Totem armor and sacrifire10/27/2022 ![]() ![]() Myth transforms disordered violence into ordered violence that engenders the group. This retrospective creation- sacrifice story is the totem myth. Through a system of group-forming rituals, a myth of blood sacrifice organizes the meaning of violent events after the fact. ![]() Myth and violence fuse in blood sacrifice. If myth without violence has no power, as Zhirinovsky proposes, violence without myth has no order. “They don’t understand that you have to pay with blood for this process,” 1 Opposing the division of Russia into republics, Zhirinovsky complained that the countries created by these new flags were abstract symbols only. The point was made by Vladimir Zhirinovsky, whose challenge to Boris Yeltsin in Russia’s first parliamentary elections caught the attention of the West. The power of a flag must be sacrificially established. Still, raising a piece of cloth and calling it a flag will not declare territory and form groups, at least not territory that will be respected, or groups that will endure and fight to produce borders. The flag is the sign and agent of the nation formed in blood sacrifice. It is a ritual in the most profound sense, for it creates the nation from the flesh of its citizens. Blood sacrifice links the citizen to the nation. This label has meaning only in reference to the group that defines it, the nation. The flag symbolizes the sacrificed body of the citizen. ![]() The totem myth: sacrifice and transformationĬhapter 4 (complete): “The totem myth: sacrifice and transformation.” Blood Sacrifice and the Nation: Totem Rituals and the American Flag. Using an anthropological theory, this groundbreaking book presents and explains the ritual sacrifices and regeneration that constitute American nationalism, the factors making particular elections or wars successful or unsuccessful rituals, and the role of the mass media in the process.Ĭarolyn Marvin is Professor at the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania. The authors argue that American patriotism is a civil religion organized around a sacred flag, whose followers engage in periodic blood sacrifice of their own children to unify the group. For information on purchasing through Amazon, click here. Blood Sacrifice and the Nation is available at a special discount rate. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |