Tag: rites of passage

Consuming Ritual

19 August 2023
bodyfilmfuneral, commemorationgender, sexualitygesture, posturepassageperformance, play, entertainmentrites of passage
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  Sacred Rites and Rituals, a forty-five minute film produced by FilmRoos for A&E’s Ancient Mysteries Series helped shape public attitudes toward ritual. These attitudes are now echoed by other media presentations of ritual. I was one of the scholarly consultants for the film and know the process that lies behind the production. I kept…

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Celebrating Aging

22 February 2023
aging, childhood, adolescencerites of passage
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    Mary Jacobs   After her mother passed away, Jeanette Leardi invited female friends to her home for a special gathering. It wasn’t exactly a memorial service; many attendees never knew her mother. Instead, it was a healing ritual for Leardi. The group lit candles, played music and took turns reading favorite poems or…

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My Book, My Self

16 October 2021
aging, childhood, adolescencebooksfamilyliteraturephotographyweddings
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  At fifty I wrote Marrying & Burying, a memoir. Today, twenty-eight years later, in the middle of a pandemic, I have time for a backward glance. Or a forward glance. Who can say? I’m scrubbing my hands routinely and building a coffin in the basement, hoping to ward off death. Writing a memoir is…

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Ritual4Return

1 October 2019
rites of passage
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From a letter written by Kevin Bott, founder of Rites4Return: “As I dug into the literature, and then into the literature on rites of passage — from van Gennep to Eliade to Turner to… well… you — I knew that I possessed, in both practical skill and spiritual/emotional calling, the tools to create something real….

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