Carnival Bakhtin
Carnivalistic sense of the world.
In “Rabelais and His World”, Bakhtin argues that the Carnival was people’s second life where they lived for a certain time and experienced the second world which they themselves have created. Perhaps the strongest argument Bakhtin gives for this assumption relies on the claim that on carnival common rules and behavior do not apply: “People were, so to speak, reborn for new, purely human relations. These truly human relations were not only a fruit of imagination or abstract thought; they were experienced” (10). There are three major examples of ways people experienced truly human relations through the activities during the carnival. First one is a lack of hierarchy. Second one is the ability to use abusive language during the carnival that was the familiarity and erased the subordination between high and low classes. Third one is the power of laughter that gave the ability to ridicule the feudal system, which had permeated human life. This paper will argue that the culture proposed by the Catholic Church and feudal system was opposed with the creation of popular culture and it led to the creation of purely human relations within the carnival. By the Carnival, Bakhtin means the specific popular tradition in the medieval Europe. Bakhtin argues that the culture of the Middle Ages was based on the serious understanding of the world in terms of corpus juris proposed by Catholic Church. Let 's call this proposed culture – high culture. Carnival was the moment in the medieval society when people lived differently and understood the world through the entertainment. If consider a particular way of life as a culture, then for Bakhtin Carnival is a form of a real life. The real means the life where people have freedom of action and equality. Carnival was not a spectacle seen by the people; they lived in it, and everyone participated because its very idea embraces all the people (Bakhtin 7). The new way of living during the carnival led
In “Rabelais and His World”, Bakhtin argues that the Carnival was people’s second life where they lived for a certain time and experienced the second world which they themselves have created. Perhaps the strongest argument Bakhtin gives for this assumption relies on the claim that on carnival common rules and behavior do not apply: “People were, so to speak, reborn for new, purely human relations. These truly human relations were not only a fruit of imagination or abstract thought; they were experienced” (10). There are three major examples of ways people experienced truly human relations through the activities during the carnival. First one is a lack of hierarchy. Second one is the ability to use abusive language during the carnival that was the familiarity and erased the subordination between high and low classes. Third one is the power of laughter that gave the ability to ridicule the feudal system, which had permeated human life. This paper will argue that the culture proposed by the Catholic Church and feudal system was opposed with the creation of popular culture and it led to the creation of purely human relations within the carnival. By the Carnival, Bakhtin means the specific popular tradition in the medieval Europe. Bakhtin argues that the culture of the Middle Ages was based on the serious understanding of the world in terms of corpus juris proposed by Catholic Church. Let 's call this proposed culture – high culture. Carnival was the moment in the medieval society when people lived differently and understood the world through the entertainment. If consider a particular way of life as a culture, then for Bakhtin Carnival is a form of a real life. The real means the life where people have freedom of action and equality. Carnival was not a spectacle seen by the people; they lived in it, and everyone participated because its very idea embraces all the people (Bakhtin 7). The new way of living during the carnival led
Cited: Bakhtin, M. M. 1895-1975. Rabelais and His World. Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press, 1968. Lindahl, Carl. "Bakhtin 's Carnival Laughter and the Cajun Country Mardi Gras." Folklore 107 (1996): 57-70. ProQuest. Web. 11 Oct. 2013.