A01=Stephen Jenkinson
ancestral knowledge
ancient wisdom
Author_Stephen Jenkinson
Category=JBCC6
Category=JHBK
Category=VXA
ceremonial wisdom
ceremonialist
ceremony
communal celebrations
community ceremonial traditions
contemplation
cultural heritage
cultural inheritance
cultural preservation
cultural ritual practices
cultural traditions
elderhood
eq_bestseller
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_mind-body-spirit
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
human connection
marriage practices
marriage rites meaning
matrimony
modern ritual significance
patrimony
ritual
ritual meaning
sacred unions
social traditions
spiritual customs
storytelling
tradition
traditional ceremonies
traditional matrimonial ceremonies
village traditions
wedding customs
wisdom
Product details
- ISBN 9781649634085
- Weight: 286g
- Dimensions: 155 x 231mm
- Publication Date: 22 Sep 2025
- Publisher: Sounds True Inc
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
Secure
checkout
Fast Shipping
Easy returns
In a time when communal rituals and cultural ceremonies fail, longtime scholar, storyteller, and ceremonialist Stephen Jenkinson asks what it means to lose cultural inheritance. In examining matrimony and its ritual twin, patrimony, Matrimony contemplates culture-making, building and preserving cultural memory, and the ache of living in a world bereft of meaning and connection. There is a real and palpable consequence to turning away from public ceremony - and not just for the celebrants.
“Matrimony and patrimony are village rites, a communal affirmation of the village’s ways of going on, sometimes not quite knowing how to,” shares Jenkinson. “The village needs and deserves a rite of public recognition of the seismic change in its life that matrimony means to make.” Privatising love, turning matrimony into a social institution barren of almost all substance, and flattening rituals into convenient events that fit into the routine of modern living erodes our connections and commitment to community and compromises our use as citizens of a troubled time. The way forward, then, is to learn and reclaim our cultural ceremonies and their meaning.
Through witty stories, insightful history, and meditative questions, Matrimony invites us to contemplate the significance of matrimony, ceremony, and cultural articulation - and how to redeem them for future generations.
Stephen Jenkinson, MTS, MSW, is a cultural worker, teacher, author, and ceremonialist. He is the creator and principal instructor of the Orphan Wisdom School, founded in 2010. He has master's degrees from Harvard University (theology) and the University of Toronto (social work). He's the author of Come of Age, the award-winning Die Wise, Money and the Soul's Desires, and Reckoning (with Kimberly Ann Johnson). For more, visit orphanwisdom.com.
