuff about Santa as a vegetation fertility deity
The repeated use of fire and water symbolism in the yearly cycle
Fireworks, lights in US
Slavs - repeated elements of
Sacrifice
Communication with the dead, return of the dead
Does this have to do with matriarchy ideas and sacrifice to the land? Maybe
Does this have to do with the ancestor cult and the idea that the soil transforms the body, taking away the flesh in one year and creating an ancestor? Maybe
Ancestor ideas may have a great deal to do with place being seen as alive
Do the Bogatyrev argument - sacrifice ideas are very meaningful to the Slavs now
What I told them about sacrifice to the Motherland and WWII
Ancestor cult important now - Minyonoks of Soviet era and how it encourages connection to the dead
They saw girls capture and "sacrifice" a boy in the Spring video
Recall the other sacrifices in the material they saw
Didukh that is used at Christmas
Epiphany
The effigy used by the grannies singing erotic songs
Ivan Kupalo "sacrifices"
Winter - the various people dressed up, including as death
One who is dressed up as a sacrificial lamb of sorts falls down and plays dead
Christmas mock plays which are essentially a backwards funeral
Women play the roles of the clergy
Something which, under normal circumstances is very much a no-no
Not even allowed past iconstatis to clean, though expected to clean rest of church
The deceased is someone (young man) pretending to be dead
After funny funeral with lots of double entendre and erotic content
"deceased" jumps up and announces he is not dead/resurrected
Is this idea that it is necessary to give something back to the land that feeds and sustains us?
Or is it communitas idea - being one with the land
The way at holidays people tend to have union of animal and vegetable
Living and dead
People and plants - the effigy
And recall Slavic death and funeral beliefs
Real fear of premature death - you might become unquiet dead
Be caught between the land of the living and the land of the dead
Fire and water deaths are special
These especially put you in a position betwixt and between
It is not just a question of premature death; it is a question of the body
Recall ancestor beliefs and idea that body decays in one year
Becomes one with the soil and the ancestors when the flesh is gone
No longer a specific individual
With fire - body obliterated
Nothing to buried
Sometimes seen as good
Supposedly Old Believers, when they committed suicide, would do it this way
(though they recall about the stolpniki)
Fire death - congregation gathers in church and this is set afire
If earth obliterates body and this is good, then fire destroys body gives earth a helping hand
But can also be seen as very bad - no body to bury and person will be unquiet dead
Water - bad if body is not recovered
Also, water is a gateway of sorts
You go through water to the land of the dead
Sadko
Water as gateway to the underworld/other world in folktales
The soul of Koshchei the deathless is hidden there
Role of children in all ritual
They are liminars, close to the ancestors
Rest of spring video - the bird cookies
Do these people think that they are helping "bring" spring?
Hard to say. People will say this, but not fully believe
What they do get out of all of the yearly cycle rituals which is very important to them is chance for young people to meet and pair up.
There are lots of little spring festivals
The analog of Ground Hog Day
Then the biggest deal is preparation of Lent and Easter
Preparation for Lent is Maslenitsa
Meat fare week
Then milk fare week = Maslenitsa
But this is a lovely holiday, foodwise
Fish products, including caviar if you can afford it
Crepes called bliny
Used for fortune-telling
Carnival atmosphere - boys fight
Then the 40 days of Lent
Starts with Sunday rather than Ash Wednesday and ends up being 42
Next big event is the great fast of Lent
Not a whole lot happens during Lent, in fact many things are prohibited
What you do during Lent is spelled out for you
No meat and no dairy for 40 days
You eat legumes
This is not Western Lent when you give up something that you like
Palm Sunday or Pussywillow Sunday - one week before Easter
The striking with the pussywillows
Boy/girl contests
Why is the pussywillow chosen
What is done with it after
Kept above icons
Used for good health and for fertility - to have babies
Right before Easter, Maundy Thursday
This is the day before Christ died
House must be clean
This is the Easter of the dead
Seeing dead on this day - attractions and dangers
Other things that must be ready are the Easter eggs
The kulichi or paskhi and the syrnaia paskha
Symbolism of beginning and end - seed and fruit
Other fertility symbolism, whether people are aware of this or not:
The paskha and the eggs
Friday is the Crucifixion
Church draped in black
The ploshchanitsa
Saturday - complete fast and blessing of the foods with which the fast will be broken
Church service is at midnight
Thrice around the church
Service until dawn and then go home and break fast
Egg contests
Gifts of eggs and/or paskha to all
Visiting of relatives
Easter, in the Orthodox church is the biggest Church holiday
Probably Christmas is the biggest folk event
After Easter ANOTHER commemoration of the dead
This is supposed to happen on Tuesday, but most people, because of the demands of a modern work schedule, shift to the following Sunday, or Doubting Thomas Sunday
Christ comes back from the dead and proves to Thomas that he is indeed Christ
Folk holiday is that the dead, all dead, the ancestors rather than any specific deceased, come back
You visit them, bring food for them and for yourself to eat with them
Recall the graveyards again with the family plots
Benches in the plots for random visits with you ancestors
Picnic tables and benches for holiday visits as on
Provody - the event right after Easter
Ascension
Notice that the interaction with the dead is through food
If the special ancestors (red death variety) are supposed to take care of food for the living
Then way to interact with all ancestors is through food
Food is vehicle of social interaction and solidarity
Society of the living is one of mutual nurturance
You help neighbors on each other's plots
Society of the dead is of mutual nurturance
Except for bad dead who feed on the living as ghouls
All transitions - interactions across boundaries, whether of time or of space is through food
Greeting stranger
Going to visit the dead
Luchak's Easter video