За съвременната сватбена обредност
On Present-day Wedding Rituals

Summary/Abstract: On the basis of concrete territorial studies of wedding rituals in Gabrovo district, the author considers their composition and the factors which determine the trends of their present development. The problem of the traditional elements in the present-day system of weddings is thoroughly examined by comparing in a chronological order the individual ritual features. The varying degree of preservation and stability of tradition is explained by the special features of the settlement and demographic structure of the region, as well as by the social, professional, educational and age characteristics of the participants in a wedding ceremony. The data obtained from ethnographic observations, as well as those taken from the sociological inquiry carried out indicate the trend of a progressive limitation of the traditional elements in wedding rituals, chiefly in the towns, and their more stable preservation in the settlements in mountainous and hilly country. At the same time certain negative sides in present-day weddings are indicated. They arc due to an uncritical attitude to the functionally senseless ritual features of the traditional wedding system, or else are the fruit of a Philistine mentality —a striving for showy extravagance. In following the cycle of the wedding ceremony, the role and place of the present-day civic ritual is considered, and certain essential contradictions are pointed out between the ideological sense of the ritual and the remaining part of the wedding ceremony. In conclusion a system of objective1 and subjective factors is set forth, which influence and determine the present-day development of wedding rituals in this transitional period of its existence.

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