Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-g7gxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-02T21:57:44.918Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Rethinking Tradition: From Ontological Reality to Assigned Temporal Meaning

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 September 2011

Hizky Shoham*
Affiliation:
Tel-Aviv University and the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem [[email protected]].
Get access

Abstract

The article seeks to revitalize the concept of tradition and re-claim its usefulness for contemporary sociological thought and research. Instead of ontological entity, tradition is defined here as an assigned temporal meaning, i.e., a symbolic activity in which various social groups attribute traditional qualities to certain sectors of life that are understood as binding together different times. The article analyzes two incompatible approaches with which tradition was hitherto conceptualized in sociology: (1) tradition as the anti-modern, and (2) tradition as synonymous with “culture.” The analysis introduces a few middle-ground options that support the theory of tradition as assigned meaning.

Résumé

L’article entend redonner vie au concept de tradition en sociologie et montrer son utilité pour la recherche aujourd’hui. Il met en évidence les insuffisances des deux interprétations usuelles : tradition comme refus de la modernité et tradition rendue synonyme de culture. Il propose de voir dans l’appel à tradition une activité symbolique par laquelle des groupes sociaux divers attribuent des caractères « traditionnels » à certains aspects de la vie sociale regardés comme assurant un lien inter-temporel.

Zusammenfassung

Dieser Aufsatz setzt sich zum Ziel der Tradition in der Soziologie einen neuen Aufschwung zu geben und ihre Bedeutung für die heutige Forschung zu verdeutlichen. Er hebt die Unzulänglichkeiten zweier gängiger Interpretationsschemen hervor: Tradition als Verweigerung der Moderne und Tradition als Synonym für Kultur. Er schlägt vor, den Aufruf an die Tradition als symbolischen Akt zu begreifen, dem verschiedene soziale Gruppen traditionelle Werte im sozialen Miteinander beimessen, die als intertemporales Bindeglied fungieren

Type
Research Articles
Copyright
Copyright © A.E.S. 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Acton, Harry B., 1952-1953. “Tradition and Some Other Forms of Order”, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, New Series, 53, pp. 1-28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arendt, Hannah, [1954] 1977. Between Past and Future: Eight Exercises in Political Thought (New York, Penguin Books).Google Scholar
Arjomand, Said A. 2010. “Three Generations of Comparative Sociologies”, European Journal of Sociology, 51(3), pp. 363-399.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beck, Ulrich, 1994. “The Reinvention of Politics: Towards a Theory of Reflexive Modernization”, in Beck, Ulrich, Giddens, Anthony and Lash, Scott, Reflexive Modernization: Politics, Tradition and Aesthetics in the Modern Social Order (Cambridge, Polity Press, pp. 1-55).Google Scholar
Becker, Jane S., 1998. Selling Tradition: Appalachia and the Construction of an American Folk, 1930-1940, (Chapel Hill, The University of North Carolina Press).Google Scholar
Ben-Amos, Dan, 1984. “The Seven Strands of Tradition: Varieties in its Meaning in American Folklore Studies”, Journal of Folklore Research 21 (2-3), pp. 97-131.Google Scholar
Bendix, Regina, 1997. In Search of Authenticity: The Formation of Folklore Studies (Madison, University of Wisconsin Press).Google Scholar
Bendix, Reinhard, 1967. “Tradition and Modernity Reconsidered”, Comparative Studies in Society and History 9 (3), pp. 292-346.Google Scholar
Benjamin, Walter, 1969. Illuminations, trans. Zohn, Harry (London, Jonathan Cape).Google Scholar
Boyer, Pascal, 1990. Tradition as Truth and Communication: A Cognitive Description of Traditional Discourse (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brubaker, Rogers, 1996. Nationalism Reframed: Nationhood and the National Question in the New Europe (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burke, Edmund, 2003. Reflections on the Revolution in France, in Turner, Frank M., ed. (New Haven, Yale University Press).Google Scholar
Burke, Peter, 1987. Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe (London, Temple Smith).Google Scholar
Calhoun, Craig, ed., 1994. Social Theory and the Politics of Identity (Cambridge, Blackwell).Google Scholar
Cannadine, David, 2001. Ornamentalism: How the British saw their Empire (New York, Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Cantile, Audrey, 1979. “The Concept of Tradition”, in Moore, Robin J., ed., Tradition and Politics in South Asia, (New Delhi, Vikas, pp. 1-16).Google Scholar
Devji, Faisal, 2007. “Apologetic Modernity”, Modern Intellectual History, 4 (1), pp. 61-76.Google Scholar
Dorson, Richard M., 1976. Folklore and Fakelore: Essays Toward A Discipline of Folk Studies (Cambridge, Harvard University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Douglas, Mary, 1982. In the Active Voice (London, Routledge & Paul Kegan).Google Scholar
Dundes, Alan and Pagter, Carl R., 1975. Urban Folklore from the Paperwork Empire (Austin, University of Texas Press).Google Scholar
Durkheim, Émile, 1933. The Division of Labor in Society, translated by Simpson, George (New York, Free Press).Google Scholar
Durkheim, Émile, 1980. “Preface to L’Année Sociologique, 1898”, Emile Durkheim: Contributions to L’Année Sociologique, Yash, Nandan, ed. (New York, Free).Google Scholar
Durkheim, Émile, [1912] 2001. The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, translated by Cosman, Carol (New York, Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Eisenstadt, Shmuel N. 1972. “Post-Traditional Societies and the Continuity and Reconstruction of Tradition”, Daedalus 102 (1), pp. 1-27.Google Scholar
Eisenstadt, Shmuel N, 1983. Tradition, Change and Modernity (New York, John Wiley).Google Scholar
Eisenstadt, Shmuel N, 1986. The Origins and Diversity of Axial Age Civilizations (Albany, Suny).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eisenstadt, Shmuel N, 2000. “Multiple Modernities”, Daedalus, 129 (1), pp. 1-29.Google Scholar
Eisenstadt, Shmuel N, 2001. “The Civilizational Dimension of Modernity: Modernity as a Distinct Civilization”, International Sociology, 16 (3), pp. 320-340.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fabian, Johannes, 1983. Time and the Other: How Anthropology Makes its Object. (New York, Columbia University Press).Google Scholar
Feldman, Steven P., 2006. “Moral Memory: Why and How Moral Companies Manage Tradition”, Journal of Business Ethics, 72, pp. 395-409.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Forest, Thomas E., 1993. “Disaster Anniversary: A Social Reconstruction of Time”, Sociological Inquiry, 63 (4), pp. 444-456.Google Scholar
Freud, Sigmund, 1939. Moses and Monotheism, translated by Jones, Katherine (New York, Vintage).Google Scholar
Gadamer, Hans-George, [1959] 2002. Truth and Method (second edition), translated by Weinsheimer, J. and Marshal, D. G. (New York, Continuum).Google Scholar
Geertz, Clifford, 1973. Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays (New York, Basic Books).Google Scholar
Giddens, Anthony, 1991. The Consequences of Modernity (Stanford, Stanford University Press).Google Scholar
Giddens, Anthony, 1994. “Living in a Post-Traditional Society”, in Beck, Ulrich, Giddens, Anthony and Lash, Scott, Reflexive Modernization: Politics, Tradition and Aesthetics in the Modern Social Order (Cambridge, Polity Press, pp. 56-109).Google Scholar
Graham, William H., 1993. “Traditionalism in Islam: An Essay on Interpretation”, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 23 (3), pp. 495-522.Google Scholar
Halbwachs, Maurice, 1992. On Collective Memory, translated by Coser, Lewis A. (Chicago, The University of Chicago Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hall, Stuart, 1990. “Cultural Identity and Diaspora”, in Rutherford, Jonathan, ed., Identity: Community, Culture, Difference (London, Lawrence & Wishart, pp. 222-237).Google Scholar
Handler, Richard, 1988. Nationalism and the Politics of Culture in Quebec (Madison, The University of Wisconsin Press).Google Scholar
Handler, Richard and Linnekin, Jocelyn, 1984. “Tradition, Genuine or Spurious”, Journal of American Folklore, 97, pp. 273-290.Google Scholar
Hann, Chris, 2007. “The Anthropology of Christianity per se”, European Journal of Sociology 48 (3), pp. 383-410.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heelas, Paul, Lash, Scott and Morris, Paul, eds., 1996. Detraditionalization (Cambridge, Blackwell).Google Scholar
Heidegger, Martin, 1996. Being and Time, translated by Stambaugh, John, (New York, State University Press).Google Scholar
Herzfeld, Michael, 1982. Ours Once More: Folklore, Ideology, and the Making of Modern Greek (Austin, University of Texas Press).Google Scholar
Hobsbawm, Eric J. and Ranger, Terence, eds., 1983. The Invention of Tradition (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press).Google Scholar
Hofer, Tamas, 1984. “The Perception of Tradition in European Ethnology”, Journal of Folklore Research, 21 (2-3), pp. 133-147.Google Scholar
Honko, Lauri and Laaksonen, Pekka, eds., 1983. “Trends in Nordic Tradition research”, Studia Fennica 27.Google Scholar
Huntington, Samuel P. 1996. The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (New York, Simon & Schuster).Google Scholar
Jacobs, Struan, 2007. “Edward Shils’ Theory of Tradition”, Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 37 (2), pp. 139-162).Google Scholar
Johnston, William M., 1991. Celebrations: The Cult of Anniversaries in Europe and the United States Today (New Brunswick, Transaction Publishers).Google Scholar
Kaviraj, S. 2005. “An Outline of a Revisionist Theory of Modernity”, European Journal of Sociology, 46 (3), pp. 497-526.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koselleck, Reinhart, 2002. The Practice of Conceptual History: Timing History, Spacing Concepts, translated by Presner, Todd Samuel (Stanford, Stanford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuhn, Thomas S., 1962. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago, University of Chicago Press).Google Scholar
Linnekin, Jocelyn S., 1983. “Defining Tradition: Variations on the Hawaiian Identity”, American Ethnologist, 10 (2), pp. 241-252.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Linnekin, Jocelyn S, 1991. “Cultural Invention and the Dilemma of Authenticity”, American Anthropologist, 93, pp. 446-449.Google Scholar
Lowenthal, David, 1985. The Past is Foreign Country (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press).Google Scholar
Macintyre, Alasdair, 1984. After Virtue: A Study in a Moral Theory (Notre Dame, Notre Dame University Press).Google Scholar
Mosse, George L., 1975. The Nationalization of the Masses: Political Symbolism and the Mass Movements in Germany from the Napoleonic Wars Through the Third Reich (New York, Howard Fertig).Google Scholar
Muir, Edward, 1981. Civic Ritual in Renaissance Venice (Princeton, Princeton University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nora, Pierre, ed., 1997. Realms of Memory, Volume II: Tradition, translated by Goldhammer, Arthur (New York, Columbia University Press).Google Scholar
Nyiri, Kristof J., 1992. Tradition and Individuality: Essays (Dordrecht, Kluwer).Google Scholar
Nyiri, Kristof J, 1995. “Introduction: Towards a Theory of Traditions”, in Nyiri, Kristof J., ed., Tradition: Proceedings of an International Research Workshop at IFK (Wien, Internationales Forschungszentrum Kulturwissenschaften, pp. 7-32).Google Scholar
Oakeshott, Michael, 1962. Rationalism in Politics and Other Essays (New York, Basic Books).Google Scholar
Olick, Jeffrey K., ed., 2003. States of Memory: Continuities, Conflicts, and Transformations in National Retrospection (Durham, Duke University Press).Google Scholar
Olick, Jeffrey K., Vinitzky-Seroussi, Vered and Levy, Daniel, eds., 2011. The Collective Memory Reader (New York, Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Ozouf, Mona, 1988. Festivals and the French Revolution, translated by Sheridan, Alan (Cambridge, Harvard University Press).Google Scholar
Paredes, Americo and Stekert, Ellen J., 1971. The Urban Experience and Folk Tradition (Austin, University of Texas Press).Google Scholar
Pecora, Vincent P., ed., 2001. Nations and Identities: Classic Readings (Oxford, Blackwell).Google Scholar
Peel, John D.Y., 1989. “The Cultural Work of Yoruba Ethnogenesis”, in Tonkin, Elizabeth, McDonald, Maryon and Chapman, Malcolm, eds., History and Ethnicity. (London/New York, Routledge).Google Scholar
Pleck, Elizabeth H., 2000. Celebrating the Family: Ethnicity, Consumer Culture, and Family Rituals (Cambridge, Harvard University Press).Google Scholar
Pocock, John G.A., 1968. “Time, Institutions and Action: An Essay on Traditions and Their Understanding”, in King, Preston, ed., Politics and Experience: Essays Presented to Professor Michael Oakeshott on the Occasion of His Retirement (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, pp. 209-237).Google Scholar
Polanyi, Michael, 1958. Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy (London, Routledge & Kegan Paul).Google Scholar
Popper, Karl, 1963. Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge (London, Routledge & Kegan Paul).Google Scholar
Povinelli, Elizabeth A., 1999. “Settler Modernity and the Quest for an Indigenous Tradition”, Public Culture, 11 (1), pp. 19-24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Redfield, Robert, 1953. The Primitive World and its Transformations, (Ithaca, Cornell University Press).Google Scholar
Redfield, Robert, 1960. Peasant Society and Culture (London, The University of Chicago).Google Scholar
Redfield, Robert and Singer, Milton, 1969. “The Cultural Role of Cities” in Sennett, Richard ed., Classic Essay,s on the Culture of Cities (New York, Meredith, pp. 206-232).Google Scholar
Ricoeur, Paul, 1970. Freud and Philosophy: an Essay on Interpretation, translated by Savage, D. (New Haven, Yale University Press).Google Scholar
Rudolph, Lloyd I. and Rudolph, Susanne H., 1967. The Modernity of Tradition: Political Development in India (Chicago, Chicago University Press).Google Scholar
Sagi, Avi, 2008. Tradition vs. Traditionalism: Contemporary Perspectives in Jewish Thought, translated by Stein, Batya (Amsterdam/New York, Rodopi).Google Scholar
Scott, James, 1998. Seeing Like a State (New Haven, Yale University Press).Google Scholar
Shils, Edward, 1958. “Tradition and Liberty: Antinomy and Interdependence”, Ethics, 68 (3), pp. 153-165.Google Scholar
Shils, Edward, 1981. Tradition (Chicago, The University of Chicago Press).Google Scholar
Shoham, Hizky, 2009. “Well … We did Some Tradition’: Invented Tradition and the Problem of the Past in the New Hebrew Culture”, Reshit 1, pp. 305-324[Hebrew].Google Scholar
Shoham, Hizky, forthcoming. “Tel-Aviv’s Foundation Myth: A Constructive Perspective”, Tel-Aviv, the First Century: Visions, Designs, Actualities, in Maoz, Azaryahu and Troen, S. Ilan (Indiana University Press)Google Scholar
Singer, Milton. 1972. When a Great Tradition Modernizes: An Anthropological Approach to Indian Civilization (New York/Washington/London, Praeger Publishers).Google Scholar
Smith, Anthony D., 1971. Theories of Nationalism (London, Duckworth).Google Scholar
Smith, Anthony D, 1991. “The Nation: Invented, Imagined, Reconstructed”, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 20 (3), pp. 353-368.Google Scholar
Smith, Anthony D, 1998. Nationalism and Modernism: A Critical Survey of Recent Theories of Nations and Nationalism (London/New-York, Routledge).Google Scholar
Smith, Anthony D, 2000. The Nation in History: Historiographical Debates about Ethnicity and Nationalism (Hanover, University Press of New England).Google Scholar
Smith, Jonathan M., 2007. “Time-Binding Communication: Transmission and Decadence of Tradition”, Ethics, Place and Environment, 10 (1), pp. 107-119.Google Scholar
Smith, Wilfred C., 1962. The Meaning and End of Religion (New York, Fortress).Google Scholar
Spillman, Lyn, 1997. Nation and Commemoration: Creating National Identities in the United States and Australia (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, Charles, 1999. “Two Theories of Modernity”, Public Culture, 11 (1), pp. 153-174.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thrupp, Sylvia, 1963. “Tradition and Development: A Choice of Views”, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 6 (1), pp. 84-92.Google Scholar
Turner, Stephen, 1991. “Social Constructionism and Social Theory”, Sociological Theory 9 (1), pp. 22-33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weber, Max, 1948. From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, translated and edited by Gerth, H. H. and Mills, C. Wright (London, Routledge and Kegan Paul).Google Scholar
Weber, Max, 1963. The Sociology of Religion, Translated by Fischoff, Ephraim (London, Methuen).Google Scholar
Weber, Max, 1964. The Theory of Social and Economic Organization, translated by Henderson, A.M. and Parsons, Talcott (London, Free Press).Google Scholar
Wertheimer, Jack, ed., 1992. The Uses of Tradition: Jewish Continuity in the Modern Era (New York/Cambridge, Jewish Theological Seminary/Harvard University Press).Google Scholar
Wilson, William A., 1976. Folklore and Nationalism in Modern Finland (Bloomington, University of Indiana Press).Google Scholar
Wittroc, Bjorn, 2000. “Modernity: One, None, or Many? European Origins and Modernity as a Global Condition”, Daedalus 129 (1), pp. : 31-60.Google Scholar
Wolf, Kurt H., ed, 1971. From Karl Mannheim (New York, Oxford University).Google Scholar
Young, Michael, 1988. The Metronomic Society: Natural Rhythms and Human Timetables (Cambridge, Harvard University Press).Google Scholar
Zerubavel, Eviatar, 2003. Time Maps: Collective Memory and the Social Shape of the Past (Chicago, University of Chicago).Google Scholar