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Communitas is inspired fellowship; a group´s pleasure in sharing common experiences; being ´in the zone´ - as in music, sport, and work; the sense felt by a group when their life together takes on full meaning. The experience of communitas, almost beyond strict definition and with almost endless variations, often appears unexpectedly.

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Introduction:Communitas and the Study of Anthropology The Experience of Communitas The Method of ´Showing Through Stories´ Contrasts: Communitas and False Communitas Festivals: July 4th, Carnival, and Clown Music and Sport: Being in the Zone The Communitas of Work: Surprising Conclusions The Communitas of Disaster The Sacredness of the People: The Communitas of Revolution and Liberation The Communitas of Nonviolence Nature and Spirit Rites of Passage: Communitas in Times of Change Conclusion: A Natural History of Joy

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"A monument to the serial careers of a remarkable anthropological couple." Barbara Tedlock, professor of Anthropology, SUNY Buffalo "Just suppose someone did know just exactly what community is, and how to resolve its complexities by revealing the communitas behind it, that would be Edie Turner, and this book would be the way she does it, for once and for all, and this time for real." Roy Wagner, professor of Anthropology, University of Virginia

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Edith Turner is Lecturer in Anthropology at the University of Virginia, USA, specializing in the study of ritual, religion, and consciousness. She has been researching the field of symbol/ritual for nearly 60 years - formerly in collaboration with her husband, renowned anthropologist Victor Turner - and has conducted fieldwork in Zambia, Northern Alaska, rural Ireland, Central and South America, Europe, and Asia. She was editor in chief of the journal, A+nthropology and Humanism , and is author of Heart of Lightness: The Life of an Anthropologist (2006), Among the Healers: Stories of Spiritual and Ritual Healing around the World (2005), and a contributor to Shamanism: A Reader (2003).

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