Description: Ritual is one of the most discussed cultural practices, yet its treatment in anthropological terms has been seriously limited, characterized by a host of narrow conceptual distinctions. One major reason for this situation has been the prevalence of positivist anthropologies that have viewed and summarized ritual occasions first and foremost in terms of their declared and assumed functions. By contrast, this book, which has become a classic, investigates them as epistemological phenomena in their own right. The author aries that in comparing and understanding public events -- a domain which includes "ritual" and "the practice of practice" generally -- one must first comprehend the logics of their design. For it is these logics of organization which establish in large measure the significance of ritual in relation to the world within which it is created and practised.

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