The Phallus, the Phallicism and the Phallic Cults in the Modern Sicily

The article studies the ideas about the human body in one of the most culturally conservative regions of Europe – Sicily; the focus is on the image of the phallus in the local culture and worldview. Basing on the ethnographic material collected in 2017–2020 and data from various sources, the author analyzes the current state of widespread phallic symbols, primarily in the folk environment, as well as behavioral norms, habits, customs associated with the phallus, many of which date back to the oldest, mainly ancient Greek phallic cults, which got a rebirth in the depths of the folk carnival culture of the Middle Ages. The wide prevalence of phallic themes and connotations in verbal language (exclamations, invectives, subcultural vocabulary, for example, gastronomic), in non-verbal means of communication (facial expressions, kinesics), iconography, artifacts, traditions, in everyday life is analyzed. The author comes to the conclusion that one can talk about the presence of a kind of phallicism in Sicily – an extremely important and widespread set of ideas, rituals and customs in local society, which flourishes despite the ethical norms of Catholicism. The bodily, corporeal representations and practices of Sicily, and primarily in the popular environment, are marked by the spirit of phallocentricity (Jacques Derrida’s term), patriarchy and gender dominance of men, and the phallus as a “sex sign” is surrounded by priority attention here

Aesthetics · Archaeology · Art · Eroticism · Ethnography · Human sexuality · Iconography · Literature · Phallic stage · Psychoanalysis · Sociology · Anthropology · Gender Studies · History · Language, Communication, and Linguistic Studies · Psychology