Abstract
In this chapter, first, the author explores the anthropological meaning of reality and describes the importance of actuality as grasped through actual involvement in the field. To identify this phase of actuality, Lévi-Strauss’s simple ‘levels of authenticity’ criterion is then introduced to clarify the conditions of ‘everyday life’.
To capture community in terms of people’s relationships in real ‘everyday life’ situations, two forms of interaction in a village on the island of Sardinia are discussed: invocation and mediation. The reason for focusing on these localised acts is that both have passivity as a starting point, and both impose a certain frame (form) on the empirical relationship between two persons. Consequently, the argument focuses on extracting the forms of personal, face-to-face bilateral relations in the two actions. The chapter does not discuss community as a reflection of factual relationships or the cultural particularities of the agro-pastoral livelihood in Sardinia; rather, it is a logic of context (locality) created by bilateral relations, which differs from universal concepts that are constructed ‘impersonally’ by discarding personhood as well as materialisation, which assumes the reality of objective ‘essentiality’.
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Notes
- 1.
Japanese anthropologist Makoto Oda (2014) points out that Kimura’s distinction between reality and actuality makes it clear that “singularity” cannot be manifested without interaction (action).
- 2.
Kimura (2000, p. 13).
- 3.
Kimura (2000, pp. 14–15). According to Kimura, a depersonalisation patient ‘has lost the capacity to sense reality as actual but is acutely aware of the loss of this sense’. In other words, there is a discrepancy between reality and actuality. He pointed out that this discrepancy occurs at the interface between reality and actuality.
- 4.
Kimura (2000, pp. 14–17).
- 5.
Kimura (1994, p. 29).
- 6.
Abu-Lughod (1991, p. 153).
- 7.
- 8.
Lévi-Strauss (2013, p. 28).
- 9.
Lévi-Strauss (1963, p. 366).
- 10.
Lévi-Strauss (1963, p. 367).
- 11.
Lévi-Strauss (2013, p. 29).
- 12.
Oda (2011, p. 269). As a consequence of Lévi-Strauss’s perspective of the ‘criterion of authenticity’, Oda (2009) presented the ‘dual societies’ perspective, which states that ‘After modernization, people have lived in two different societies, an authentic society and an inauthentic society’. He further stated that if the everyday practices responding to neoliberalism and globalism are reviewed from this perspective, it becomes clear that they are carried out in authentic society, such as non-identical repetition and maintain the boundary between ‘authentic society’ and ‘inauthentic society’, creating dual societies.
- 13.
Oda (2014, p. 7).
- 14.
Anderson (2006, p. 6). The style in which villagers engaged in face-to-face contact imagine is described as follows: ‘Javanese villagers have always known that they are connected to people they have never seen, but these ties were once imagined particularistically––as indefinitely stretchable nets of kinship and clientship’.
- 15.
Oda (2014, p. 4).
- 16.
The author has researched several village festivals held in honour of saints, and this paper is based on the records kept by the comitato of the festival in Village B in which she participated. The stay was 2 weeks in duration, beginning on 6 September 2001.
- 17.
Japanese anthropologist Taeko Udagawa (2004) described the greetings and giro frequently made outdoors in Town R near Roma with reference to the dimension of specific behaviour, which is divorced from its purpose or function, as follows: ‘The first thing we notice is that they are not always outdoors with someone or in conversation. They usually pass by those they meet and exchange greetings, and often just exchange looks without uttering a word at the time. Even when standing next to someone, once they have greeted each other, they remain silent and watch people pass by without talking to each other. They also never stay in one place outdoors, moving to another after a while or walking from place to place’ (p. 351).
- 18.
There were 14 members of the comitato in which the author was allowed to participate. The author mainly helped prepare the meals served during the festival (14–16 September). Various performers are invited to the festival, including groups of traditional dancers and tenores from neighbouring villages, and a meal is served after the performance.
- 19.
- 20.
Sassu (2009, p. 73). Translated by the author.
- 21.
- 22.
Masia (1982, p. 86).
- 23.
- 24.
- 25.
- 26.
Pinna (2003, pp. 120–121).
- 27.
Pinna (2003, p. 12).
- 28.
Masia (1982, p. 89).
- 29.
Masia (2017, p. 185).
- 30.
Geertz (1973, p. 22).
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Imoto, Y. (2023). Thinking About ‘Community’ in Everyday Life. In: Urai, K., Katsuragi, M., Takeuchi, Y. (eds) Realism for Social Sciences. Translational Systems Sciences, vol 36. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-4153-7_11
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