Abstracts
Abstract
Queer moments abound in traditional rituals associated with marriages and weddings, not only in some regions of English Canada but in most European and European-colonised locations. In the Prairie provinces and Ontario, mock weddings (folk dramatic travesties of the Christian/majoritarian wedding ceremony, usually performed cross dressed) can interrupt wedding showers or milestone anniversary parties. And from Prince Edward Island to British Columbia, charivaris (late night visits to a newly married couple, featuring extreme noisemaking and/or traditional trickery) can follow a marriage. The authors question whether these practices transgress against conventional heterosexual marriage or merely ritualise and thus contain potential resistance to its strictures, and find that they do both.
Résumé
Les épisodes louches abondent dans les rituels traditionnels associés aux mariages et aux noces, pas seulement dans quelques régions du Canada anglais, mais dans la plupart des lieux européens ou de colonisation européenne. Dans les provinces des Prairies et en Ontario, des parodies de mariages (travestissements spectaculaires de la cérémonie de mariage de la majorité chrétienne, où l’on intervertit généralement les costumes) peuvent interrompre les showers ou les anniversaires de mariage. Et, de l’Île du Prince Édouard à la Colombie britannique, des charivaris (visites nocturnes à des couples de nouveaux mariés, où l’on fait le plus de bruit possible accompagné ou non de méchancetés traditionnelles) peuvent se dérouler à la suite des noces. Les auteures se demandent si ces pratiques transgressent le mariage hétérosexuel conventionnel ou si elles ne font que ritualiser et donc restreindre la résistance potentielle au strict encadrement qu’il implique, pour découvrir qu’elles font les deux.
Appendices
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