Embodying the Gods: The Re-enactment of Myth in a Scottish Pagan Festival.
Storytelling is an important element of Pagan rituals because it allows the participants to reconnect, bodily, emotionally and spirituality, with past and present. In this presentation, I draw on ethnographic data collected during the Samhuinn Festival taking place on 31st October in Edinburgh. This event marks the changing of seasons, gathers thousands of people, and brings ancient Celtic stories alive with a modern twist. The festival revolves around the staging and re-enactment of the epic battle between two characters, the Summer and Winter Kings. Both are accompanied by their respective crews of otherworldly creatures inspired in local folklore: fairies, beasties, and morrigans, among others. The re-enactment of this myth becomes a multi-sensory experience for both the participants and the audience, highlighting the role of storytelling in the elaboration of individual and collective spiritual experiences.
Yael Dansac is a Marie Curie Research Fellow at CIERL, Université Libre de Bruxelles. She holds a PhD in Social Anthropology and Ethnology by the EHESS Paris. She studies ritual creativity and ritual design in alternative spiritual practices held at megalithic sites. She co-edited the book Relating with More-than-Humans. Interbeing Rituality in a Living World (Springer, 2022).
online, 17 May 2024