The Interpretation of Symbolism in Wan Female Initiation
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2509974 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Philip L Ravenhill (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1978 |
| Volume | 48 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 66-79 |
| Publication date | 1978-01-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Africa (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0001-9720 • E-ISSN: 1750-0184 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/1158711 |
| OpenAlex | W2048922463 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 9 |
The ProblemAnthropological analyses of cultural symbolism have often benefitted fron the commentary of gifted informants who have provided ethnographers with detailed symbolic exegeses of the rites and ceremonies of their societies. Ethnographers have usually signalled with enthusiasm such received help and offered profound thanks to their philosophically reflective friends, but at the same time few, if any, ethnographers have indicated a willingness to restrict their data to those offered by such exegetes. In part this reticence is perhaps due to the fact that reliance upon the knowledge or philosophical reflexions of ritual or religious virtuosi raises the question of a possible disparity between the explicit 'theological' or cosmological knowledge controlled by certain experts and the implicit working knowledge of practical religion as understood by the majority of its practitioners (cf. Leach 1968). Thus there arises the problem of the subject matter of investigation: should anthropological analyses of symbolism be directed toward explicit specialized knowledge or implicit common knowledge? Furthermore, is articulated knowledge part of the solution of symbolic analysis or is it more properly part of the data (Sperber 1975:x, passim
Enthusiasm · Epistemology · Ethnography · Interpretation (philosophy · Linguistics · Psychoanalysis · Sociology · Subject (documents · The Symbolic · Theology · Anthropology · Central European Literary Studies · Computer Science · Culinary Culture and Tourism · Historical Geopolitical and Social Dynamics · Philosophy · Psychology
| Highly cited | No |
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