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Religious experience and rituals in Czech Neopaganism
El Ouri, Filip ; Horská, Kateřina (advisor) ; Klepal, Jaroslav (referee)
The subject of this thesis is to present the results of my ethnographic research in the setting of one of the most active Czech neopagan organizations, "Slovanský kruh" ( the Slavic Circle ), focusing primarily on capturing the course of gatherings organized by this group, including their ritual component, and how participants describe their experience from these gatherings. In addition, I focus on the role participants attribute to these meetings and experiences in their daily lives, and how they describe their other religious practices. My findings in this thesis are based on data collected during my participant observation at the gatherings of this organization and from interviews with some of the participants of those gatherings. Keywords neopaganism, Slovanský kruh, the Slavic Circle, religion, religious experience, ritual, ethnography, anthropology, the Czech Republic
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Becoming Bodies: An Ethnographic study of Ayurvedic Practice
Wolfová, Alžběta ; Bittnerová, Dana (advisor) ; Holmerová, Iva (referee) ; Horák, Miroslav (referee)
This thesis introduces a critical analysis of a self-proclaimed alternative to modernity. Based on a case of selected, so-called non-conventional medicine within the context of the Czech Republic between 2013 and 2017, I explore how a specific bodily practice like Ayurveda works in this environment. Since it is sought and employed in the everyday lives of an increasing number of people, even in such modestly sized post-socialist country, it resembles similar tendencies generally described in the globalized world (especially from the middle class upwards) in recent decades. Drawing upon (auto)ethnographic research, which originated at a school for future Ayurvedic practitioners and continued into informal meetings- sometimes at the homes of practitioners, I introduce Ayurveda as a specific way of body becoming. Starting with how the body and wellbeing is discursively established within the space of schools, I nevertheless focus mostly on individual practice. I look at how Ayurvedic epistemology is employed and how it enables recognition of one's own body, and subjectivity as interconnected with the surrounding environment. I follow how, as a result of this process, this recognition conditions a certain self- empowerment, especially regarding the establishment or maintenance of one's own wellbeing. I...
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Reprodukce na okraji: Morální ekonomie romské fertility
Szénássy, Edit ; Stöckelová, Tereza (advisor) ; Jakoubková Budilová, Lenka (referee) ; Šmídová, Iva (referee)
Situated at the intersections of reproduction, population politics, health care services, and marginality in Central Europe, this dissertation explores the diverse ways Romani women living in precarious circumstances demonstrate reproductive agency. In particular, it examines the ways their agency critically engages with the discourse of responsibilization (Rose 1996, 2007) on the affective and social levels in a context ruled by a moral regime that calls for reproductive governance (Morgan & Roberts, 2012, 2019). Discussion and analysis are based on long- term participant observation in a segregated Romani settlement in Slovakia, as well as a short- term observation of staff and patients at a maternity ward in the Czech Republic. The ethnographic methodology and analysis are inspired by critical medical anthropology and the anthropology of reproduction. Building on this mixed-method approach, the analysis focuses on the individual, communal, and societal aspects of reproductive decision-making. It discloses the significant material and moral constraints surrounding women's reproductive decisions and it shows that marginalized Roma women both revere and refuse the discourses of self- governance, responsibility, and accountability in their reproductive practices. The text tackles the economics of...
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Ethnographic study of Role-playing in World of Warcraft
Dušek, Ondřej ; Švelch, Jaroslav (advisor) ; Reifová, Irena (referee)
This thesis explores the almost unexplored phenomenon of role-playing in the MMORPG video game genre, focusing specifically on role-playing in World of Warcraft (WoW). Its assumption is that although players of this genre overwhelmingly focus on the gameplay aspects of the game, role-playing in MMORPGs exists and takes place as an activity of the fringe culture of players. The aim of this thesis is to investigate this phenomenon in WoW, to find out how role- playing in the game takes place and what artificial reality role-playing participants create in the virtual world of the game, and also to define this phenomenon as a form of role-playing The theoretical part of the thesis is divided into three segments. The first segment deals with role-playing itself and the role-playing game (RPG) genre, which is superior to the MMORPG subgenre. The second segment delves into the known knowledge about role-playing in MMORPGs, and the third describes the examined game WoW. In order to fulfill the goals of this thesis and answer the research questions, ethnographic procedures are used in the research part, by which the author of this thesis infiltrates the virtual role-playing environment in WoW and actively participates in the events, which he further describes and analyzes. Based on the analysis of field...
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The Social Death of Things? Minimalism as an alternative lifestyle
Brunerová, Aneta ; Zandlová, Markéta (advisor) ; Abu Ghosh, Yasar (referee)
The popularity of the minimalist lifestyle has been growing rapidly since 2008, especially in the American context. In recent years, this phenomenon has also been noticeable in the Czech Republic, manifesting itself in a critical revision of consumer society, to which it responds and defines itself in new forms of (anti)consumption. This thesis aims to examine minimalist consumption practices and to analyse minimalism mainly through the lens of material culture studies. With the help of ethnographic practices, I focus on selected aspects of the minimalist lifestyle, including its connection to environmental and anti-consumerist attitudes, attitudes towards material objects as such, or the position of minimalist actors in the social field. Keywords: ethnography, minimalism, material culture, consumer practices, consumer society
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Extreme metal - subculture and identity
Pospíšilová, Anna ; Doubek, David (advisor) ; Lipský, Matěj (referee)
The aim of this thesis was to investigate the identity of extreme metal musicians. In the theoretical part, the terms identity, genre, subculture were defined and a brief history of extreme metal was outlined. In the empirical part, research was presented in which 8 semi-structured interviews with grindcore, black metal, trash metal and death metal musicians were analyzed using qualitative methods. Subsequently, an analysis of the interviews was carried out, from which 11 main categories emerged that characterize the individual experience of extreme metal musicians. Based on the obtained results and data from participant observation, the chapter on the identity of an extreme metal musician was created, within which 2 main areas emerged, the purity of metal and the energy of metal, which form the basic pillars of the identity of an extreme metal musician. In the following chapter, the obtained data were placed in a wider context by means of a comparison with the theoretical starting points of the work. KEYWORDS Metal music, identity, subculture, etnography, analysis of interview
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