Ritual and the Enemy Body: A New Approach to Modern Atrocity

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ID: 288736
2025
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Abstract
The concept of ritual has been all too loosely applied to violence and atrocity with assumptions of repetitiveness, mythic symbolism, and religious overtones. This paper examines a selection of modern cases of atrocity for specific ritual elements: attention to body and spaces as frames for meaning; a prescripted mode of action; and performative enaction of a new millennial or transgressive order. Focal cases include American lynching (nineteenth–twentieth centuries) and militia atrocities in Sierra Leone and Liberia (1990s), while examples of gendered atrocity in ritualized forms (perpetrated by Bosnian Serbs and the Islamic State) are broached in the conclusion. Ritualization is not typical to modern atrocities but allows perpetrating groups to experience meaningfulness in the violent acts they assemble, often in situations of crisis.
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persistent_1761421519_68fd28cf601ee Use this key to autocite in the manuscript while using SciMatic Manuscript Manager or Thesis Manager
Authors David Frankfurter
Journal ADVANCES IN ARCHAEOLOGICAL PRACTICE
Year 2025
DOI
10.1017/S0010417525000076
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