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RITES OF PASSAGE
(обряды изменения гражданского состояния)
THE DEFAULT-RELIGION RULE (религия по умолчанию)
The Englishmen is probably the least religious people on Earth. Most of them are not christened nowadays, and only about half get married in church, but almost all of us have a Christian funeral of some sort.
In any case, the Church of England is the least religious church on Earth. Someone said that the Church of England is so constituted that its members can really believe anything at all, but of course almost none of them do.
It is hard to find anyone who takes the Church of England seriously even among its own ranks. I
THE BENIGN-INDIFFERENCE RULE (благодушное безразличие)
They are not a nation of explicit, unequivocal atheists. Nor are we agnostics. Both of these imply a degree of interest in whether or not there is a deity enough either to reject or question the notion. Most English people are just not much bothered about it.
In opinion polls, about 60 per cent of the population answer yes when asked if they believe in God.
They have no actual objection to God. God is all very well, in His place, which is the church. When they are in His house at weddings and funerals they make all the right polite noises, as one does in peoples houses, although they find the earnestness of it all faintly ridiculous and a bit uncomfortable.
There is nothing the English hate more than a fuss.
HATCHINGS, MATCHINGS AND DISPATCHINGS («рождения, свадьбы и смерти»)
The term rites de passage was coined in 1908 by the anthropologist Arnold van Gennep, who defined them as rites which accompany every change of place, state, social position and age.
Ambivalence Rules (правила двойственного отношения)
The problem is that there are occasions at which private family matters (pair-bonding, bereavement, transition to adulthood) become public. On top of all that, one is expected to express a bit of emotion. Not much, admittedly: the English do not go in for extravagant weeping and wailing at funerals, frenzied joy at weddings, or excessively gooey sentimentality at christenings; but even the minimal, token display of feeling that is customary at English rites of passage can be an ordeal for many of them.
The passage from one social state to another is a difficult business, and it is no accident that such events, in most cultures, almost invariably involve the consumption of significant quantities of alcohol.
At the same time they find these ceremonies acutely embarrassing and uncomfortable. The rituals involved in private weddings, funerals and other passages are just formal enough to make them feel stiff and resentful, but also informal enough to expose our social dis-ease.
Hatching Rules and Initiation Rites (рождение детей и обряды посвящения)
Only around a quarter of the English have their babies christened. The birth of a child is a positive event, certainly, but the English do not make nearly as much of a big social fuss about it as most other cultures. The proud new father may buy a few rounds of drinks for his mates in the pub. The child is not even the subject of conversation for very long: once the father has been subjected to a bit of good-natured ribbing, and a brief moaning ritual about the curtailment of freedom, sleepless nights.
The grandparents, other close relatives and the mothers female friends may take more of a genuine interest in the infant. Christenings tend to be relatively small and quiet affairs; and even at christenings, the baby is only the focus of attention for a very brief period.
It is just that as a culture we do not seem to value children as highly as other cultures do. It is often said that the English care more about their animals than their children.
Kid-talk and the One-downmanship Rules (правила ведения разговора о детях)
English parents are as proud of their children as parents in any other culture, but you would never know this from the way they talk about them. The modesty rules not only forbid boasting about ones offspring, but specifically prescribe mock-denigration of them. Even the proudest and most doting of English parents must roll their eyes, sigh heavily, and moan to each other about how noisy, tiresome, lazy, hopeless and impossible their children are.
The rules of the one-downmanship game also include a strict injunction against ever criticizing the other persons child. You must be carefully phrased to avoid causing offence. A deliberately vague Oh, I know or a bit of empathetic tutting and rueful head-shaking are the only truly safe responses, and should be immediately followed by a one-down grumble about your own childrens failings.
None of this is as calculated or deliberately hypocritical as it might sound. Most English parents obey the one-downmanship rules automatically, without thinking.
The Invisible-puberty Rule (переходный возраст, которого якобы не существует)
The vast majority of English children have no official rite of passage to mark their transition to adolescence.
The eighteenth-birthday celebration, marks their transition to adulthood. Eighteen is the age at which the English are officially entitled to vote, get married without parental consent, have homosexual sex, watch X-rated films and, most importantly for many, buy alcoholic drinks.
The Gap-Year Ordeal (свободный год: перерыв в учебе)
Among the educated classes, the eighteenth-birthday rites are now often followed by the Gap Year, a passage between school and university involving a more prolonged liminal period, in which it is customary for young people to spend some months travelling abroad, often incorporating some kind of charity work and generally seeing the Real World and having meaningful, character-building Experiences.
Gap-Year initiates of all classes are expected to come back from their Experience transformed into mature, socially aware, reliable adults, ready to take on the enormous challenge and responsibility of living in a university hall
Student Rites
Freshers Week Rules (неделя первокурсника)
Another important rite of passage is known as Freshers Week. The initiates are first separated from their families.
They are hurled into a disorienting, noisy, exhausting succession of parties and fairs and events. By the end of the week, the initiate has achieved a new social identity: he or she is incorporated as a student into the student tribe and finally allowed to rest a bit, calm down, and start attending lectures and participating in normal student life.
Freshers are encouraged to meet and make friends with as many fellow students as possible.
Getting drunk during Freshers Week is more or less compulsory and the English self-fulfilling belief in the magical disinhibiting powers of alcohol is essential without it, the inversion of normal social rules about talking to strangers would be pointless, as most freshers would be too shy to approach anyone.
Exam and Graduation Rules (экзамены и церемония вручения дипломов
The next significant transitional rites for students are final exams, post-exam celebrations and graduation ceremonies: the passage from studenthood to proper adulthood.
The ordeal of final exams have their own unwritten rules. The modesty rule is important: even if you are feeling reasonably calm and confident about an exam, it is not done to say so you must pretend to be full of anxiety and self-doubt, convinced that you are going to fail, because it goes without saying that you have not done anywhere near enough work.
After exams Those who do well must always appear surprised by their success, even if they secretly feel it was well deserved. Cries of Oh my God! I dont believe it! are the norm when such students receive their results, and while elation is expected, success should be attributed to good fortune (I was lucky all the right questions came up) rather than talent or hard work.
The next opportunity not to get excited is the graduation ceremony. Students all claim to be bored and unimpressed by this occasion; none will admit to any sense of pride: it is just a tedious ritual, to be endured for the sake of doting parents.
Matching Rites (ОБРЯДЫ БРАКОСОЧЕТАНИЯ)
They have the usual stag and hen nights (Americans call them bachelor and bachelorette parties); church or civil ceremony followed by reception; champagne; bride in white; wedding cake ditto; bridesmaids (optional); best man; speeches; special food; drink; dancing (optional); family tensions and feuds.
The English make rather less of a big social fuss about the engagement than many other cultures. They make rather more of a fuss over the stag and hen nights, which are often considerably more protracted and festive than the wedding.
The Money-talk Taboo (табу на разговор о деньгах)
For the male partner to fork out about a months salary on an engagement ring but to ask or talk about how much the ring cost would be offensive. The cost of the wedding itself is traditionally borne by the brides parents, but in these days of late marriages is now often met or at least shared by the couple themselves and/or grandparents or other relatives.
Humour Rules
In the wedding someone is bound to do or say something that will cause embarrassment. They find solemnity discomforting, and somehow faintly ridiculous. Humour is their favourite coping mechanism, and laughter is their standard way of dealing with their social dis-ease.
DISPATCHING RITES (похоронные обряды)
The Humour-vivisection Rule (усечение юмора)
Funerals are the one time when humour would be disrespectful and out of place. Without it, we are left naked, unprotected, our social inadequacies exposed for all to see.
Earnestness-taboo Suspension and Tear-quotas (приостановка действия табу на излишнюю серьезность/ норма слез)
They are expected to be solemn. Not too heartfelt. Tears are permitted; a bit of quiet, unobtrusive sobbing and sniffing is acceptable, but the sort of anguished howling that is considered normal at funerals in many other cultures, would here be regarded as undignified and inappropriate.
England is possibly the only culture in the world in which no tears at all is entirely normal and acceptable The English do not measure grief in tears. Their instinctive response to death is a form of denial they try to ignore it and pretend it is not happening, but this is rather hard to do at a funeral.
CALENDRICAL RITES AND OTHER TRANSITIONS (сезонные обряды)
Calendrical rites include big celebrations such as Christmas and New Years Eve, and others that occur at the same time every year, such as Easter, May Day, Harvest Festivals, Halloween and Guy Fawkes Night, as well as Mothers Day, Valentines Day and Bank Holidays.
Christmas and New Years Eve Rules
Christmas and New Years Eve are by far the most important. Christmas Day (25th of December) is firmly established as a family ritual, while New Years Eve is a much more raucous celebration with friends.
The Christmas Moan-fest and the Bah-humbug Rule (выражение недовольства по поводу Рождества)
Christmas shopping is the bit many English people are thinking of when they say that they hate Christmas, and usually means shopping for Christmas presents, food, cards, decorations and other trappings. As it is considered manly to profess to detest any sort of shopping, men are particularly inclined to moan about how much they dislike Christmas. But the Christmas-moan is now something of a national custom, and both sexes generally start moaning about Christmas in early November.
Christmas-present Rules
Actually telling someone the price of their present, or even that it was expensive, would be crass beyond belief.
Minor Calendricals Commas and Semi-colons (второстепенные обряды)
Some interesting fact - Valentines Day also just about counts as a semi-colon, although they dont get a day off work, as it plays a significant part in their courtship and mating practices (significant enough to cause a big peak in the suicide rates, anyway).
And every English sub-culture has its own calendricals its own annual tribal gatherings and festivals. These include the upper-class Season, of which the Royal Ascot race-meeting, the Henley Regatta and Wimbledon tennis championships (always abbreviated to just Ascot, Henley and Wimbledon) are the principal events.
Holidays . . .
Summer holidays are an alternative reality: if they can, they go to another country; they dress differently; e eat different, special, more indulgent food (Go on, have another ice-cream, youre on holiday!) and they behave differently.
Holidays and mini-remissions do not challenge or subvert the norms and laws that are sometimes suspended for their duration; quite the opposite: holidays highlight and reinforce these rules. The English can only take so much liminality. By the end of the summer holidays, they have had enough of indulgence and excess, and yearn for a bit of moderation.