Approaching the Sacred: Pilgrimage in Historical and Intercultural Perspective

Abstract

The aim of the volume is a comparative study of non-European pilgrimages under different historical conditions and changing power relations. Historic transformations but also continuities in organization, bodily and spiritual experience, as well as individual and collective motives are discussed. Written by an interdisciplinary group of authors, their various disciplinary perspectives offer insight into the differences in methods, theoretical reflections and the use and meanings of objects in ritual performances. The construction of sacred spaces as landscapes of imagination reflects a wide range of meaning in regard of the growing complexity and social dynamism in times of postmodernity.