| This study is an ethnographic investigation of the Japanese tea ritual as a complex communicative event. Although most tea ritual scholars rely upon written texts for their analysis of the tea ceremony, this study grounds its claims in participant observations of, and interviews about, the actions, words, and interpretations of those who perform the ceremony. It offers an interdisciplinary approach to the study of ritual by combining perspectives on ritual theory, cultural and interpersonal communication, and Mikhail Bakhtin's social view of language. Rather than investigating ritual's social structure and sequential form, this study focuses on ritual as a socially constructed communicative event.;Dell Hymes's ethnography of communication provides a descriptive framework for establishing the social and cultural context of the Japanese tea ritual performance. Data were collected over a nine month period across three field sites in the Northwest, U.S. and in tea lessons, formalized tea events, and public tea demonstrations. The data revealed both the types of speech genres enacted by tea participants and their interpersonal significance.;The study describes how tea participants enact ritualized communication, in the form of greetings, formalized dialogues, silence, and the expression of the Japanese tea concept, toriawase. Moreover, tea participants enact informal and spontaneous communicative genres that include storytelling, reminiscing, joking/humor, gossiping, conflict, and nonverbal communication such as the use of facial expression, eye contact, and touch, that fall outside the boundaries of the ritual's formalized structure. These speech genres show that while ritual communication patterns frame the tea ceremony, informal speech forms are an inherent part of its character.;In addition to identifying the types of speech genres enacted in tea ritual, this study analyzes their interpersonal significance and their function in constructing interpersonal relationships. "Tea friend" is one kind of relationship built around the tea ritual, that reflects the intimacy and closeness of the collaborative nature of ritual enactment. The Japanese tea phrase, "ichigo ichie," reflects the reciprocal nature of the ritual necessary to build meaningful relationships. These findings demonstrate that a constrained and highly rule governed event like the Japanese tea ritual is a salient interpersonal setting. |
