Civilised Tribalism: Burning Man, Event-Tribes and Maker Culture

Abstract

Otherwise known as Black Rock City, Burning Man is an artistic event, that, mounted annually in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert, has become the inspiration for a global cultural movement. While it has been the subject of considerable attention from ethnographers and sociologists, Burning Man has persistently resisted classification. In this article, I undertake a tentative approach to Burning Man via a concept integral to Maffesoli’s postmodern social philosophy popular within Anglophone sociology: the neo-tribe. Ethnographic attention to Burning Man illustrates spectacular aspects of neo-tribalism. It is cyclical, immediate, sensual, enchanted, collaborative and offers multiple sites of belonging for participants, many of whom will self-identify as ‘tribal’ or ‘neo-tribal’. And yet Burning Man is also demonstrative of an optimising modernist ‘project’ complicating, if not incongruent with, postmodern tribalism. With Black Rock City theme camps, art projects and build teams echoing a design-orientated maker culture, and an organisation – the Burning Man Project – dedicated to propagating and scaling (making) the ethical, civic and progressive dimensions of this culture, this article demonstrates the paradoxical proclivities of Burning Man’s tribal character. The objective of the article is to forge a fuller understanding of Burning Man and other ‘transformational’ events illustrative of an alternative tribalism, and to explore ways the phenomenon both approximates and deviates from Maffesoli’s thesis.

From escape to seeking: understanding drug tourists

“…Since then, the neo tribal theory has been accepted as an alternative to subculture theory. The theory is first used in sociological researches (Bennett, 1999;Hetherington, 1998;Hughson, 1999), then in marketing researches (Cooper, McLoughlin, & Keating, 2005;Cova & Cova, 2001), and recently in recreation and tourism researches (Goulding & Shankar, 2011;Hardy & Robards, 2015;Hardy, Dolnicar, & Vorobjovas-Pinta, 2021;St John, 2018;Vorobjovas-Pinta, 2018;Vorobjovas-Pinta & Lewis, 2021;Wang & Xie, 2021;Weaver, 2011;Wu & Dai, 2019). Therefore, neo tribal theory can be considered as a guide to understanding the social behaviors of travelers or tourists.…”

Creating the Extraordinary: The Social Practices of a Fantasy Event

“…Based on the work of Van Gennep (1960/2010), and Turner (19671979), events are described as liminal spaces, which are situated outside ordinary life, and which remove participants from their daily routines. Instead the participants enter an in-between state of liminality, exploration, and new possibilities (Rihova et al, 2015;Sterchele & Saint-Blancat, 2015;StJohn, 2017;Turner, 1995). As Durkheim's classic work on rituals describes, bodily co-presence and interaction of large groups can lead to a collective feeling of togetherness, described as collective effervescence (Durkheim, 1912).…”

Radical inclusion: immersive 360‐degree video capture, dissemination, and use of emerging technology in support of traditional archival roles at a university library

“…This paper presents a case study in the development, methods, and sustainability of an ongoing project to leverage virtual reality technologies and incorporate immersive VR content into one such collection of University Libraries at the University of Nevada, Reno. A Land Grant institution, Libraries at the public state university and PhD‐granting institution of Carnegie class R2: Doctoral Universities – Higher Research Activity, made an active choice to develop and house archival collections associated with the Burning Man event held annually (St. John, ) on the Black Rock Desert playa in the northern Nevada section of the Great Basin. The Burning Inquiry collection, “a comprehensive collection of published materials on the Burning Man event, including a growing collection of archival and artistic materials” was born, including ephemeral “art, performances, happenings, and spontaneous celebrations” (Home, 2017) that take place at the event.…”