Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice

Citation

Bell, C. (2009). Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice. Oxford University Press. (Originally published 1992; this edition adds a foreword by Diane Jonte-Pace.)

Chapter Summary

The book is a work of theory about theory. In the introduction Bell says she does not offer a comprehensive history of the term "ritual", a survey of the best-known ethnographic examples, or a revised theory of ritual. Her aim is to reassess "what we have been doing with the category of ritual", why scholars have ended up where they are, and how an approach might be formulated that can compare ritual with other forms of social action. The nine chapters are arranged in three parts that correspond to three stages of argument she describes in the introduction: a critical reading of how the category was built, a proposal for an alternative interpretation, and an application of that interpretation to classic issues. The contents list gives the chapter titles below.

Introduction

The introduction (pages 3–12 of this edition, including notes) explains why the notion of ritual is "overdue for an extended critical rethinking" after two decades in which ritual became an interdisciplinary topic of interest in its own right. It names Jack Goody's earlier doubts about ritual as a formal category, argues against simply discarding the term, and lays out the three-part plan. It also announces that the book reads theories selectively, at an abstract level, to find the "cracks, instabilities, and manipulated themes" through which the category was constructed.

Part I: The Practice of Ritual Theory

Chapters 1–3 carry out the first task, a critical theory of the category itself. Their titles are Constructing Ritual, Constructing Meaning and Constructing Discourse. According to the introduction, the argument of this part is that the theories of historians of religion, sociologists and anthropologists, for all their differences, work to resolve the problems posed by an initial split between thought and action, and that talk about ritual is organised as a coherent whole by that opposition. Bell also suggests that ritual emerged as a discrete object of study in a period when "reason" and scientific knowledge were defining a hegemony in Western intellectual life.

Part II: The Sense of Ritual

The second part proposes that so-called ritual activities be taken out of their isolated position as special, paradigmatic acts and returned to the context of social activity in general. Its chapters are Action and Practice, The Ritual Body and Ritual Traditions and Systems. The introduction says that attempts to see ritual as social praxis are analysed, as are the difficulties "practice theory" encounters in getting past the thought–action dichotomy. Bell then proposes "ritualization" as a strategic way of acting, rooted in the interplay of a socialised body and the environment it structures, and asks how this way of acting differentiates itself from other practices.

Part III: Ritual and Power

The third part applies the notion of ritualization to belief, ideology, legitimation and power, the long-standing concerns of ritual studies, in three chapters: Ritual Control, Ritual, Belief, and Ideology and The Power of Ritualization. The introduction describes its main argument: ritualization is a strategy for constructing a limited and limiting power relationship that involves both consent and resistance, rather than absolute control of one group by another.

Key Concepts

Introduction and Part I

• Ritual as a constructed category: the book treats "ritual" as an object built by scholarship, not as a given.
• Thought and action: the opposition on which, in Bell's account, theories of ritual are organised.
• Critical theory in three steps: deconstructing the problem's history, proposing an interpretation, and extending it to applications.

Part II

• Ritual as social activity: placing ritual back inside ordinary social practice.
• Practice theory: examined for the difficulties it meets in overcoming the thought–action split.
• Ritualization: a culturally strategic way of acting that differentiates itself from other activity and is linked to the socialised body.

Part III

• Belief, ideology and legitimation: the traditional issues revisited.
• Ritualization and power: a limited, negotiated relationship of consent and resistance.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• A stated, original aim. Bell's introduction separates her project from a history of the term or an ethnographic survey and sets out what she is doing, with the three-stage design visible in the contents, so a reader can tell what each part is for.
• Reflexive about its own method. She says she reads the literature "to discover the cracks, instabilities, and manipulated themes", quotes and paraphrases terms closely because the argument depends on how language is used, and acknowledges that the book is itself a piece of theoretical practice with its own "schemes, feints, and blind spots".
• Wide range of sources. The introduction frames the discussion across anthropology, sociology and the history of religions, and the epigraphs and notes draw on writers such as Geertz, Leach, Douglas and Lévi-Strauss.
• Lasting concepts. The Oxford description presents the book as a work that helped legitimise ritual studies as a field, and "ritualization" is the idea at the centre of its argument.

Limitations

• Abstract and theoretical. Bell says that her starting point is not an instance of ritual activity and that the book stays at a level of reflection more linked to theory than to ethnographic data. Readers wanting worked ethnographic analysis should look elsewhere.
• Not a survey. The author states that her reading is selective and "neither an objective nor a systematic review" of each contribution on its own merits; it should not be used as a neutral summary of ritual theory.
• Demanding for newcomers. The argument is conducted at a general level among the major theorists of ritual, so it assumes familiarity with them.
• Dated edition. This is a reissue of a 1992 text with a new foreword, not a revision, so it does not take account of later work.

Where It Fits in the Course

Bell's book belongs in the later part of the kinship, religion and ritual course, after an introduction and the classic accounts. The short introductions are Stephenson's Ritual: A Very Short Introduction, which surveys how ritual has been defined across anthropology, religious studies and performance studies, and Bielo's Anthropology of Religion: The Basics; the longer Stein et al. textbook adds ritual, symbolism, healing, magic and witchcraft in ethnographic context. Turner's The Ritual Process and Douglas's Purity and Danger are works by the kind of major theorist whom Bell's book examines (her notes cite both authors), so reading them first makes her argument concrete.

Bourdieu's Outline of a Theory of Practice, from the anthropological theory course, is a natural companion for Part II, since Bell's introduction says that part analyses practice theory and its difficulties.

How to Use This Book

It is written for advanced undergraduates and graduate students who already know the main theories of ritual from earlier reading. A practical order is: read the introduction closely, since it gives the whole plan; read Part I with the major theorists you already know in mind, testing the claim about thought and action against them; read Part II as the constructive core; and Part III last, when the concept of ritualization is secure.

Take notes on each theorist Bell discusses, keep a short list of the stages of her argument, and compare her account with at least one ethnographic description of a rite. Her own introduction acknowledges that the gap between theory and thick description lies beyond the book's scope, so the reader has to bring the ethnography.