Original scientific paper
Pilgrimage as cultural technique of ecstasy. Flow-experiences on the way to Mariazell
Barbara Sieferle
; Institute for European Ethnology, Department of History and European Ethnology, University of Innsbruck
Abstract
The starting point for this article is the observation that contemporary society is characterized by the search for ecstatic experience. Although ecstatic experience is often associated or even equated with religious experience, I argue that it only becomes religious if it is given a transcendental meaning which refers to an alternative reality. My argumentation is based on an empirical example: contemporary pilgrimages on foot to the Catholic pilgrimage site Mariazell in Austria. I will give an ethnographic account of ecstatic experiences on pilgrimages and identify one special form of ecstatic experience many pilgrims have on their way to Mariazell: the so-called flow experience. I argue that pilgrimages on foot can be considered as cultural techniques of ecstasy which generate flow experiences and that their interpretation (as religious or not religious) depends mainly on what according to the sociologist Pierre Bourdieu is called ‘habitus’.
Keywords
cultural technique; ecstasy; ecstatic culture; flow; habitus; Mariazell; pilgrimage; sport; transcendence
Hrčak ID:
134461
URI
Publication date:
8.2.2015.
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