Marking Transitions and Meaning across the Life Course: Older People's Memories of Religious and Secular Ceremonies in Eastern and Western Europe

在西欧，关于过去50年宗教衰落对整个生命过程中的福祉，特别是老年人的福祉的后果的辩论越来越多。这些担忧在英国表现得最为强烈。宗教和精神意义的丧失所填补的差距可能没有被世俗的替代品充分填补。前东欧国家为宗教和世俗意识形态的等同性提供了有趣的测试案例。二战结束后建立的共产主义政权试图将宗教文化颠覆为社会主义文化，并取得了不同程度的成功。保加利亚和罗马尼亚是邻国的例子，它们有着相似的近代历史，但宗教信仰却截然不同。保加利亚的宗教活动明显和持续下降，但罗马尼亚没有。那些经历过共产主义政权及其解体时期的老年人的记忆提供了潜在的重要证据，证明社会主义仪式和公民仪式被认为是等同的，目的是在生活的关键时刻取代宗教仪式。在这项建议中，我们打算采访来自每个国家的20名老年人，他们是经过精心挑选的，代表主要的宗教团体以及人口中无神论者和非宗教信仰者。我们将要求他们回忆他们生活中的重要事件，特别是出生、结婚和死亡，以及宗教和世俗仪式和仪式在增强这些事件的意义方面的作用。我们还将要求他们反思自世纪后半叶以来他们在这一社会生活领域所经历的变化，以及宗教和世俗仪式和仪式的作用的减少（在保加利亚和罗马尼亚增加）对他们及其家庭的影响。这项研究将由一个口述历史学家和老年病学家小组进行，他们将定期开会，设计和协调所有三个国家的数据收集、分析和结果介绍。研究结果将在口述历史、老年学和社会科学领域传播。该项目将有助于促进在欧洲口述历史和老年学中被严重忽视的宗教研究，并有望为更具代表性的欧洲研究提供资金。它也应该作为一个刺激，以进一步合作之间的老年学家和口述历史学家在理解的决定因素，生活质量和调整整个生命周期。

In Western Europe debate has increased about the consequences of religious decline in the last 50 years for well-being across the life course, and particularly in old age. These concerns have been expressed most strongly in the UK. The gap filled by the loss of religious and spiritual meanings may not have been adequately filled by secular alternatives. The former states of Eastern Europe provide interesting test cases for the equivalence of religious and secular ideologies. The communist regimes set up at the end of WWII attempted to subvert religious culture into a socialist one with varying degrees of success. Bulgaria and Romania are examples of neighbouring countries with similar recent histories, but contrasting religiosity. A marked and persisting decline in religious practice took place in Bulgaria but not in Romania. The memories of those older people who lived through the period of communist power and its dissolution provide potentially important evidence on the perceived equivalence of the socialist and civic ceremonies designed to replace religious ritual at key points of life. In this proposal we intend to interview 20 older people from each country, carefully selected to represent the major religious groupings as well as the atheist and non-religious-practising parts of the population. We will ask them to recall the important events of their lives, particularly births, marriages and death, and the role of religious and secular ritual and ceremony in enhancing the meaning of these events. We will also ask them to reflect on the changes that they have experienced in this area of social life since the latter part of the 20th century, and how the decreasing (increasing in Bulgaria and Romania) role of religious and secular ritual and ceremony has affected them and their families. The research will be conducted by a team of oral historians and gerontologists, who will meet regularly to design and coordinate the data collection, analysis and presentation of results in all three countries. The results will be disseminated in oral history, gerontology and social science contexts. This project will help promote the study of religion which has been greatly neglected in oral history and gerontology across in Europe and will hopefully lead to funding of a more representative European study. It should also act as a stimulus to further cooperation between gerontologists and oral historians in understanding the determinants of quality of life and adjustment across the life cycle.