Gender Distinctions in Monteros Mortuary Ritual

Abstract

The recent literature on religious ritual, however varied and complex, seems to fall into two major camps: one emphasizing a state of liminality or reversal, a temporary suspension of the behavioral norms and expectations that guide daily existence; and the other illustrating a consonance betsveen ritual representations and the cultural symbols that dominate everyday life. In this paper I present a situation in which the second type of interpretation would seem, at least on the surface, to apply. Mortuary rituals in southeastern Spain appear, from what we might call a Geertzian perspective, to have operated both as models of and models for prevailing male and female roles (Geertz I 966; Ortner I 97 8). Traditionally, and until the middle I970S, not only did key gender symbols receive condensed, exaggerated expression in mortuary ceremonies, but also ceremonial participants were constrained in the performance of ritual duties by their adherence to gender-exclusive rules. Similarly, ceremonial change in southeastern Spain has proceeded apace with social change. In the period when gender distinctions were most socially pronounced they were an essential feature of mortuary rites; as these distinctions have become muted in everyday life, so too are they gradually disappearing in ritual. An overview of mortuary ceremonies in this part of the world, then, would lead us to conclude either that ritual change mirrors fundamental social change or that it anticipates social change by providing the progressive segments of society an outlet for patterns that will later become more widespread. In this paper I intend to demonstrate why this conclusion, despite its appealing simplicity, is deceptive. By examining several types of mortuary ritual specifically funerals and All Saints' Day-I wish to show the inadequacy of tracing modifications in male and female ceremonial behavior simply to changes in everyday gender norms and expectations.