Approaching Medieval Sacrality

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. A. Hall
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Art History ◽  
Social Behaviour ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Everyday Lives ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Holistic Interpretation

Creating, inviting, and repurposing sacrality was a fundamental quest of social behaviour in the medieval period. From the major shrines of cathedrals down to the portable sanctity of amulets, the pursuit of sacredness affected the everyday lives of Christian believers, helping to fashion memories and create heirlooms. Drawing on history, art history, anthropology, and folklore under the broad umbrella of material culture, this contribution takes a socially informed and trans-disciplinary approach to archaeology and seeks a holistic interpretation of the medieval past, one that does not neglect the intangible. This contribution seeks to underline the value of recent, new perspectives in this area and to broaden their application. Three overlapping themes are considered: relics, places, and mobility.

Contemporary Images of Hindu Bhakti: Identity and Visuality

2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 129-141
Author(s):  
Amy-Ruth Holt ◽  
Karen Pechilis
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Art History ◽  
Communal Identity ◽  
History Writing ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Visual Cultures ◽  
Religion And Art ◽  
Distinguishing Features ◽  
Geographical Locations

Abstract Historians writing on modernity often remark on the power of the visual, appealing to Walter Benjamin's influential observation that ‘modernity under late capitalism is dominated, and haunted, by dream-images and commodified visual fetishes’ (Benjamin 1968; Levin 1993, p.23; Ramaswamy 2003, p.xiii). Yet, studies of bhakti commonly focus on the literature and biographies of the bhakti saints instead of its visual dimensions in art, material culture, and performance. In this special issue, scholars of religion and art history writing on diverse visual cultures, communities, and geographical locations under the umbrella of the contemporary era reveal two distinguishing features of bhakti. The first is bhakti's impetus to establish the artist's, devotee's, or saint's individual and communal identity that resituates today's religion. The second is bhakti's formation of emotive imagery with visual agency animated by participatory desires that inspire the creation and re-creation of imagery and performances that speak directly to the everyday. Identity and visuality, found together in contemporary bhakti imagery, shape our distinctive analysis and redirect Benjamin's original statement from postcolonial nation-building towards the vitality of devotional participation.

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Hopkins
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
Short Note ◽  
Current Situation ◽  
Research Projects ◽  
Everyday Lives ◽  
Early Settlement ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Initial Research

The chapters in this collection explore the everyday lives, experiences, practices and attitudes of Muslims in Scotland. In order to set the context for these chapters, in this introduction I explore the early settlement of Muslims in Scotland and discuss some of the initial research projects that charted the settlement of Asians and Pakistanis in Scotland’s main cities. I then discuss the current situation for Muslims in Scotland through data from the 2011 Scottish Census. Following a short note about the significance of the Scottish context, in the final section, the main themes and issues that have been explored in research about Muslims in Scotland.

Goods and States: The Political Logic of State-Socialist Material Culture

2009 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 426-459 ◽  
Author(s):  
Krisztina Fehérváry
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Democratic Governance ◽  
Soviet Bloc ◽  
The Political ◽  
State Socialism ◽  
Iron Curtain ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Widespread Phenomenon ◽  
The City ◽  
State Socialist

In the two decades since the fall of state socialism, the widespread phenomenon ofnostalgiein the former Soviet satellites has made clear that the everyday life of state socialism, contrary to stereotype, was experienced and is remembered in color. Nonetheless, popular accounts continue to depict the Soviet bloc as gray and colorless. As Paul Manning (2007) has argued, color becomes a powerful tool for legitimating not only capitalism, but democratic governance as well. An American journalist, for example, recently reflected on her own experience in the region over a number of decades:It's hard to communicate how colorless and shockingly gray it was behind the Iron Curtain … the only color was the red of Communist banners. Stores had nothing to sell. There wasn't enough food… . Lines formed whenever something, anything, was for sale. The fatigue of daily life was all over their faces. Now… fur-clad women confidently stride across the winter ice in stiletto heels. Stores have sales… upscale cafés cater to cosmopolitan clients, and magazine stands, once so strictly controlled, rival those in the West. … Life before was so drab. Now the city seems loaded with possibilities (Freeman 2008).

scholarly journals “This one Grandma knew, too, exactly this one!” Processes of Canonization in Children’s Music

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ingeborg Lunde Vestad ◽  
Petter Dyndahl
Keyword(s):  
Day Care ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Care Staff ◽  
Best Interest ◽  
Children's Music ◽  
Everyday Lives ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Care Facilities ◽  
Different Levels ◽  
Musical Activities

Processes of musical canonization occur at different levels of culture and society. People have a strong propensity to categorize, differentiate, and evaluate the music that is important to them, and music is ascribed value in action by people in real-life settings. Based in these premises, the article discusses two questions: First, how does the idea of a canon of children’s music influence the daily musical activities and repertoires used in children’s day care facilities and family homes? Second, in what ways is music legitimized in the everyday lives of children? Our data is collected by observation and interviews conducted in two pedagogical day care facilities and nine family homes. Children, day care staff and parents participated in the study. We find that a discussion of canonization in children’s music along the following four paths of legitimation is meaningful: the “good, old stuff,” the need for renewal, the inclusion of other types of music other than that aimed at a child audience, and the need for a wide array of genres and sentiments. Finally, we argue that although the legitimation and canonization in children’s music obviously involve considerations of musical aspects, separating these canonization processes from the prevailing socio-cultural ideas of childhood and children’s best interest is impossible.  

scholarly journals Serialised Novels in the Polish Emigré Press in the USA, 1881–1918

2022 ◽  
Vol 124 ◽  
pp. 207-238
Author(s):  
Elżbieta Nowosielska
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
United States Of America ◽  
The United States ◽  
Editorial Boards ◽  
Everyday Lives ◽  
Financial Difficulties ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
The Usa ◽  
Historical Themes

This article discusses serialised novels published before 1918 in the Polish émigré press in the United States of America. These works were a popular feature of dailies and weeklies, but the periodicals’ regular financial difficulties meant that it was books published several years or indeed several decades earlier in Europe which were most often serialised. Consequently, most of the works that appeared in the periodicals failed to reflect contemporary literary trends while also overlooking subjects relevant to the everyday lives of Poles abroad. Still, the prevailing patriotic and historical themes complemented the values that many editorial boards subscribed to.

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