Rituals have always been valued highly by the members of any given society and the popularity of ritual and ceremony has enjoyed a recent revival in westernized countries, particularly in Europe, despite the relaxation and elimination of national boundaries and the move towards federalism. Understanding Rituals presents six different contributions on how to understand rituals within the frame of contemporary social anthropology and shows how diverse theoretical viewpoints seem to lead to the common feeling that rituals now constitute one of the most fertile fields of anthropological research. The distinguished contributors present analyzed rituals taken from a wide range of societies and link the Vedic time to the present situation in India; a West African society to Wittgenstein's requirement for comparison with Western feelings; and link and contrast the different modes of participation in a Nuba village of Sudan, as well as the confronting Punjabi and English communities of a London suburb. Rituals are also analyzed as they create, preserve and transform social relations and cultural identity. The contributors demonstrate how rituals can be used for discovery of the ultimate and contradictory values to which each society as a whole is attached. Understanding Rituals is invaluable to all lecturers and students of social anthropology and cultural studies.