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The study deals with pilgrimages to Esquipulas, Guatemala, and patterns of miracle in terms of their perception by the pilgrims reaching this prominent religious hub of Central America. Two key pilgrimage discourses are distinguished: traditional Maya pilgrimage, based on regular, calendar customs, and conventional Catholic pilgrimage, founded on occasional journeys to fulfil a vow. The Western understanding of miracle as a transgression of “natural laws” or “common course of nature” is relativized and contested arguing that the ethnographic evidence of Esquipulas shows not only different, but also opposite conceptions. Then, the study presents a spectrum of miracle ideas drawing from the Maya as well as European – the case of Lourdes is exemplary here – traditions in terms of the degree of their uncommonness. It is concluded that anthropology has to comprehend miracles as marvels in its cultural context; nevertheless, there is a widespread idea among many cultures that miracle is something wonderful, related to the awareness of non-obviousness of certain things and phenomena. Miracles find its content and meaning within particular cosmology, but, anchored in the psychological characteristics of the astonishment and the difference between usual and unusual or ordinary and extraordinary, they refer to features of human mind in a more general way.

The study has two objectives. Firstly, offering a summary of theory of collective memory, it is argued that the concept of memory tends to be used in a broad sense, threatening to fusion with the anthropological notion of culture. In this respect, it is proposed to use the term when referring to the social remembering of specific historical events, persons and experiences in a particular society or culture at a particular place and time. Moreover, several reasons of the memory boom such as some theoretical problems within the social sciences, the specificity of French culture and historiography, postmodern turn, detraditionalism or discourse of postcolonialism are indicated. The other purpose of the study consists in emphasising of the psychosocial power of the past and socially constructed history in the traditional as well as contemporary pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. The disintegration of old myths demands the rise of new chains of memory. Comparing the work of the scholars like Nora and Hervieu-Léger with the ideas of Halbwachs and Eliade, the same power of the past is recognized in some academic and intellectual discourses. The conclusion presents the social and scientific attractiveness of memory as a consequence of the need of identity, significance and sense, and the never-ending debate about change and continuity.

Recenze: Grace Davieová: Výjimečný případ Evropa. Podoby víry v dnešním světě. Brno: Centrum pro studium demokracie a kultury, 2009 (z anglického originálu Europe: The Exceptional Case. Parameters of Faith in the Modern World vydaného v roce 2002 nakladatelstvím Darton, Longman & Todd přeložil Tomáš Suchomel), 208 stran.

Předložený článek se zabývá výzkumem K. Ludikovského v trati Cepový rybník na katastru obce Žerotína. Roku 1959 zde byla prozkoumána dvě pyrotechnická zařízení interpretovaná jako prosté železářské výhně. Analýza vyzvednuté keramiky umožnila tento výrobní areál datovat do konce 9. až průběhu 10. století. V roce 2018 proběhla revize všech nálezů uložených ve Vlastivědném muzeu v Olomouci, a to jak nálezů pocházejících z výzkumu, tak i starších náhodně získaných střepů z této trati. Nový rozbor keramiky umožňuje klást zdejší osídlení do první poloviny 10. až první poloviny 11. století. Provedená analýza strusky z výzkumů doložila, že zde probíhalo kovářské zpracování železa.

The study deals with pilgrimages to Esquipulas, Guatemala, and patterns of miracle in terms of their perception by the pilgrims reaching this prominent religious hub of Central America. Two key pilgrimage discourses are distinguished: traditional Maya pilgrimage, based on regular, calendar customs, and conventional Catholic pilgrimage, founded on occasional journeys to fulfil a vow. The Western understanding of miracle as a transgression of "natural laws" or "common course of nature" is relativized and contested arguing that the ethnographic evidence of Esquipulas shows not only different, but also opposite conceptions. Then, the study presents a spectrum of miracle ideas drawing from the Maya as well as European - the case of Lourdes is exemplary here - traditions in terms of the degree of their uncommonness. It is concluded that anthropology has to comprehend miracles as marvels in its cultural context; nevertheless, there is a widespread idea among many cultures that miracle is something wonderful, related to the awareness of non-obviousness of certain things and phenomena. Miracles find its content and meaning within particular cosmology, but, anchored in the psychological characteristics of the astonishment and the difference between usual and unusual or ordinary and extraordinary, they refer to features of human mind in a more general way.

Civil-religious hierarchies (also known as cargo systems or cofradías) in Mesoamerica have received considerable academic attention, namely in connection with the performance of feasts of saints, social organization of community, and prestige. In this paper the institution in Mayan culture is described and the anthropological theories focused on the problem of extensive expenditure during the feasts are discussed. Through an analysis of the dynamic history and contemporary progress of the institution, the paper takes issue with both the approaches of cultural essentialism or functionalism and colonial historicism or Marxism. In contrast to some of the recent anthropological developments, such as post-colonialism and post-structuralism, a phenomenological attitude which appreciates the relevance of expenditure as a psychosocial phenomenon of sacrifice is highlighted. In general terms, the aim of the study is to demonstrate the fruitfulness of diversity; drawing from particular social and individual circumstances and specific motives, anthropologists grasp the complexity of phenomena in a way which enables them to fulfil the age-old need for theoretical plurality and to make sense of nonsense. The conclusion discusses the emphasis of contemporary anthropology on anti-isolationism, anti-passivism, and anti-totalism.

This article examines how the general theory of shamanism fits with the specific shamanic practice in contemporary Mayan culture. In this context of the relationship between the universal and the particular, the question of the nature of the phenomenon arises: is shamanism a useful anthropological category or a vacant, ambiguous notion to abandon? The essay begins with a look at the great – the Eliadean and neuropsychological – theories, suggesting that these approaches ontologize and reduce reality. Then, exploring the way by which anthropologists have tried to describe and define the Maya shaman, it is argued that no dichotomization can capture the totality of the neuropsychological, social and cultural significance of this practitioner. Nevertheless, it is maintained that dichotomization can be a good analytic tool if it is used only as a tool for understanding and thinking. Identifying shamanism in Mesoamerica, it is concluded that the term may be used cross-culturally; however, avoidance of ontologization is necassary because of the heterogeneity and multidimensionality of the phenomenon.

The essay deals with the relationships among pilgrimage, travelling, ethnography, tourism and other forms of mobility. I argue that it is not useful to distinguish strictly between the categories of pilgrimage and tourism. Furthermore, I try to challenge the boundaries between religious and secular motion to attain more complex view of the matter. I utilize examples from San Giovanni Rotondo, Italy; San Marcos La Laguna, Guatemala; Mariazell, Austria; and the Viennese palace of Albertina to explore the multidimensionality of the subject and simultaneously to depict its similarities. The journeys to the extraordinary, unusual or exceptional experiences share some common aspects such as the power of metanarratives or the effect of psychosocial reinforcement. Here I focus on how the images and discourses are culturally constructed and used by pilgrims, tourists and travellers. Finally, I emphasize that the journeys provide psychic strengthening and social capital to the actors.