Material Culture Perspective Research Articles

Cultural Blending in Korean Death Rites: New Interpretive Approaches (review)

Reviewed by: Cultural Blending in Korean Death Rites: New Interpretive Approaches Andrew Eungi Kim Cultural Blending in Korean Death Rites: New Interpretive Approaches, by Chang-Won Park, London: Continuum, 2010, xiii + 227p. In Cultural Blending in Korean Death Rites, Chang-Won Park analyzes the cultural blending of Confucian and Christian traditions in death rites in Korea, utilizing the concept of the “total social phenomenon” as an overarching interpretive framework of his study. The main idea of the concept is that social phenomena are inter-connected and that each social phenomenon should be understood as a totality. Applied to death rites in Korea, the concept implies that all the features of each death rite are deeply inter-connected with other death rites and make up a whole. Park begins by noting that death ritual in South Korea entails three distinct rites: two traditionally held rites, funerals and ancestral rituals, as well as one recently emerged ritual of bible-copying. For ritual at death, Park examines two key changes in recent funerary practice in Korea, namely the increasing popularity of cremation and the rise of the hospital funeral hall as the most preferred venue for funerals. For ritual after death, Park discusses ancestral ritual as not only a death ritual but also a cultural practice emphasizing filial piety and family loyalty. He also observes that a third form of death rite has recently emerged among elderly Korean Christians, namely bible-copying, which involves making hand-written copies of the entire bible. These Christians, in preparation for death, invest extensive time and effort into completing the copying of the bible in order to leave behind something meaningful for their children. Combining the insights of theological, historical, sociological and anthropological approaches, the author thus provides historical and contemporary accounts of the three death rites in Korea: ritual before death (bible-copying), ritual at death (funerary rites), and ritual after death (ancestral ritual). Each of these three death rites is examined from the perspectives of embodiment (cultural meanings attributed to material things or social phenomena), exchange (exchange of gifts, material or symbolic) and material culture. For example, the practice of bible-copying is seen as an embodiment of both Confucian and Christian spiritualities, i.e. Confucian dedication to self-cultivation through learning and Christian piousness toward the Word of God. From the perspective of exchange, the practice of copying the bible represents what is [End Page 221] called an “inalienable gift” or “non-exchangeable” gift. Once the copying of the bible is completed, old people give a hand-copied bible to one of their children. In doing so, they do not want something equivalent in return; rather, they want the bible to be cherished by their descendent(s). The hand-copied bible thereby becomes “an ‘inalienable thing’ which serves as an ‘anchorage in time,’ relating children to both their ancestors and God” (p. 51). Giving of condolence money to the bereaved family is also a manifestation of exchange. The perspective of material culture assumes that the examination of the material aspect of death rites, e.g. mourning garments, a photo of the deceased, ritual food, ancestral tablets, etc. provides insights into not only the rituals themselves but also human minds and social relations. In discussing these rites, the author focuses on the complex interplay of Confucianism and Christianity, since the latter has established itself as the largest religion in Korea with about 14 million members, representing nearly 30 percent of the total population of 49 million. The interplay between the two religious traditions itself is very interesting, since Korea is considered the most Confucianized society in East Asia. Surveys have consistently shown that Koreans are more Confucianized than their Chinese and Japanese counterparts in subscribing to Confucian values such as filial piety and loyalty and in observing the basic Confucian rituals such as burial rites and ancestor worship. In this staunchly Confucian context, Christianity has succeeded in becoming a dominant religion, a remarkable feat given the fact that it has failed to garner a significant following in the neighbouring countries with similar cultural traditions. In this distinctive religious landscape, a complex interplay of Confucianism and Christianity has continued: although Christianity is the largest religion, Confucianism...

Dutch Influence on British Architecture in the Late-Stuart Period, c. 1660–c. 1714

Few would question the notion that architectural links between Britain and the Dutch Republic grew strong during the seventeenth century, culminating with an unusual stylistic congruity achieved during the reign of William and Mary. What surprises is how difficult it is to establish the exact nature of this relationship and the relative benefit each country derived from it. This paper, which approaches the subject from a material culture perspective, takes as its theme the 'building world' shared by the two societies. Exchanges between the British and the Dutch in the broader architectural milieu during the seventeenth century formed a continuum, spanning the full range of activities, from technology transfer and trade in building materials to material culture, landscape and urban design. And the links were not restricted to the upper levels of society either; trades people too played an active role in this relationship — a factor which in Britain helped to sustain a classicizing vernacular that formed the bedrock upon which an independent British classical tradition would subsequently be built.

Connectedness and Worthiness for the Embedded Self: A Material Culture Perspective

This article is based on a study of intergenerational transfers of contaminated objects, colloquially referred to as “heirlooms.” Motivations and processes are described within the central dialectic of an individual actor seeking positive affect through the pursuit of connectedness and worthiness and in the context of the larger social order. Object symbolism is examined from the perspectives of the individual actor, society, and culture. The family is conceptualized as a special case of the “other.” A theoretical framework is developed that draws extensively on Walter Goldschmidt’s notion of “The Culturally Embedded Self” in The Human Career: The Self in a Symbolic World (1990) and on Sidney Levy’s work as presented in Brands, Consumers, Symbols, and Research (1999). This framework is referred to with the acronym MOSES for Motivations, Object Symbolism, and the Embedded Self.

Consumo como cultura material

Este artigo pretende considerar as conseqüências de se enxergar o consumo através das lentes dos estudos de cultura material contemporâneos. O artigo inicia reconhecendo as razões pelas quais o consumo é freqüentemente visto como a destruição da cultura material e portanto intrinsicamente maligno. Em seguida explora as várias abordagens disciplinares ao consumo, tal como da história e sociologia, antes de se concentrar na antropologia e em diversas perspectivas regionais. Ele então explora abordagens mais específicas oriundas dos estudos de cultura material, primeiro teoricamente, e em seguida substantivamente, em termos de quatro gêneros: a casa, vestuário, a mídia e o carro. Dois interesses mais amplos seguem, o da análise da cadeia de commodities e da relação geral entre pessoas e coisas. O artigo conclui que, ao invés de promover o materialismo, uma perspectiva de cultura material enfatiza o quanto o consumo pode ser usado para entender a nossa humanidade.

Material Culture and Embodied Action: Sociological Notes on the Examination of Musical Instruments in Jazz Improvisation

This paper argues that the examination of technologies and their social contexts, which form the basis of the material culture perspective, can be strengthened through an increased awareness of the intersubjective and embodied features of social action. With reference to the ways in which jazz musicians improvise with instruments through embodied praxological skills ( Sudnow, 1978 ) and intersubjective art world knowledge ( Becker, 1982 ), the paper demonstrates the empirical value of these basic sociological concepts. It shows that the ‘affordances’ of usage ( Gibson, 1979 ) that result from social actors' application of objects through orientation to normative procedure become visible through an understanding of embodied habituated social practice, and it is exactly such affordances that constitute the contextual relevance of materiality for social action.

The ‘Casser Maison’ Ritual

This paper addresses the relationship between mobility, ageing and death in an urban housing market from a material culture perspective. It examines a divestment ritual performed by elderly people in Montreal (Canada) on the occasion of a move from a home on their own to a care environment. This move which is often a move into a smaller place and a smaller set of things is also accompanied by the compulsion for the people to divest themselves of some of their belongings, a process that is called ‘ casser maison’, literally ‘breaking the house’. This ethnographic paper reveals that ‘ casser maison’ is not only a matter of getting separated from some, if not most, of one’s possessions, however. It is also a matter of placing those possessions among the kin or other potential recipients. In this respect, ‘ casser maison’ pertains to a ritualized form of construction of the self through the emptying of the place. It proceeds from the wish to ancestralize oneself; the capacity to place one’s possessions is taken to guarantee the survival of the subject and of his or her memory. As such, this paper demonstrates that, through the use of personal belongings, the divestment of the self becomes a form of investment.