The role, in this context, of every day rituals, such as the momentary experience of pilgrimage that comes from my morning walk in the park, remains less clear. It would probably be useful, I suppose, to consider aspects of de Certeau’s arguments in his The Practice of Everyday Life that distinguishes between strategy and tactics, but, if I recall de Certeau correctly he suggests that tactics include every day practice that seeks to complicate and appropriate efforts of the state to structure practices whether through design or such structured encounters as ritual. More importantly, does this suspension of the rules of everyday life open up the potential to experience space in new and significant ways. I’m less concerned here with the experiences of stones, trees, animals, or house foundations and more interested in considering whether our relationship to these things changes as a result of the suspension of at least some of the rules of every day life. My thinking is that the concept of radical equality experienced through communitas could extend beyond the limits of human community and considered as a way to understand a transformed relationship with our physical environment. I think my use of the term would benefit from re-reading Edith Turner’s book Communitas: The Anthropology of Collective Joy (2011). In Victor Turner’s work this term refers to the experience of social equality that occurs during pilgrimage or other kinds of ritual life. As a way to kick start this process, I’m going to offer some random thoughts here that maybe will find their way into my paper.įirst, I’ve been thinking a bit more about my somewhat lazy use of the concept of communitas. The more that I’ve mulled this paper over, I can’t help think that it will benefit from some revision. I proposed a paper that considered my every day pilgrimage through a local park which has led me to unpack this break from my everyday life along spatial and temporal lines. This year, the conference is dedicated to pilgrimage and movement with all the complexities that these words entail. Yesterday, I posted a draft of a paper that I’m planning to give (well, “to post”) at the annual CHAT conference. Western Argolid Archaeological Project (103).Pyla-Koutsopetria Archaeological Project (104).Archaeology of the Contemporary World (161).Search for: Follow me on Twitter My Tweets Categories The Digital Press at the University of North Dakota.3D Modeling in Mediterranean Archaeology.

Ashlar stone pattern