Robert Yelle, Postdoctoral Fellow in the Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities and Visiting Assistant Professor and Illinois Humanities Post-Doctoral Fellow for 2005-06, will give a talk entitled, "Toward a Theory of Performance: The Rhetoric of Ritual and the Reasons for its Decline," on Friday, Oct. 14, at noon, in Room 2090B of the Foreign Languages Building, 707 S. Mathews Ave., Urbana, on the U. of I. campus.

The talk is free and open to the public.

In his presentation, Yelle will discuss the development in recent decades of the idea that ritual is a kind of "performance" has become increasingly popular, in keeping with the rise of a broader interest in the study of performance. Using Hindu mantras and other forms of ritual language as examples, Yelle will talk about what performance means in the case of ritual.

He will also introduce some historical perspectives on the reason for the decline of such types of ritual performance. More recently, cognitive theorists of religion such as Harvey Whitehouse have echoed Stanley Tambiah's earlier assertion that the decline of some rituals can be attributed to the "tedium effect": the same formal properties of ritual, including especially its repetitiveness, that reinforce performance can also produce boredom, fatigue, and ultimately, the demise of ritual.

Yelle asserts that such explanations leave out what may have been one of the most important reasons for the decline of ritual performance: the Protestant critique of "vain repetitions" in prayer and of other forms of ceremonial as "idolatry," which induced liturgical reforms in Britain and subsequently in colonial India and elsewhere.

The speaker received a Ph.D. in the History of Religions from the University of Chicago in 2002. He is the author of “Explaining Mantras: Ritual, Rhetoric, and the Dream of a Natural Language in Hindu Tantra” (2003).

Yelle’s presentation is the first in a new Work in Progress Series of talks sponsored by the Program for the Study of Religion. The purpose of the series is to provide a vehicle for receiving reaction to work in progress by the program’s faculty and others with an interest in the academic study of religion, according to Robert J. McKim, director of the program. Presenters will give a brief account of a project they are currently working on, leaving time for questions and comments from the audience.

The next talk in the series is scheduled for Nov. 11 when Wayne Pitard of the UIUC Program for the Study of Religion will address "The Ancient Canaanite Myth of Baal: Writing a Commentary."