Essay Rituals - 605 Words

Rituals There are rituals that we practice year after year, but forget where they came from. Sometimes we continue to practice these rituals even after we have lost the meaning of why they are practiced. In the story The Lottery by Shirley Jackson, the practice of a yearly ritual changes the lives of all the people who participate. Jacksons story reveals a horrific ritual in which one person is sacrificed by being stoned to death in order to have a better crop season. Jackson uses symbolic objects to represent the villagers closed-minded beliefs and their acceptance of rituals. The controlling symbol in the story is a black wooden box. The box symbolizes death, and it holds the fate of one person within it. Even though, the†¦show more content†¦Again, color is used symbolically in the usage of a blank or black spotted piece of paper. As Mr. Graves opened the slip of paper and there was a general sigh through the crowd as he held it up and everyone could see that it was blank (79) the sight of the blank piece of paper not only meant relief but life. The feeling of anxiety swept the crowd as they saw who possessed the piece of paper that marked death. Tessie had drawn the piece of paper with a black spot on it, the black spot Mr. Summers had made the night before with the heavy pencil her husband forced the slip of paper out of her hand (79). The mark was felt heavily on her soul for she knew the outcome of having drawn the black spot. The stones in the story were used symbolically to represent a cold, hard heart. Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones (79). This contrasts what we have read in the bible that only he who had no sins should cast the first stone. Tessie was an innocent bystander to a brutal ritual. While some people such as Mrs. Delacroix selected a stone so large she had to pick it up with both hands others selected a few pebbles(79). Perhaps with the passing of age, one feels that the larger the stone the greater the benefit. However, innocence is seen when the children made a great pile of stones in one corner of the square they selected theShow MoreRelatedRites Of Passage And Ritual1116 Words   |  5 Pages Attending a kind of subcultural initiation ritual, known as a gig, in this case comprised of local Wellington musicians is reminiscent of Turner’s discussion of rituals and Rites of passage. This particular r itual form certainly encourages belonging, uniformity that appears to be a universal attribute of group rituals. 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