Lietuvos etnologija / Lithuanian ethnology

‘No human beings, at whatever stage of culture, completely eliminate spiritual preoccupations from their economic concerns’ (Malinowski 1935: xx). Drawing on the history and theory of economic anthropology from the pioneering investigations of Bronislaw Malinowski to the work of a postdoctoral research team at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology (Halle/S) between 2009 and 2012, this paper* explores the interface between ritual and the economy in socialist and post-socialist Eastern Europe. The ruptures of early socialism gave way to a re-embedding of the economy that was especially dynamic in the sphere of the household. By contrast, postsocialist disembedding is proving harder to modify.