Rites Of Passage In Contemporary Africa

The articles which comprise this book where delivered initially at a conference held at the University of Zimbabwe, 21-24 June 1994, on the of the interaction between Christian religion and traditional African religions. This text demonstrates that the academic study of religion is not only responsive to developments in religious life, but is interested in actively exploring the symbolic structures expressed in Christian and traditional ritual activities. Academic understanding is shown to be interactive with the many factors which compromise meaning within human societies and religious communities.

Thinkers and activists from many orientations and traditions are now coming together to explore ways to reconstitute rites of passage as a form of community healing for our public and personal ills. Crossroads is a comprehensive collection of over fifty cutting-edge writings on diverse aspects of the transition to adulthood. "In no uncertain terms, Crossroads opens our eyes to our responsibility to the adolescents who are now growing up without sacred rituals and hence without knowledge of spiritual roots in their culture. Many of the writers have first-hand experience and first-rate ideas of how to transform this cultural crisis. Crossroads also challenges us to integrate our own inner adolescent. Piercing insight with realistic hope " -- Marlon Woodman The Ravaged Bridegroom

Bringing The Light Into A New Day provides a scaffolding to understand the purpose, function, structure, process and transformative power of the rites of passage process. Light is a metaphor for opportunity, hope and wisdom. Our light is our heritage, a dynamic interaction of the past and future to create new solutions for our present. If we do not bring this light into the new day, then we doom ourselves to be cast in the faint light of others’ interpretations of “our” capabilities. African-American families and communities must bring the light into the new day, so our children can see their unique genius. How to bring this light? African-centered Rites of Passage!

This book connects traditional religions to the thriving religious activity in Africa today.

In The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure, Victor Turner examines rituals of the Ndembu in Zambia and develops his now-famous concept of "Communitas." He characterizes it as an absolute inter-human relation beyond any form of structure.The Ritual Process has acquired the status of a small classic since these lectures were first published in 1969. Turner demonstrates how the analysis of ritual behavior and symbolism may be used as a key to understanding social structure and processes. He extends Van Gennep's notion of the "liminal phase" of rites of passage to a more general level, and applies it to gain understanding of a wide range of social phenomena. Once thought to be the "vestigial" organs of social conservatism, rituals are now seen as arenas in which social change may emerge and be absorbed into social practice.As Roger Abrahams writes in his foreword to the revised edition: "Turner argued from specific field data. His special eloquence resided in his ability to lay open a sub-Saharan African system of belief and practice in terms that took the reader beyond the exotic features of the group among whom he carried out his fieldwork, translating his experience into the terms of contemporary Western perceptions. Reflecting Turner's range of intellectual interests, the book emerged as exceptional and eccentric in many ways: yet it achieved its place within the intellectual world because it so successfully synthesized continental theory with the practices of ethnographic reports."

Van Gennep was the first observer of human behaviour to note that the ritual ceremonies that accompany the landmarks of human life differ only in detail from one culture to another, and that they are in essence universal. Originally published in English in 1960. This edition reprints the paperback edition of 1977.