1. Hugging the Saint: Improvising Ritual on the Pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela

Abstract

[ This chapter brings together ritual theory and the cultural studies of pilgrimage in a mutually illuminating conjunction, with examples drawn from Santiago de Compostela. Author's broad thesis is that current definitions of ritual privilege the repetitive, formulaic, and even abstract nature of ritual response, whereas he would highlight ritual's materiality and plasticity—its tendency to variably appropriate concrete ritual objects depending on context and user. The gesture of hugging the saint is now controlled by the cathedral authorities, but in earlier centuries the action was less codified. Interaction with the saint's statue might take place within a ritual framework, but that the gestures were open to manipulation by the individual user, who often appears to be improvising. At Santiago, this improvisation with the statue can be seen as a popular response to the difficulty of accessing the body of the saint between the twelfth and the nineteenth centuries. Keywords:cultural studies; hugging the saint; improvising ritual; pilgrimage; saint's statue; Santiago de Compostela , This chapter brings together ritual theory and the cultural studies of pilgrimage in a mutually illuminating conjunction, with examples drawn from Santiago de Compostela. Author's broad thesis is that current definitions of ritual privilege the repetitive, formulaic, and even abstract nature of ritual response, whereas he would highlight ritual's materiality and plasticity—its tendency to variably appropriate concrete ritual objects depending on context and user. The gesture of #034;hugging the saint#034; is now controlled by the cathedral authorities, but in earlier centuries the action was less codified. Interaction with the saint's statue might take place within a ritual framework, but that the gestures were open to manipulation by the individual user, who often appears to be improvising. At Santiago, this improvisation with the statue can be seen as a popular response to the difficulty of accessing the body of the saint between the twelfth and the nineteenth centuries. Keywords:cultural studies; hugging the saint; improvising ritual; pilgrimage; saint's statue; Santiago de Compostela ]