Victor Turner's Rites Of Passage

Aspects of Liminality in the Post-partum Ritual of the Twelve Apostles Church
Introduction
The purpose of this essay is to explore Victor Turner’s ideas on liminality. A description of the setsetse ritual of new mothers in the Twelve Apostles Church has been provided.
Definition of Ritual, Liminality and Rites de Passage
Every society has further divisions within it, whether by age, gender or rank. “Wherever there are fine distinctions among age or occupational groups, progression from one group to the next is marked by special acts…” (Van Gennep, 2004:3). These rites of passage involve three stages. Separation in which the subject is removed from his familiar environment, transition in which the old identity is destroyed and a new one created,

Following labour, she returned to her maternal home. It is said of a woman “O ile setsetse”, she has gone to setsetse. This first stage of rites of passage, separation, rendered her structurally invisible from her religious and social community (Turner, 1967). During this post-partum period, she is a transitional figure, in between being a woman and a mother, in between the sacred and magical world of creating life (giving birth) and death, in between having her own identity as a woman and her new identity as a mother, even in between having her body belong to herself, separate from the baby. She is described as ‘o tshilafetse’ from the verb go tshilafala, to be dirty, contaminated. Ritual uncleanliness is also a characteristic of liminality, “used as an analogy for expressing a general view of the social order’ (Douglas 19: 3). The contamination of the blood of childbirth is the biological symbol that is applied to her and in her invisibility and symbolic death (Turner, 1967), she is kept hidden as even in her own family home she is confined to one room. Her death is also symbolised in that she will no longer be known as Kgolofelo, her given name, but as NaGrace, mother of

Without her gown she also has no status as umzelwane (a believer) as the community refers to one another. During this period of postpartum seclusion, NaGrace withdraws from her structural position as a wife, daughter and church goer, a lack of identity being characteristic of liminality (Turner, 1967). Her status is one of nudity, another characteristic of liminal personae. The baby, who is still one with her until baptism, is also a liminal persona that requires protection. As liminal personae, the mother and child share equal status. Neither of them is allowed to enter the church, nor may they leave the house or receive visitors outside of immediate family. They share a uniform condition (Turner, 1967). The mother’s eating is viewed in the light of maintaining her strength in order to pass on that same physical wellbeing to her child through breastfeeding, go tiisa ngwana, to harden or strengthen the child. The child is also transitioning from the soft, fluid world of the womb, to the firmer, solid world outside, hence the need to be strengthened. Along with preparing her food, NaGrace’s mother is the elder who imparts gnosis. NaGrace herself is being strengthened as she is now seen as old enough to partake in certain conversations she was not privy to before. This can be seen as communication of the sacra, sacred things which “symbolically