Festival

The word "festival" was originally used as an adjective from the late fourteenth century, deriving from Latin via Old French.^[6] In Middle English, a "festival dai" was a religious holiday.^[7]

The first recorded used of the word "festival" as a noun was in 1589 (as "Festifall").^[6] Feast first came into usage as a noun c. 1200,^[8] and its first recorded use as a verb was circa 1300.^[9]

The word gala comes from Arabic word khil'a, meaning robe of honor.^[10] The word gala was initially used to describe "festive dress", but came to be a synonym of "festival" starting in the 18th century.^[11]

History

Festivals have long been significant in human culture and are found in virtually all cultures.

Many festivals have religious origins and entwine cultural and religious significance in traditional activities. The most important religious festivals such as Christmas, Rosh Hashanah, Diwali, Eid-al-Fitr and Eid-al-Adha serve to mark out the year. Others, such as harvest festivals, celebrate seasonal change. Events of historical significance, such as important military victories or other nation-building events also provide the impetus for a festival. An early example is the festival established by Ancient Egyptian Pharaoh Ramesses III celebrating his victory over the Libyans.^[21] In many countries, royal holidays commemorate dynastic events just as agricultural holidays are about harvests. Festivals are often commemorated annually.

There are numerous types of festivals in the world and most countries celebrate important events or traditions with traditional cultural events and activities. Most culminate in the consumption of specially prepared food (showing the connection to "feasting") and they bring people together. Festivals are also strongly associated with national holidays. Lists of national festivals are published to make participation easier.^[22]

Types of festivals

The scale of festivals varies; in location and attendance, they may range from a local to national level.^[23][16] Music festivals, for example, often bring together disparate groups of people, such that they are both localised and global.^[24] The "vast majority" of festivals are, however, local, modest and populist.^[25] The abundance of festivals significantly hinders quantifying the total there of.^[14] There exists significant variation among festivals, beyond binary dichotomies of sacred and secular, rural and urban, people and establishment.^[25]

Religious festivals

Among many

Arts festivals

Among the many offspring of general arts festivals are also more specific types of festivals, including ones that showcase intellectual or creative achievement such as

Film festivals involve the screenings of several different films, and are usually held annually. Some of the most significant film festivals include the Berlin International Film Festival, the Venice Film Festival and the Cannes Film Festival.

A food festival is an event celebrating food or drink. These often highlight the output of producers from a certain region. Some food festivals are focused on a particular item of food, such as the National Peanut Festival in the United States, or the Galway International Oyster Festival in Ireland. There are also specific beverage festivals, such as the famous Oktoberfest in Germany for beer. Many countries hold festivals to celebrate wine. One example is the global celebration of the arrival of Beaujolais nouveau, which involves shipping the new wine around the world for its release date on the third Thursday of November each year.^[36][37] Both Beaujolais nouveau and the Japanese rice wine sake are associated with harvest time. In the Philippines, there are at least two hundred festivals dedicated to food and drinks.^{[citation needed]}

Seasonal and harvest festivals

Seasonal festivals, such as

Politics

Scholarly literature notes that festivals functionally disseminate political values and meaning, such as ownership of place, which undergoes transformation in accordance with the festival.^[5][25] Furthermore, a festival may act as an artefact which allows citizens to achieve "certain ideals", including those of identity and ideology.^[40] Festivals may be used to rehabilitate or elevate the image of a city; the ephemerality of festivals means that their impact is often incorporeal, of name, memory and perception.^[14][25] In deviating from routine, festivals may reinforce the convention, be it social, cultural or economic.^[16][25]

Study of festivals

• fungi and animals
  associated with cultural events such as festivals, processions and special occasions.
• Heortology – the study of religious festivals. It was originally only used in respect of Christian festivals,^[41] but it now covers all religions, in particular those of Ancient Greece.^[42] See list of foods with religious symbolism for some topical overlap.

See also

References

• Cudny, Waldemar (2016). Festivalisation of Urban Spaces. Springer Geography.
  S2CID 168194339
  .

Further reading

• Ian Yeoman, ed. (2004). Festival and events management: an international arts and culture perspective (1st ed., repr. ed.). Amsterdam: Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann.
  ISBN 978-0-7506-5872-0
  .

External links

New International Encyclopedia article "Festivals

".

• Media related to Festivals at Wikimedia Commons
• The dictionary definition of Festival at Wiktionary