Abstract
In this exercise, Victor Turner's essay on Hidalgo and the Mexican Revolution of Independence is revisited in light of his writings on the anthropology of experience and performance. On the internal margins of this anthropology, affinities between Turner and Walter Benjamin are found, three of which are particularly evident: 1) while carrying out an archaeology of experience, Turner discovers liminal experience, and Benjamin, the great narrative tradition; 2) in their discussions of transformations which accompany industrial capitalism, Turner speaks of the sparagmos, or dismemberment of forms of symbolic action; and Benjamin, of the ruins of experience and the shattering of tradition; and 3) in search of ways to reconstitute meaningful experience, Turner's attentions are directed toward liminoid forms of symbolic action; and Benjamin's, toward new narrative forms. As the image of Tonantzin flashes up, questions emerge, bringing to the surface some of the more surprising elements of Turner's thought.
Keywords
Victor Turner; Walter Benjamin; Tonantzin; Experience; Performance