Neither Here Nor There:
A Rites of Passage Site on the
Eastern Fringes of the Mauna Kea
Adze Quarry, Hawai'i
Neither Here Nor There:
A Rites of Passage Site on the
Eastern Fringes of the Mauna Kea
Adze Quarry, Hawai'i
Date
1999-06-01
Authors
McCoy, Patrick C.
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Volume
7
Number/Issue
1
Starting Page
11
Ending Page
38
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Abstract
The archaeological study of religion and ritual, "denounced by the brave and
avoided by the sensible," (Grme 1981:218, quoted in Garwood et al 1991:v), is
clearly one of the most neglected and, thus, underdeveloped areas of archaeological
theory and practice. l The reasons for this are not hard to find. Chief among
them is the vexed issue of how ritual is to be defined. Most archaeologists would
probably agree with John Barrett in doubting that "a satisfactory definition could
ever operate cross-culturally and at a resolution sufficient for detailed empirical
study" (Barrett 1991: 1). Catherine Bell has suggested that we in fact abandon the
concept of ritual as a natural category of human practice with a single set of defining
features and think instead in terms of "ritualization," defined by her as "a way
of acting that is designed and orchestrated to distinguish and privilege what is
being done in comparison to other, more quotidian, activities" (Bell 1992:74).
Bell's concept, which should appeal to archaeologists because it is set forth in a
framework of practical activity, is employed in the analysis and interpretation of a
site (50-10-23-16204) situated on the eastern fringes of the Mauna Kea Adze
Quarry (Fig. 1), some one-half km from the nearest source of tool-quality raw
material in a flow located on the eastern side of the Humuula Trail (Fig. 2). The
evidence suggests that this ambiguously located site, situated outside the quarry
proper but still a part of it because of the activities that took place there, was the
locus of initiation rites for apprentice adze makers who, because they were "transitional
beings," were outside the normal social structure and, thus, "neither here,
nor there" (Turner 1967:97).
Description
Keywords
Mauna Kea,
Adze Quarry,
ritualization,
deities,
shrines,
artifacts
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24 pages
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