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Religion Dispatches compares Bonaroo to Burning Man: Like revivals and camp meetings from the nineteenth century forward, the festivals allow participants to suspend their everyday lives to engage in something that is both theatrical and ecstatic. Events like Burning Man, an eight-day annual event in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada, have attracted particular scholarly attention for the way that they allow participants to create impromptu communities, to be arbiters of their own rules, and to create thick meaning for themselves through social interaction.While I'm happy to see this included in the breadth of RD's subject matter, the Bonaroo pieces are disappointingly simplistic. 'Golly, contemporary festivals have many ritualistic elements and spiritual entailments.' Then again, that's more or less the premise of my own work, though I would hope that the length & depth of my examination renders it a bit more nuanced. Maybe one of these days I'll pitch an article bearing my own (ahem) "particular scholarly attention" to Religion Dispatches. For their part, Burning Man organizers tried to bring a bit of the playa spirit to Bonnaroo this year. In other news, Pastafarians celebrated summer solstice by processing an icon of their believed deity through the streets of Seattle. A couple folks have recently blogged a bit about a new 'ethnography' on Second Life. (maybe I don’t actually have to ‘play’ the damn thing-- I can be an armchair anthropologist in the virtual wilderness.) And Dan Terdiman isn't going to Graceland. Tags: burning man, festival cultures, ritual, virtual worlds
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Get religion points me to a piece in the Washington Times ( of all places) on religion at Burning Man. Some interesting individual anecdotes, not a whole lot of depth or insight, though she does uncover some somewhat atypical perspectives (for this context, at least). I seem to remember a call for subjects going out on the Jackrabbit earlier this summer, so am glad to bump into its fruition. It's interesting that she starts off with a Muslim's narrative--an attempt to reverse the reader's presumptions? or merely to entice with the exotic, or unexpected? It's not surprising that the individual she profiles could find no other Muslim's to practice with--out of the vast cornucopia of religious syncretism and symbolic appropriation that is Burning Man, Islam was the one tradition I never found represented or reimagined on the playa (that is, in a participatory way, rather than as an aspect of some artistic commentary on recent political events). I also recall bumping into this thread on Islam on the eplaya, which I believe must be the one mentioned in the article. What the author fails to note is how nasty the burners on the eplaya (and tribe) can be in general, not just about this topic, and further how nasty some burner's attitudes about religion generally are, not just Islam. (I'm also happy to see a piece on this year's event that doesn't mention the early ignition & the alleged arsonist. refreshing...)Tags: burning man
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Looked at as an ethical problem, an online acquaintance put it pretty clearly. In trying to explain Burning Man, and in particular this year's incident, to her four year old, she said it's like when you make something out of blocks & then sometimes you decide you want to knock it down, just for fun. But this time, someone knocked over someone elses blocks without permission. The four year old then responded--that's not playing nice, is he in time out now? So ethically, even a four year old knows better than to destroy someone else's art. However, from another perspective, the Man is more than one person's--or even several people's art. It is a public icon and a private fetish that belongs to all Burners, who through the doctrine of participation are expressly and collectively invited experience it as their own and to imbue it with their own personal meanings. The act of burning it outside its sanctioned ritual sacrifice was in fact a powerful statement--as evinced by the controversy, conversations, and widespread media coverage the act received. Many people feel that this act served to restore some of the event's cacophonous prankster spirit, and also served as a kind of symbolic reclamation of the Man from the increasingly routinized bureaucracy of "the Borg." It can be construed as an act of ritual criticism--as those who applaud this act see the arsonist as speaking/acting for a sentiment they share. But this ritual transgression also served to shift the focus from the collective to the individual, as one man is reaping a great deal of attention for his "alleged" act of ritual arson, at least out here in the default world. On the playa, the organizers, for their part, appear to be reshifting the perspective back to the community by reconstructing the Man in full view of the community at the Man's central, still standing, base. And from yet another perspective, I can't view this separately from my personal acquaintance with the "alleged" perp. My personal opinion of him is pretty low and has been for a long time. I've found him to be driven by ego, machismo, and prone to bouts of manic aggression. No thanks. (with all due respect to any beloved friends who remain close to him and whom might be reading here, I know in particular he's been a huge support to Amacker following her near fatal accident...) Also, his statement as posted on laughingsquid (upate #18) is typically arrogant: "We could give a fuck less what you all think of us for doing this. Most of you are newbies who have been drawn in by the semi-religious nature of the event, or maybe just the easy drugs and easier sex. You have nothing to offer the event other than your fucking money and obedience. You spend the rest of your lives in mortal fear of everything that insurance companies tell you to fear, and pretend that you’re free and clear because you spend four days at a desert bacchanal where spinelessness is not only encouraged but genetically replicated for implementation in successive generations. In short, you are the swine of which Thompson spoke. Get over yourselves."As if someone who attended the event 3 times--and hadn't been there since 98--can even begin to accurately characterize the motivation and experience of the tens of thousands who have participated since he decided he was too cool for school. And as if the event wasn't always semi-religious to begin with. And he doesn't care what we think, but he's here to tell us what he thinks we should think. I also find it sad that--in terms of media coverage at least--the ritual arson has eclipsed the Green Man theme and environmental artistry, at least for now. At least Paul's act didn't appear to damage the works of art in the Pavilion (so far as I've been able to gather from afar), but it does sound like the structure was off limits for a couple days at least. Which is a shame, because a lot of people put a lot of time energy & soul into that space. On a personal note, I'll admit that while I remain fascinated by the event and am having a ball watching it from a distance this year, I really don't miss being there. Oh sure, I do miss hanging out with my pals in the BLD, especially Juke (though, praises be, not his pork--he dropped some off for us in a freezer bag, complete with a jar of his raspberry chiplote bbq sauce, a few weeks ago when he swung through town. joy!) But it's being quite fun- and yet another perspective on the whole thing--to watch it all go down via the internet (not to mention the daily fun of hanging out with Spencer!) So tonight, we dine on pork and watch the webcast of the burn. Tags: burning man, ritual
Current Mood: not dusty
Current Music: the norman bates memorial soundtrack show on kfjc
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