Through the Apulian Streets: The Liminal Space-Time of the Holy Week’s Processions Cover Image

Through the Apulian Streets: The Liminal Space-Time of the Holy Week’s Processions
Through the Apulian Streets: The Liminal Space-Time of the Holy Week’s Processions

Author(s): Vito Carrassi
Subject(s): Customs / Folklore, Theology and Religion, Cultural Anthropology / Ethnology, Culture and social structure
Published by: Eesti Kirjandusmuuseum
Keywords: Apulia; chronotope; Holy Week; liminality; procession; religion; ritual year; space; street; time;

Summary/Abstract: My article, building on fieldwork carried out between 2013 and 2015, focuses on the importance, significance and specificity that the religious and devotional processions have in many Apulian sites. This is particularly clear for the Holy Week, whose rituality is generally characterized by a complex and manifold set of performances primarily taking place within and along the city/town streets. Referring to the Bakhtinian concept of chronotope, the street may be regarded as a liminal space-time where the inhabitants meet, confront each other and live day by day, giving rise to the everyday and common dimension of their existence. Yet, on given occasions (during the Holy Week, for instance), the streets can be turned into a sort of open stage, temporarily and exclusively dwelt with and managed by certain individuals and groups, first and foremost the laical confraternities. These people, through their performances, act as mediators between the common and the uncommon, the secular and the sacred, the worldly and the otherworldly; in so doing, they stage a ritual drama by which some sacred symbols (in particular the simulacra representing Christian figures and dogmas) leave their ordinary, static dimension (enclosed in the churches) to acquire an extraordinary, dynamic, and more engaging role. Nowadays, this is an essential means through which local communities seek both to preserve/strengthen their identity and to promote their cultural heritage.

  • Issue Year: 2020
  • Issue No: 78
  • Page Range: 173-196
  • Page Count: 24
  • Language: English