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Kumbh Mela

Kumbh Mela or Kumbha Mela is a major pilgrimage and festival in Hinduism, On February 4, 2019, Kumbh Mela witnessed the largest public gathering. It is celebrated in a cycle of approximately 12 years, to celebrate every revolution Brihaspati (Jupiter) completes, at four river-bank pilgrimage sites: Prayagraj (Ganges-Yamuna-Sarasvati rivers confluence), Haridwar (Ganges), Nashik (Godavari), and Ujjain (Shipra). The festival is marked by a ritual dip in the waters, but it is also a celebration of community commerce with numerous fairs, education, religious discourses by saints, mass gatherings of monks, and entertainment. The seekers believe that bathing in these rivers is a means to prāyaścitta (atonement, penance, restorative action) for past mistakes, and that it cleanses them of their sins.

The festival is traditionally credited to the 8th-century Hindu philosopher and saint Adi Shankara, as a part of his efforts to start major Hindu gatherings for philosophical discussions and debates along with Hindu monasteries across the Indian subcontinent. However, there is no historical literary evidence of these mass pilgrimages called "Kumbha Mela" prior to the 19th century. There is ample evidence in historical manuscripts and inscriptions of an annual Magha Mela in Hinduism – with periodic larger gatherings after 6 or 12 years – where pilgrims gathered in massive numbers and where one of the rituals included a sacred dip in a river or holy tank. According to Kama MacLean, the socio-political developments during the colonial era and a reaction to Orientalism led to the rebranding and remobilisation of the ancient Magha Mela as the modern era Kumbh Mela, particularly after the Indian Rebellion of 1857.

The weeks over which the festival is observed cycle at each site approximately once every 12 years based on the Hindu luni-solar calendar and the relative astrological positions of Jupiter, the sun and the moon. The difference in Prayag and Haridwar festivals is about 6 years, and both feature a Maha (major) and Ardha (half) Kumbh Melas. The exact years – particularly for the Kumbh Melas at Ujjain and Nashik – have been a subject of dispute in the 20th century. The Nashik and Ujjain festivals have been celebrated in the same year or one year apart, typically about 3 years after the Allahabad / Prayagraj Kumbh Mela. Elsewhere in many parts of India, similar but smaller community pilgrimage and bathing festivals are called the Magha Mela, Makar Mela or equivalent. For example, in Tamil Nadu, the Magha Mela with water-dip ritual is a festival of antiquity. This festival is held at the Mahamaham tank (near Kaveri river) every 12 years at Kumbakonam, attracts millions of South Indian Hindus and has been described as the Tamil Kumbh Mela. Other places where the Magha-Mela or Makar-Mela bathing pilgrimage and fairs have been called Kumbh Mela include Kurukshetra, Sonipat, and Panauti (Nepal).

The Kumbh Melas have three dates around which the significant majority of pilgrims participate, while the festival itself lasts between one and three months around these dates. Each festival attracts millions, with the largest gathering at the Prayag Kumbh Mela and the second largest at Haridwar. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica and Indian authorities, more than 200 million Hindus gathered for the Kumbh Mela in 2019, including 50 million on the festival's most crowded day. The festival is one of the largest peaceful gatherings in the world, and considered as the "world's largest congregation of religious pilgrims". It has been inscribed on the UNESCO's Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The festival is observed over many days, with the day of Amavasya attracting the largest number on a single day. The Kumbh Mela authorities said that the largest one-day attendance at the Kumbh Mela was 30 million on 10 February 2013, and 50 million on 4 February 2019.

Etymology and nomenclature
The Kumbha in Kumbha Mela literally means "pitcher, jar, pot" in Sanskrit. It is found in the Vedic texts, in this sense, often in the context of holding water or in mythical legends about the nectar of immortality. The word Kumbha or its derivatives are found in the Rigveda (1500–1200 BCE), for example, in verse 10.89.7; verse 19.16 of the Yajurveda, verse 6.3 of Samaveda, verse 19.53.3 of the Atharvaveda, and other Vedic and post-Vedic ancient Sanskrit literature. In astrological texts, the term also refers to the zodiac sign of Aquarius. The astrological etymology dates to late 1st-millennium CE, likely influenced by Greek zodiac ideas.

The word mela means "unite, join, meet, move together, assembly, junction" in Sanskrit, particularly in the context of fairs, community celebration. This word too is found in the Rigveda and other ancient Hindu texts. Thus, Kumbh Mela means an "assembly, meet, union" around "water or nectar of immortality".

Mythology
Many Hindus believe that the Kumbh Mela originated in times immemorial and is attested in the Hindu mythology about Samudra Manthana (lit. churning of the ocean) found in the Vedic texts. Historians, in contrast, reject these claims as none of the ancient or medieval era texts that mention the Samudra Manthana legend ever link it to a "mela" or festival. According to Giorgio Bonazzoli – a scholar of Sanskrit Puranas, these are anachronistic explanations, an adaptation of early legends to a later practice by a "small circle of adherents" who have sought roots of a highly popular pilgrimage and festival.

This Hindu legend describes the creation of a "pot of amrita (nectar of immortality)" after the forces of good and evil churn the ocean of creation. The gods and demons fight over this pot, the "kumbha", of nectar in order to gain immortality. In a later day extension to the legend, the pot is spilled at four places, and that is the origin of the four Kumbha Melas. The story varies and is inconsistent, with some stating Vishnu as Mohini avatar, others stating Dhanavantari or Garuda or Indra spilling the pot. This "spilling" and associated Kumbh Mela story is not found in the earliest mentions of the original legend of Samudra Manthana (churning of the ocean) such as the Vedic era texts (pre-500 BCE). Nor is this story found in the later era Puranas (3rd to 10th-century CE).

While the Kumbha Mela phrase is not found in the ancient or medieval era texts, numerous chapters and verses in Hindu texts are found about a bathing festival, the sacred junction of rivers Ganga, Yamuna and mythical Saraswati at Prayag, and pilgrimage to Prayag. These are in the form of Snana (bathe) ritual and in the form of Prayag Mahatmya (greatness of Prayag, historical tour guides in Sanskrit).

History
The earliest mention of Prayag and the bathing pilgrimage is found in Rigveda Pariśiṣṭa (supplement to the Rigveda). It is also mentioned in the Pali canons of Buddhism, such as in section 1.7 of Majjhima Nikaya, wherein the Buddha states that bathing in Payaga (Skt: Prayaga) cannot wash away cruel and evil deeds, rather the virtuous one should be pure in heart and fair in action. The Mahabharata mentions a bathing pilgrimage at Prayag as a means of prāyaścitta (atonement, penance) for past mistakes and guilt. In Tirthayatra Parva, before the great war, the epic states "the one who observes firm [ethical] vows, having bathed at Prayaga during Magha, O best of the Bharatas, becomes spotless and reaches heaven." In Anushasana Parva, after the war, the epic elaborates this bathing pilgrimage as "geographical tirtha" that must be combined with Manasa-tirtha (tirtha of the heart) whereby one lives by values such as truth, charity, self-control, patience and others.

There are other references to Prayaga and river-side festivals in ancient Indian texts, including at the places where present-day Kumbh Melas are held, but the exact age of the Kumbh Mela is uncertain. The 7th-century Buddhist Chinese traveller Xuanzang (Hiuen Tsang) mentions king Harsha and his capital of Prayag, which he states to be a sacred Hindu city with hundreds of "deva temples" and two Buddhist institutions. He also mentions the Hindu bathing rituals at the junction of the rivers. According to some scholars, this is the earliest surviving historical account of the Kumbh Mela, which took place in present-day Prayag in 644 CE.

Kama MacLean – an Indologist who has published articles on the Kumbh Mela predominantly based on the colonial archives and English-language media, states based on emails from other scholars and a more recent interpretation of the 7th-century Xuanzang memoir, the Prayag event happened every 5 years (and not 12 years), featured a Buddha statue, involved alms giving and it might have been a Buddhist festival. In contrast, Ariel Glucklich – a scholar of Hinduism and Anthropology of Religion, the Xuanzang memoir includes, somewhat derisively, the reputation of Prayag as a place where people (Hindus) once committed superstitious devotional suicide to liberate their souls, and how a Brahmin of an earlier era successfully put an end to this practice. This and other details such as the names of temples and bathing pools suggest that Xuanzang presented Hindu practices at Prayag in the 7th century, from his Buddhist perspective and perhaps to "amuse his audience back in China", states Glucklich.

Other early accounts of the significance of Prayag to Hinduism is found in the various versions of the Prayaga Mahatmya, dated to the late 1st-millennium CE. These Purana-genre Hindu texts describe it as a place "bustling with pilgrims, priests, vendors, beggars, guides" and local citizens busy along the confluence of the rivers (Sangam). These Sanskrit guide books of the medieval era India were updated over its editions, likely by priests and guides who had a mutual stake in the economic returns from the visiting pilgrims. One of the longest sections about Prayag rivers and its significance to Hindu pilgrimage is found in chapters 103–112 of the Matsya Purana.

Evolution of earlier melas to Kumbh Melas
According to James Lochtefeld – a scholar of Indian religions, the phrase Kumbh Mela and historical data about it is missing in early Indian texts. However, states Lochtefeld, these historical texts "clearly reveal large, well-established bathing festivals" that were either annual or based on the twelve-year cycle of planet Jupiter. Manuscripts related to Hindu ascetics and warrior-monks – akharas fighting the Islamic Sultanates and Mughal Empire era – mention bathing pilgrimage and a large periodic assembly of Hindus at religious festivals associated with bathing, gift-giving, commerce and organisation. An early account of the Haridwar Kumbh Mela was published by Captain Thomas Hardwicke in 1796 CE.

According to James Mallinson – a scholar of Hindu yoga manuscripts and monastic institutions, bathing festivals at Prayag with large gatherings of pilgrims are attested since "at least the middle of the first millennium CE", while textual evidence exists for similar pilgrimage at other major sacred rivers since the medieval period. Four of these morphed under the Kumbh Mela brand during the East India Company rule (British colonial era) when it sought to control the war-prone monks and the lucrative tax and trade revenues at these Hindu pilgrimage festivals. Additionally, the priests sought the British administration to recognise the festival and protect their religious rights.

The 16th-century Ramcharitmanas of Tulsidas mentions an annual Mela in Prayag, as does a Muslim historian's Ain-i-Akbari (c. 1590 CE). The latter Akbar-era Persian text calls Prayag (spells it Priyag) the "king of shrines" for the Hindus, and mentions that it is considered particularly holy in the Hindu month of Magha. The late 16th-century Tabaqat-i-Akbari also records of an annual bathing festival at Prayag sangam where "various classes of Hindus came from all sides of the country to bathe, in such numbers, that the jungles and plains [around it] were unable to hold them".

The Kumbh Mela of Haridwar appears to be the original Kumbh Mela, since it is held according to the astrological sign "Kumbha" (Aquarius), and because there are several references to a 12-year cycle for it. The later Mughal Empire era texts that contain the term "Kumbha Mela" in Haridwar's context include Khulasat-ut-Tawarikh (1695–1699 CE), and Chahar Gulshan (1759 CE). The Khulasat-ut-Tawarikh also mentions an annual bathing pilgrimage festival in Prayag, but it does not call it Kumbh. Both these Mughal era texts use the term "Kumbh Mela" to describe only Haridwar's fair, mentioning a similar fair held in Prayag and Nashik. The Khulasat-ut-Tawarikh lists the following melas: an annual mela and a Kumbh Mela every 12 years at Haridwar; a mela held at Trimbak when Jupiter enters Leo (that is, once in 12 years); and an annual mela held at Prayag (in modern Prayagraj) in Magh.

Like the Prayag mela, the bathing pilgrimage mela at Nasik and Ujjain are of considerable antiquity. However, these were referred to as Singhasth mela, and the phrase "Kumbh mela" is yet to be found in literature prior to the 19th century. The phrases such as "Maha Kumbh" and "Ardh Kumbh" in the context of the ancient religious pilgrimage festivals with a different name at Prayag, Nasik and Ujjain are evidently of a more modern era.

The Magh Mela of Prayag is probably the oldest among the four modern day Kumbh Melas. It dates from the early centuries CE, given it has been mentioned in several early Puranas. However, the name Kumbh for these more ancient bathing pilgrimages probably dates to the mid-19th century. D. P. Dubey states that none of the ancient Hindu texts call the Prayag fair as a "Kumbh Mela". Kama Maclean states that the early British records do not mention the name "Kumbh Mela" or the 12-year cycle for the Prayag fair. The first British reference to the Kumbh Mela in Prayag occurs only in an 1868 report, which mentions the need for increased pilgrimage and sanitation controls at the "Coomb fair" to be held in January 1870. According to Maclean, the Prayagwal Brahmin priests of Prayag coopted the Kumbh legend and brand to the annual Prayag Magh Mela given the socio-political circumstances in the 19th century.

The Kumbh Mela at Ujjain began in the 18th century, when the Maratha ruler Ranoji Shinde invited ascetics from Nashik to Ujjain for a local festival. Like the priests at Prayag, those at Nashik and Ujjain, competing with other places for a sacred status, may have adopted the Kumbh tradition for their pre-existing Magha melas.

Akharas: Warrior monks, recruitment drive and logistics
One of the key features of the Kumbh mela has been the camps and processions of the sadhus (monks). By the 18th century, many of these had organised into one of thirteen akharas (warrior ascetic bands, monastic militia), of which ten were related to Hinduism and three related to Sikhism. Seven have belonged to the Shaivism tradition, three to Vaishnavism, two to Udasis (founded by Guru Nanak's son) and one to Nirmalas. These soldier-monk traditions have been a well-established feature of the Indian society, and they are prominent feature of the Kumbh melas.

Until the East India Company rule, the Kumbh Melas (Magha Melas) were managed by these akharas. They provide logistical arrangements, policing, intervened and judged any disputes and collected taxes. They also have been a central attraction and a stop for mainstream Hindus who seek their darsana (meeting, view) as well as spiritual guidance and blessings. The Kumbh Melas have been one of their recruitment and initiation venues, as well as the place to trade. These akharas have roots in the Hindu Naga (naked) monks tradition, who went to war without clothes. These monastic groups traditionally credit the Kumbh mela to the 8th-century Hindu philosopher Adi Shankara, as a part of his efforts to start monastic institutions (matha), and major Hindu gatherings for philosophical discussions and debates. However, there is no historic literary evidence that he actually did start the Kumbh melas.

During the 17th century, the akharas competed for ritual primacy, priority rights to who bathes first or at the most auspicious time, and prominence leading to violent conflicts. The records from the East India Company rule era report of violence between the akharas and numerous deaths. At the 1760 Kumbh Mela in Haridwar, a clash broke out between Shaivite Gosains and Vaishnavite Bairagis (ascetics), resulting in hundreds of deaths. A copper plate inscription of the Maratha Peshwa claims that 12,000 ascetics died in a clash between Shaivite sanyasis and Vaishnavite bairagis at the 1789 Nashik Kumbh Mela. The dispute started over the bathing order, which then indicated status of the akharas. At the 1796 Kumbh Mela in Haridwar, violence broke out between the Shaivites and the Udasis on logistics and camping rights.

The repetitive clashes, battle-ready nature of the warrior monks, and the lucrative tax and trading opportunities at Kumbh melas in the 18th-century attracted the attention of the East India Company officials. They intervened, laid out the camps, trading spaces, and established a bathing order for each akhara. After 1947, the state governments have taken over this role and provide the infrastructure for the Kumbh mela in their respective states.

The Kumbh Melas attract many loner sadhus (monks) who do not belong to any akharas. Of those who do belong to a group, the thirteen active akharas have been,
 * 7 Shaiva akharas: Mahanirvani, Atal, Niranjani, Anand, Juna, Avahan, and Agni
 * 3 Vaishnava akharas: Nirvani, Digambar, and Nirmohi
 * 3 Sikh akharas: Bara Panchayati Udasins, Chota Panchayati Udasins, and Nirmal

The ten Shaiva and Vaishnava akharas are also known as the Dasanamis, and they believe that Adi Shankara founded them and one of their traditional duties is dharma-raksha (protection of faith).

Significance and impact
The Kumbh melas of the past, albeit with different regional names, attracted large attendance and have been religiously significant to the Hindus for centuries. However, they have been more than a religious event to the Hindu community. Historically the Kumbh Melas were also major commercial events, initiation of new recruits to the akharas, prayers and community singing, spiritual discussions, education and a spectacle. During the colonial era rule of the East India Company, its officials saw the Hindu pilgrimage as a means to collect vast sums of revenue through a "pilgrim tax" and taxes on the trade that occurred during the festival. According to Dubey, as well as Macclean, the Islamic encyclopaedia Yadgar-i-Bahaduri written in 1834 Lucknow, described the Prayag festival and its sanctity to the Hindus. The British officials, states Dubey, raised the tax to amount greater than average monthly income and the attendance fell drastically. The Prayagwal pandas initially went along, according to colonial records, but later resisted as the impact of the religious tax on the pilgrims became clear. In 1938, Lord Auckland abolished the pilgrim tax and vast numbers returned to the pilgrimage thereafter. According to Macclean, the colonial records of this period on the Prayag Mela present a biased materialistic view given they were written by colonialists and missionaries.

Baptist missionary John Chamberlain, who visited the 1824 Ardh Kumbh Mela at Haridwar, stated that a large number of visitors came there for trade. He also includes a 1814 letter from his missionary friend who distributed copies of the Gospel to the pilgrims and tried to convert some to Christianity. According to an 1858 account of the Haridwar Kumbh Mela by the British civil servant Robert Montgomery Martin, the visitors at the fair included people from a number of races and clime. Along with priests, soldiers, and religious mendicants, the fair had horse traders from Bukhara, Kabul, Turkistan as well as Arabs and Persians. The festival had roadside merchants of food grains, confectioners, clothes, toys and other items. Thousands of pilgrims in every form of transport as well as on foot marched to the pilgrimage site, dressed in colourful costumes, some without clothes, occasionally shouting "Mahadeo Bol" and "Bol, Bol" together. At night the river banks and camps illuminated with oil lamps, fireworks burst over the river, and innumerable floating lamps set by the pilgrims drifted downstream of the river. Several Hindu rajas, Sikh rulers and Muslim Nawabs visited the fair. Europeans watched the crowds and few Christian missionaries distributed their religious literature at the Hardwar Mela, wrote Martin.

Prior to 1838, the British officials collected taxes but provided no infrastructure or services to the pilgrims. This changed particularly after 1857. According to Amna Khalid, the Kumbh Melas emerged as one of the social and political mobilisation venues and the colonial government became keen on monitoring these developments after the Indian rebellion of 1857. The government deployed police to gain this intelligence at the grassroots level of Kumbh Mela. The British officials in co-operation with the native police also made attempts to improve the infrastructure, movement of pilgrims to avoid a stampede, detect sickness, and the sanitary conditions at the Melas. Reports of cholera led the officials to cancel the pilgrimage, but the pilgrims went on "passive resistance" and stated they preferred to die rather than obey the official orders.

Massacres, stampedes and scandals
The Kumbh Melas have been sites of tragedies. According to Sharaf ad-Din Ali Yazdi – the historian and biographer of the Turco-Mongol raider and conqueror Timur, his armies plundered Haridwar and massacred the gathered pilgrims. The ruthlessly slaughtered pilgrims were likely those attending the Kumbh mela of 1399. The Timur accounts mention the mass bathing ritual along with shaving of head, the sacred river Ganges, charitable donations, the place was at the mountainous source of the river and that pilgrims believed a dip in the sacred river leads to their salvation.

Several stampedes have occurred at the Kumbh Melas. After an 1820 stampede at Haridwar killed 485 people, the Company government took extensive infrastructure projects, including the construction of new ghats and road widening, to prevent further stampedes. The various Kumbh melas, in the 19th- and 20th-century witnessed sporadic stampedes, each tragedy leading to changes in how the flow of pilgrims to and from the river and ghats was managed. In 1986, 50 people were killed in a stampede. The Prayag Kumbh mela in 1885 became a source of scandal when a Muslim named Husain was appointed as the Kumbh Mela manager, and Indian newspaper reports stated that Husain had "organised a flotilla of festooned boats for the pleasure of European ladies and gentlemen, and entertained them with dancing girls, liquor and beef" as they watched the pilgrims bathing.

1857 rebellion and the Independence movement
According to the colonial archives, the Prayagwal community associated with the Kumbh Mela were one of those who seeded and perpetuated the resistance and 1857 rebellion to the colonial rule. Prayagwals objected to and campaigned against the colonial government who supported Christian missionaries and officials who treated them and the pilgrims as "ignorant co-religionists" and who aggressively tried to convert the Hindu pilgrims to a Christian sect. During the 1857 rebellion, Colonel Neill targeted the Kumbh mela site and shelled the region where the Prayagwals lived, destroying it in what Maclean describes as a "notoriously brutal pacification of Allahabad". "Prayagwals targeted and destroyed the mission press and churches in Allahabad". Once the British had regained control of the region, the Prayagwals were persecuted by the colonial officials, some convicted and hanged, while others for whom the government did not have proof enough to convict were persecuted. Large tracts of Kumbh mela lands near the Ganga-Yamuna confluence were confiscated and annexed into the government cantonment. In the years after 1857, the Prayagwals and the Kumbh Mela pilgrim crowds carried flags with images alluding to the rebellion and the racial persecution. The British media reported these pilgrim assemblies and protests at the later Kumbh Mela as strangely "hostile" and with "disbelief", states Maclean.

The Kumbh Mela continued to play an important role in the independence movement through 1947, as a place where the native people and politicians periodically gathered in large numbers. In 1906, the Sanatan Dharm Sabha met at the Prayag Kumbh Mela and resolved to start the Banaras Hindu University in Madan Mohan Malaviya's leadership. Kumbh Melas have also been one of the hubs for the Hindutva movement and politics. In 1964, the Vishva Hindu Parishad was founded at the Haridwar Kumbh Mela.

Rising attendance and scale

The historical and modern estimates of attendance vary greatly between sources. For example, the colonial era Imperial Gazetteer of India reported that between 2 and 2.5 million pilgrims attended the Kumbh mela in 1796 and 1808, then added these numbers may be exaggerations. Between 1892 and 1908, in an era of major famines, cholera and plague epidemics in British India, the pilgrimage dropped to between 300,000 and 400,000.

During World War II, the colonial government banned the Kumbh Mela to conserve scarce supplies of fuel. The ban, coupled with false rumours that Japan planned to bomb and commit genocide at the Kumbh mela site, led to sharply lower attendance at the 1942 Kumbh mela than prior decades when an estimated 2 to 4 million pilgrims gathered at each Kumbh mela. After India's independence, the attendance rose sharply. On amavasya – one of the three key bathing dates, over 5 million attended the 1954 Kumbh, about 10 million attended the 1977 Kumbh while the 1989 Kumbh attracted about 15 million.

On 14 April 1998, 10 million pilgrims attended the Kumb Mela at Haridwar on the busiest single day, according to the Himalayan Academy editors. In 2001, IKONOS satellite images confirmed a very large human gathering, with officials estimating 70 million people over the festival, including more than 40 million on the busiest single day according to BBC News. Another estimate states that about 30 million attended the 2001 Kumbh mela on the busiest mauni amavasya day alone.

In 2007, as many as 70 million pilgrims attended the 45-day long Ardha Kumbh Mela at Prayagraj. In 2013, 120 million pilgrims attended the Kumbh Mela at Prayagraj. Nasik has registered maximum visitors to 75 million.

Maha Kumbh at Prayagraj is the largest in the world, the attendance and scale of preparation of which keeps rising with each successive celebration. For the 2019 Ardh Kumbh at Prayagraj, the preparations include a inr 420000000000 temporary city over 2,500 hectares with 122,000 temporary toilets and range of accommodation from simple dormitory tents to 5-star tents, 800 special trains by the Indian Railways, artificially intelligent video surveillance and analytics by IBM, disease surveillance, river transport management by Inland Waterways Authority of India, and an app to help the visitors.

The Kumbh mela is "widely regarded as the world's largest religious gathering", states James Lochtefeld. According to Kama Maclean, the coordinators and attendees themselves state that a part of the glory of the Kumbh festival is in that "feeling of brotherhood and love" where millions peacefully gather on the river banks in harmony and a sense of shared heritage.

Types
The Kumbh Mela are classified as:
 * The Purna Kumbh Mela (sometimes just called Kumbh or "full Kumbha"), occurs every 12 years at a given site.
 * The Ardh Kumbh Mela ("half Kumbh") occurs approximately every 6 years between the two Purna Kumbha Melas at Prayagraj and Haridwar.
 * The Maha Kumbh, which occurs every 12 Purna Kumbh Melas i.e. after every 144 years.

For the 2019 Prayagraj Kumbh Mela, the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath announced that the Ardh Kumbh Mela (organised every 6 years) will simply be known as "Kumbh Mela", and the Kumbh Mela (organised every 12 years) will be known as "Maha Kumbh Mela" ("Great Kumbh Mela").

Locations

Numerous sites and fairs have been locally referred to be their Kumbh Melas. Of these, four sites are broadly recognised as the Kumbh Melas: Prayagraj, Haridwar, Trimbak-Nashik and Ujjain. Other locations that are sometimes called Kumbh melas – with the bathing ritual and a significant participation of pilgrims – include Kurukshetra, and Sonipat.

Dates
Each site's celebration dates are calculated in advance according to a special combination of zodiacal positions of Bṛhaspati (Jupiter), Surya (the Sun) and Chandra (the Moon). The relative years vary between the four sites, but the cycle repeats about every 12 years. Since Jupiter's orbit completes in 11.86 years, a calendar year adjustment appears in approximately 8 cycles. Therefore, approximately once a century, the Kumbh mela returns to a site after 11 years.

Past years
Kumbh Mela at Prayagraj is celebrated approximately 3 years after Kumbh at Haridwar and 3 years before Kumbh at Nashik and Ujjain (both of which are celebrated in the same year or one year apart).

Historical Festival management
The Kumbh Mela attracts tens of millions of pilgrims. Providing for a safe and pleasant temporary stay at the festival site is a complex and challenging task. The camping (santhas/akharas), food, water, sanitation, emergency health care, fire services, policing, disaster management preparations, the movement of people require significant prior planning. Further, assistance to those with special needs and lost family members through Bhule-Bhatke Kendra demands extensive onsite communication and co-ordination. In the case of Prayag in particular, the festival site is predominantly submerged during the monsoon months. The festival management workers have only two and a half months to start and complete the construction of all temporarily infrastructure necessary for the pilgrims, making the task even more challenging.

In 2013, the Indian government authorities, in co-operation with seva volunteers, monks and Indian companies, set up 11 sectors with 55 camp clusters, providing round-the-clock first aid, ambulance, pharmacy, sector cleaning, sanitation, food and water distribution (setting up 550 km of pipelines operated by 42 pumps), cooking fuel, and other services. According to Baranwal et al., their 13-day field study of the 2013 Kumbh mela found that "the Mela committee and all other agencies involved in Mela management successfully supervised the event and made it convenient, efficient and safe," an assessment shared by the US-based Center for Disease Control for the Nasik Kumbh mela.

Bathing and processions
Bathing, or a dip in the river waters, with a prayer, is the central ritual of the Kumbh Melas for all pilgrims. Traditionally, on amavasya – the most cherished day for bathing – the Hindu pilgrims welcome and wait for the thirteen sadhu akharas to bathe first. This event – called shahi snan or rajyogi snan – is marked by a celebratory processional march, with banners, flags, elephants, horses and musicians along with the naked or scantily clad monks, some smeared with bhasma (ashes). These monastic institutions come from different parts of India, have a particular emblem symbol and deity (Ganesha, Dattatreya, Hanuman, etc.). The largest contingent is the Juna akhara, traced to Adi Shankara, representing a diverse mix from the four of the largest Hindu monasteries in India with their headquarters at Sringeri, Dvarka, Jyotirmatha and Govardhana. The Mahanirbani and Niranjani are the other large contingents, and each akhara has their own lineage of saints and teachers. Large crowds gather in reverence and cheer for this procession of monks. Once these monks have taken the dip, the festival day opens for bathing by the pilgrims from far and near the site.

The bathing ritual by the pilgrims may be aided by a Prayagwal priest or maybe a simple dip that is private. When aided, the rituals may begin with mundan (shaving of head), prayers with offerings such as flowers, sindur (vermilion), milk or coconut, along with the recitation of hymns with shradha (prayers in the honour of one's ancestors). More elaborate ceremonies include a yajna (homa) led by a priest. After these river-side rituals, the pilgrim then takes a dip in the water, stands up, prays for a short while, then exits the river waters. Many then proceed to visit old Hindu temples near the site.

The motivations for the bathing ritual are several. The most significant is the belief that the tirtha (pilgrimage) to the Kumbh Mela sites and then bathing in these holy rivers has a salvific value, moksha – a means to liberation from the cycle of rebirths (samsara). The pilgrimage is also recommended in Hindu texts to those who have made mistakes or sinned, repent their errors and as a means of prāyaścitta (atonement, penance) for these mistakes. Pilgrimage and bathing in holy rivers with a motivation to do penance and as a means to self-purify has Vedic precedents and is discussed in the early dharma literature of Hinduism. Its epics such as the Mahabharata describe Yudhisthira in a state full of sorrow and despair after participating in the violence of the great war that killed many. He goes to a saint, who advises him to go on a pilgrimage to Prayag and bathe in river Ganges as a means of penance.

Feasts, festivities and discussions
Some pilgrims walk considerable distances and arrive barefoot, as a part of their religious tradition. Most pilgrims stay for a day or two, but some stay the entire month of Magh during the festival and live an austere life during the stay. They attend spiritual discourses, fast and pray over the month, and these Kumbh pilgrims are called kalpavasis.

The festival site is strictly vegetarian by tradition, as violence against animals is considered unacceptable. Many pilgrims practice partial (one meal a day) or full vrata (day-long fasting), some abstain from elaborate meals. These ritual practices are punctuated by celebratory feasts where vast number of people sit in rows and share a community meal – mahaprasada – prepared by volunteers from charitable donations. By tradition, families and companies sponsor these anna dana (food charity) events, particularly for the monks and the poor pilgrims. The management has established multiple food stalls, offering delicacies from different states of India.

Other activities at the mela include religious discussions (pravachan), devotional singing (kirtan), and religious assemblies where doctrines are debated and standardised (shastrartha). The festival grounds also feature a wide range of cultural spectacles over the month of celebrations. These include kalagram (venues of kala, Indian arts), laser light shows, classical dance and musical performances from different parts of India, thematic gates reflecting the historic regional architectural diversity, boat rides, tourist walks to historic sites near the river, as well opportunities to visit the monastic camps to watch yoga adepts and spiritual discourses.

Darshan
Darshan, or viewing, is an important part of the Kumbh Mela. People make the pilgrimage to the Kumbh Mela specifically to observe and experience both the religious and secular aspects of the event. Two major groups that participate in the Kumbh Mela include the Sadhus (Hindu holy men) and pilgrims. Through their continual yogic practices the Sadhus articulate the transitory aspect of life. Sadhus travel to the Kumbh Mela to make themselves available to much of the Hindu public. This allows members of the Hindu public to interact with the Sadhus and to take "darshan". They are able to "seek instruction or advice in their spiritual lives." Darshan focuses on the visual exchange, where there is interaction with a religious deity and the worshiper is able to visually "'drink' divine power." The Kumbh Mela is arranged in camps that give Hindu worshipers access to the Sadhus. The darshan is important to the experience of the Kumbh Mela and because of this worshipers must be careful so as to not displease religious deities. Seeing of the Sadhus is carefully managed and worshipers often leave tokens at their feet.

In culture
Kumbh Mela has been theme for many documentaries, including Kings with Straw Mats (1998) directed by Ira Cohen, Kumbh Mela: The Greatest Show on Earth (2001) directed by Graham Day, Short Cut to Nirvana: Kumbh Mela (2004) directed by Nick Day and produced by "Maurizio Benazzo", Kumbh Mela: Songs of the River (2004) by Nadeem Uddin, Invocation, Kumbh Mela (2008), Kumbh Mela 2013: Living with Mahatiagi (2013) by the Ukrainian Religious Studies Project Ahamot, and Kumbh Mela: Walking with the Nagas (2011), Amrit: Nectar of Immortality (2012) directed by Jonas Scheu and Philipp Eyer.

In 2007, National Geographic filmed and broadcast a documentary of the Prayag Kumbh Mela, named Inside Nirvana, under the direction of Karina Holden with the scholar Kama Maclean as a consultant. In 2013, the National Geographic returned and filmed the Inside the Mahakumbh. Indian and foreign news media have covered the Kumbh Mela regularly. On 18 April 2010, a popular American morning show CBS News Sunday Morning extensively covered Haridwar's Kumbh Mela, calling it "The Largest Pilgrimage on Earth". On 28 April 2010, the BBC reported an audio and a video report on Kumbh Mela, titled "Kumbh Mela: 'greatest show on earth'". On 30 September 2010, the Kumbh Mela featured in the second episode of the Sky One TV series An Idiot Abroad with Karl Pilkington visiting the festival.

Young siblings getting separated at the Kumbh Mela were once a recurring theme in Hindi movies. Amrita Kumbher Sandhane, a 1982 Bengali feature film directed by Dilip Roy, also documents the Kumbh Mela.

Ashish Avikunthak's Bengali-language feature length fiction film Kalkimanthakatha (2015), was shot in the Prayag Kumbh Mela in 2013. In this film, two characters search for the tenth avatar and the final avtar of Lord Vishnu – Kalki, in the lines of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot.

title: Kumbh Mela


text:
Talk:Pandoro

Contents
Panettone does not contain citron or pine nuts! The traditional recipe wants candied fruit and raisins. No anise or chocolate. In the last years variations on panettone and pandoro included or excluded ingredients (with chocolate, no candied fruit or no raisins, etc) but these are only variations: commercial variations. Simonetta - Roma - Italy

And Pandoro does not come in a "cone" shape!! it has a very distictive star section, it is served covered in icing sugar and very often cut horizontally, then the slices are rotated 20-30 degrees in order to alternate the star "points" and create a Xmas tree shape - of sorts...

Dipped in coffe, tea, milk????? we are not talking about a "cornetto" with which most Italians start their day...Pandoro is served as a pudding, generally "nature", occasionally with sauces such as a mascarpone sauce (mascarpone cheese, sugar, eggs) or less traditionally a chocolate ganache(cream, chocolate). Who writes this stuff??

Need to find material on the relation between Ofella and Pandoro. This site http://www.cittadiverona.it/guide/prodotti-tipici/dolci.php proposes that the Ofella was developed from the Nadalin, this other suggests that the Ofella was the ancestor of the Pandoro http://www.tourism.verona.it/_vti_g2_pian1.aspx?rpstry=27_ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.103.18.60 (talk) 23:44, 17 December 2003 (UTC)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Talk:Pandoro


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User:Akajune

I'm new here. hahaa BracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracket BracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracketBracket dotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolon dotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolon dotcolondotcolondotcolondotcolon MetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphorm MetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphorm MetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphormMetaphorm MetaphormMetaphormMetaphorm MetaphormMetaphorm Metaphorm --Akajune 03:37, 7 Dec 2004 (UTC)

title: User:Akajune


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Structuration theory

The theory of structuration is a social theory of the creation and reproduction of social systems that is based on the analysis of both structure and agents (see structure and agency), without giving primacy to either. Furthermore, in structuration theory, neither micro- nor macro-focused analysis alone is sufficient. The theory was proposed by sociologist Anthony Giddens, most significantly in The Constitution of Society, which examines phenomenology, hermeneutics, and social practices at the inseparable intersection of structures and agents. Its proponents have adopted and expanded this balanced position. Though the theory has received much criticism, it remains a pillar of contemporary sociological theory.

Premises and origins
Sociologist Anthony Giddens adopted a post-empiricist frame for his theory, as he was concerned with the abstract characteristics of social relations. This leaves each level more accessible to analysis via the ontologies which constitute the human social experience: space and time ("and thus, in one sense, 'history'.") His aim was to build a broad social theory which viewed "[t]he basic domain of study of the social sciences... [as] neither the experience of the individual actor, nor the existence of any form of societal totality, but social practices ordered across space and time." His focus on abstract ontology accompanied a general and purposeful neglect of epistemology or detailed research methodology, consistent with other types of pragmatism.

Giddens used concepts from objectivist and subjectivist social theories, discarding objectivism's focus on detached structures, which lacked regard for humanist elements and subjectivism's exclusive attention to individual or group agency without consideration for socio-structural context. He critically engaged classical nineteenth and early twentieth century social theorists such as Auguste Comte, Karl Marx, Max Weber, Émile Durkheim, Alfred Schutz, Robert K. Merton, Erving Goffman, and Jürgen Habermas. Thus, in many ways, structuration was "an exercise in clarification of logical issues." Structuration drew on other fields, as well: "He also wanted to bring in from other disciplines novel aspects of ontology that he felt had been neglected by social theorists working in the domains that most interested him. Thus, for example, he enlisted the aid of geographers, historians and philosophers in bringing notions of time and space into the central heartlands of social theory." Giddens hoped that a subject-wide "coming together" might occur which would involve greater cross-disciplinary dialogue and cooperation, especially between anthropologists, social scientists and sociologists of all types, historians, geographers, and even novelists. Believing that "literary style matters", he held that social scientists are communicators who share frames of meaning across cultural contexts through their work by utilising "the same sources of description (mutual knowledge) as novelists or others who write fictional accounts of social life."

Structuration differs from its historical sources. Unlike structuralism it sees the reproduction of social systems not "as a mechanical outcome, [but] rather ... as an active constituting process, accomplished by, and consisting in, the doings of active subjects." Unlike Althusser's concept of agents as "bearers" of structures, structuration theory sees them as active participants. Unlike the philosophy of action and other forms of interpretative sociology, structuration focuses on structure rather than production exclusively. Unlike Saussure's production of an utterance, structuration sees language as a tool from which to view society, not as the constitution of society—parting with structural linguists such as Claude Lévi-Strauss and generative grammar theorists such as Noam Chomsky. Unlike post-structuralist theory, which put similar focus on the effects of time and space, structuration does not recognise movement, change and transition. Unlike functionalism, in which structures and their virtual synonyms, "systems", comprise organisations, structuration sees structures and systems as separate concepts. Unlike Marxism, structuration avoids an overly restrictive concept of "society" and Marxism's reliance on a universal "motor of history" (i.e. class conflict), its theories of societal "adaptation", and its insistence on the working class as universal class and socialism as the ultimate form of modern society. Finally, "structuration theory cannot be expected to furnish the moral guarantees that critical theorists sometimes purport to offer."

Duality of structure
Giddens observed that in social analysis, the term structure referred generally to "rules and resources" and more specifically to "the structuring properties allowing the 'binding' of time-space in social systems". These properties make it possible for similar social practices to exist across time and space and that lend them "systemic" form. Agents—groups or individuals—draw upon these structures to perform social actions through embedded memory, called memory traces. Memory traces are thus the vehicle through which social actions are carried out. Structure is also, however, the result of these social practices. Thus, Giddens conceives of the duality of structure as being: "...the essential recursiveness of social life, as constituted in social practices: structure is both medium and outcome of reproduction of practices. Structure enters simultaneously into the constitution of the agent and social practices, and 'exists' in the generating moments of this constitution."

Giddens uses "the duality of structure" (i.e. material/ideational, micro/macro) to emphasize structure's nature as both medium and outcome. Structures exist both internally within agents as memory traces that are the product of phenomenological and hermeneutic inheritance and externally as the manifestation of social actions. Similarly, social structures contain agents and/or are the product of past actions of agents. Giddens holds this duality, alongside "structure" and "system," in addition to the concept of recursiveness, as the core of structuration theory. His theory has been adopted by those with structuralist inclinations, but who wish to situate such structures in human practice rather than to reify them as an ideal type or material property. (This is different, for example, from actor–network theory which appears to grant a certain autonomy to technical artifacts.)

Social systems have patterns of social relation that change over time; the changing nature of space and time determines the interaction of social relations and therefore structure. Hitherto, social structures or models were either taken to be beyond the realm of human control—the positivistic approach—or posit that action creates them—the interpretivist approach. The duality of structure emphasizes that they are different sides to the same central question of how social order is created.

Gregor McLennan suggested renaming this process "the duality of structure ", since both aspects are involved in using and producing social actions.

Cycle of structuration
The duality of structure is essentially a feedback–feedforward process whereby agents and structures mutually enact social systems, and social systems in turn become part of that duality. Structuration thus recognizes a social cycle. In examining social systems, structuration theory examines structure, modality, and interaction. The "modality" (discussed below) of a structural system is the means by which structures are translated into actions.

Interaction
Interaction is the agent's activity within the social system, space and time. "It can be understood as the fitful yet routinized occurrence of encounters, fading away in time and space, yet constantly reconstituted within different areas of time-space." Rules can affect interaction, as originally suggested by Goffman. "Frames" are "clusters of rules which help to constitute and regulate activities, defining them as activities of a certain sort and as subject to a given range of sanctions." Frames are necessary for agents to feel "ontological security, the trust that everyday actions have some degree of predictability. Whenever individuals interact in a specific context they address—without any difficulty and in many cases without conscious acknowledgement—the question: "What is going on here?" Framing is the practice by which agents make sense of what they are doing.

Routinization
Structuration theory is centrally concerned with order as "the transcending of time and space in human social relationships". Institutionalized action and routinization are foundational in the establishment of social order and the reproduction of social systems. Routine persists in society, even during social and political revolutions, where daily life is greatly deformed, "as Bettelheim demonstrates so well, routines, including those of an obnoxious sort, are re-established." Routine interactions become institutionalized features of social systems via tradition, custom and/or habit, but this is no easy societal task and it "is a major error to suppose that these phenomena need no explanation. On the contrary, as Goffman (together with ethnomethodology) has helped to demonstrate, the routinized character of most social activity is something that has to be 'worked at' continually by those who sustain it in their day-to-day conduct." Therefore, routinized social practices do not stem from coincidence, "but the skilled accomplishments of knowledgeable agents."

Trust and tact are essential for the existence of a "basic security system, the sustaining (in praxis) of a sense of ontological security, and [thus] the routine nature of social reproduction which agents skilfully organize. The monitoring of the body, the control and use of face in 'face work'—these are fundamental to social integration in time and space."

Explanation
"When I utter a sentence I draw upon various syntactical rules (sedimented in my practical consciousness of the language) in order to do so. These structural features of the language are the medium whereby I generate the utterance. But in producing a syntactically correct utterance I simultaneously contribute to the reproduction of the language as a whole. ...The relation between moment and totality for social theory... [involves] a dialectic of presence and absence which ties the most minor or trivial forms of social action to structural properties of the overall society, and to the coalescence of institutions over long stretches of historical time." Thus, even the smallest social actions contribute to the alteration or reproduction of social systems. Social stability and order is not permanent; agents always possess a dialectic of control (discussed below) which allows them to break away from normative actions. Depending on the social factors present, agents may cause shifts in social structure.

The cycle of structuration is not a defined sequence; it is rarely a direct succession of causal events. Structures and agents are both internal and external to each other, mingling, interrupting, and continually changing each other as feedbacks and feedforwards occur. Giddens stated, "The degree of "systemness" is very variable. ...I take it to be one of the main features of structuration theory that the extension and 'closure' of societies across space and time is regarded as problematic."

The use of "patriot" in political speech reflects this mingling, borrowing from and contributing to nationalistic norms and supports structures such as a police state, from which it in turn gains impact.

Structure and society
Structures are the "rules and resources" embedded in agents' memory traces. Agents call upon their memory traces of which they are "knowledgeable" to perform social actions. "Knowledgeability" refers to "what agents know about what they do, and why they do it." Giddens divides memory traces (structures-within-knowledgeability ) into three types:
 * Domination (power): Giddens also uses "resources" to refer to this type. "Authoritative resources" allow agents to control persons, whereas "allocative resources" allow agents to control material objects.
 * Signification (meaning): Giddens suggests that meaning is inferred through structures. Agents use existing experience to infer meaning. For example, the meaning of living with mental illness comes from contextualized experiences.
 * Legitimation (norms): Giddens sometimes uses "rules" to refer to either signification or legitimation. An agent draws upon these stocks of knowledge via memory to inform him or herself about the external context, conditions, and potential results of an action.

When an agent uses these structures for social interactions, they are called modalities and present themselves in the forms of facility (domination), interpretive scheme/communication (signification) and norms/sanctions (legitimation).

Thus, he distinguishes between overall "structures-within-knowledgeability" and the more limited and task-specific "modalities" on which these agents subsequently draw when they interact.

The duality of structures means that structures enter "simultaneously into the constitution of the agent and social practices, and 'exists' in the generating moments of this constitution." "Structures exist paradigmatically, as an absent set of differences, temporally "present" only in their instantiation, in the constituting moments of social systems." Giddens draws upon structuralism and post-structuralism in theorizing that structures and their meaning are understood by their differences.

Agents and society
Giddens' agents follow previous psychoanalysis work done by Sigmund Freud and others. Agency, as Giddens calls it, is human action. To be human is to be an agent (not all agents are human). Agency is critical to both the reproduction and the transformation of society. Another way to explain this concept is by what Giddens calls the "reflexive monitoring of actions." "Reflexive monitoring" refers to agents' ability to monitor their actions and those actions' settings and contexts. Monitoring is an essential characteristic of agency. Agents subsequently "rationalize," or evaluate, the success of those efforts. All humans engage in this process, and expect the same from others. Through action, agents produce structures; through reflexive monitoring and rationalization, they transform them. To act, agents must be motivated, must be knowledgeable must be able to rationalize the action; and must reflexively monitor the action.

Agents, while bounded in structure, draw upon their knowledge of that structural context when they act. However, actions are constrained by agents' inherent capabilities and their understandings of available actions and external limitations. Practical consciousness and discursive consciousness inform these abilities. Practical consciousness is the knowledgeability that an agent brings to the tasks required by everyday life, which is so integrated as to be hardly noticed. Reflexive monitoring occurs at the level of practical consciousness. Discursive consciousness is the ability to verbally express knowledge. Alongside practical and discursive consciousness, Giddens recognizes actors as having reflexive, contextual knowledge, and that habitual, widespread use of knowledgeability makes structures become institutionalized.

Agents rationalize, and in doing so, link the agent and the agent's knowledgeability. Agents must coordinate ongoing projects, goals, and contexts while performing actions. This coordination is called reflexive monitoring and is connected to ethnomethodology's emphasis on agents' intrinsic sense of accountability.

The factors that can enable or constrain an agent, as well as how an agent uses structures, are known as capability constraints include age, cognitive/physical limits on performing multiple tasks at once and the physical impossibility of being in multiple places at once, available time and the relationship between movement in space and movement in time.

Location offers are a particular type of capability constraint. Examples include:
 * Locale
 * Regionalization: political or geographical zones, or rooms in a building
 * Presence: Do other actors participate in the action? (see co-presence); and more specifically
 * Physical presence: Are other actors physically nearby?

Agents are always able to engage in a dialectic of control, able to "intervene in the world or to refrain from such intervention, with the effect of influencing a specific process or state of affairs." In essence, agents experience inherent and contrasting amounts of autonomy and dependence; agents can always either act or not.

Methodology
Structuration theory is relevant to research, but does not prescribe a methodology and its use in research has been problematic. Giddens intended his theory to be abstract and theoretical, informing the hermeneutic aspects of research rather than guiding practice. Giddens wrote that structuration theory "establishes the internal logical coherence of concepts within a theoretical network." Giddens criticized many researchers who used structuration theory for empirical research, critiquing their "en bloc" use of the theory's abstract concepts in a burdensome way. "The works applying concepts from the logical framework of structuration theory that Giddens approved of were those that used them more selectively, 'in a spare and critical fashion.'" Giddens and followers used structuration theory more as "a sensitizing device".

Structuration theory allows researchers to focus on any structure or concept individually or in combination. In this way, structuration theory prioritizes ontology over epistemology. In his own work, Giddens focuses on production and reproduction of social practices in some context. He looked for stasis and change, agent expectations, relative degrees of routine, tradition, behavior, and creative, skillful, and strategic thought simultaneously. He examined spatial organization, intended and unintended consequences, skilled and knowledgeable agents, discursive and tacit knowledge, dialectic of control, actions with motivational content, and constraints. Structuration theorists conduct analytical research of social relations, rather than organically discovering them, since they use structuration theory to reveal specific research questions, though that technique has been criticized as cherry-picking.

Giddens preferred strategic conduct analysis, which focuses on contextually situated actions. It employs detailed accounts of agents' knowledgeability, motivation, and the dialectic of control.

Criticisms and additions
Though structuration theory has received critical expansion since its origination, Giddens' concepts remained pivotal for later extension of the theory, especially the duality of structure.

Strong structuration
Rob Stones argued that many aspects of Giddens' original theory had little place in its modern manifestation. Stones focused on clarifying its scope, reconfiguring some concepts and inserting new ones, and refining methodology and research orientations. Strong structuration:
 * 1) Places its ontology more in situ than abstractly.
 * 2) Introduces the quadripartite cycle, which details the elements in the duality of structure. These are:
 * 3) * external structures as conditions of action;
 * 4) * internal structures within the agent;
 * 5) * active agency, "including a range of aspects involved when agents draw upon internal structures in producing practical action"; and
 * 6) * outcomes (as both structures and events).
 * 7) Increases attention to epistemology and methodology. Ontology supports epistemology and methodology by prioritising:
 * 8) * the question-at-hand;
 * 9) * appropriate forms of methodological bracketing;
 * 10) * distinct methodological steps in research; and
 * 11) * "[t]he specific combinations of all the above in composite forms of research."
 * 12) Discovers the "meso-level of ontology between the abstract, philosophical level of ontology and the in-situ, ontic level." Strong structuration allows varied abstract ontological concepts in experiential conditions.
 * 13) Focuses on the meso-level at the temporal and spatial scale.
 * 14) Conceptualises independent causal forces and irresistible causal forces, which take into account how external structures, internal structures, and active agency affect agent choices (or lack of them). "Irresistible forces" are the connected concepts of a horizon of action with a set of "actions-in-hand" and a hierarchical ordering of purposes and concerns. An agent is affected by external influences. This aspect of strong structuration helps reconcile an agent's dialectic of control and his/her more constrained set of "real choices."

Post-structuration and dualism
Margaret Archer objected to the inseparability of structure and agency in structuration theory. She proposed a notion of dualism rather than "duality of structure". She primarily examined structural frameworks and the action within the limits allowed by those conditions. She combined realist ontology and called her methodology analytical dualism. Archer maintained that structure precedes agency in social structure reproduction and analytical importance, and that they should be analysed separately. She emphasised the importance of temporality in social analysis, dividing it into four stages: structural conditioning, social interaction, its immediate outcome and structural elaboration. Thus her analysis considered embedded "structural conditions, emergent causal powers and properties, social interactions between agents, and subsequent structural changes or reproductions arising from the latter." Archer criticised structuration theory for denying time and place because of the inseparability between structure and agency.

Nicos Mouzelis reconstructed Giddens' original theories. Mouzelis kept Giddens' original formulation of structure as "rules and resources." However, he was considered a dualist, because he argued for dualism to be as important in social analysis as the duality of structure. Mouzelis reexamined human social action at the "syntagmatic" (syntactic) level. He claimed that the duality of structure does not account for all types of social relationships. Duality of structure works when agents do not question or disrupt rules, and interaction resembles "natural/performative" actions with a practical orientation. However, in other contexts, the relationship between structure and agency can resemble dualism more than duality, such as systems that are the result of powerful agents. In these situations, rules are not viewed as resources, but are in states of transition or redefinition, where actions are seen from a "strategic/monitoring orientation." In this orientation, dualism shows the distance between agents and structures. He called these situations "syntagmatic duality". For example, a professor can change the class he or she teaches, but has little capability to change the larger university structure. "In that case, syntagmatic duality gives way to syntagmatic dualism." This implies that systems are the outcome, but not the medium, of social actions. Mouzelis also criticised Giddens' lack of consideration for social hierarchies.

John Parker built on Archer and Mouzelis's support for dualism to propose a theoretical reclamation of historical sociology and macro-structures using concrete historical cases, claiming that dualism better explained the dynamics of social structures. Equally, Robert Archer developed and applied analytical dualism in his critical analysis of the impact of New Managerialism on education policy in England and Wales during the 1990s and organization theory.

John B. Thompson
Though he agreed with the soundness and overall purposes of Giddens' most expansive structuration concepts (i.e., against dualism and for the study of structure in concert with agency), John B. Thompson ("a close friend and colleague of Giddens at Cambridge University") wrote one of the most widely cited critiques of structuration theory. His central argument was that it needed to be more specific and more consistent both internally and with conventional social structure theory. Thompson focused on problematic aspects of Giddens' concept of structure as "rules and resources," focusing on "rules". He argued that Giddens' concept of rule was too broad.

Thompson claimed that Giddens presupposed a criterion of importance in contending that rules are a generalizable enough tool to apply to every aspect of human action and interaction; "on the other hand, Giddens is well aware that rules, or some kinds or aspects of rules, are much more important than others for the analysis of, for example, the social structure of capitalist societies." He found the term to be imprecise and to not designate which rules are more relevant for which social structures.

Thompson used the example of linguistic analysis to point out that the need for a prior framework which to enable analysis of, for example, the social structure of an entire nation. While semantic rules may be relevant to social structure, to study them "presupposes some structural points of reference which are not themselves, with regard to which [of] these semantic rules are differentiated" according to class, sex, region and so on. He called this structural differentiation.

Rules differently affect variously situated individuals. Thompson gave the example of a private school which restricts enrollment and thus participation. Thus rules—in this case, restrictions—"operate, affecting unevenly various groups of individuals whose categorization depends on certain assumptions about social structures." The isolated analysis of rules does not incorporate differences among agents.

Thompson claimed that Giddens offered no way of formulating structural identity. Some "rules" are better conceived of as broad inherent elements that define a structure's identity (e.g., Henry Ford and Harold Macmillan are "capitalistic"). These agents may differ, but have important traits in common due to their "capitalistic" identity. Thompson theorized that these traits were not rules in the sense that a manager could draw upon a "rule" to fire a tardy employee; rather, they were which " the kinds of rules which are possible and which thereby  the scope for institutional variation." It is necessary to outline the broader social system to be able to analyze agents, actors, and rules within that system.

Thus Thompson concluded that Giddens' use of the term "rules" is problematic. "Structure" is similarly objectionable: "But to adhere to this conception of structure, while at the same time acknowledging the need for the study of 'structural principles,' 'structural sets' and 'axes of structuration,' is simply a recipe for conceptual confusion."

Thompson proposed several amendments. He requested sharper differentiation between the reproduction of institutions and the reproduction of social structure. He proposed an altered version of the structuration cycle. He defined "institutions" as "characterized by rules, regulations and conventions of various sorts, by differing kinds and quantities of resources and by hierarchical power relations between the occupants of institutional positions." Agents acting within institutions and conforming to institutional rules and regulations or using institutionally endowed power reproduce the institution. "If, in so doing, the institutions continue to satisfy certain structural conditions, both in the sense of conditions which delimit the scope for institutional variation and the conditions which underlie the operation of structural differentiation, then the agents may be said to reproduce social structure."

Thompson also proposed adding a range of alternatives to Giddens' conception of constraints on human action. He pointed out the paradoxical relationship between Giddens' "dialectic of control" and his acknowledgement that constraints may leave an agent with no choice. He demanded that Giddens better show how wants and desires relate to choice.

Giddens replied that a structural principle is not equivalent with rules, and pointed to his definition from A Contemporary Critique of Historical Materialism: "Structural principles are principles of organisation implicated in those practices most "deeply" (in time) and "pervasively" (in space) sedimented in society", and described structuration as a "mode of institutional articulation"  with emphasis on the relationship between time and space and a host of institutional orderings including, but not limited to, rules.

Ultimately, Thompson concluded that the concept of structure as "rules and resources" in an elemental and ontological way resulted in conceptual confusion. Many theorists supported Thompson's argument that an analysis "based on structuration's ontology of structures as norms, interpretative schemes and power resources radically limits itself if it does not frame and locate itself within a more broadly conceived notion of social structures."

Change
Sewell provided a useful summary that included one of the theory's less specified aspects: the question "Why are structural transformations possible?" He claimed that Giddens' overrelied on rules and modified Giddens' argument by re-defining "resources" as the embodiment of cultural schemas. He argued that change arises from the multiplicity of structures, the transposable nature of schemas, the unpredictability of resource accumulation, the polysemy of resources and the intersection of structures.

The existence of multiple structures implies that the knowledgeable agents whose actions produce systems are capable of applying different schemas to contexts with differing resources, contrary to the conception of a universal habitus (learned dispositions, skills and ways of acting). He wrote that "Societies are based on practices that derived from many distinct structures, which exist at different levels, operate in different modalities, and are themselves based on widely varying types and quantities of resources. ...It is never true that all of them are homologous."

Originally from Bourdieu, transposable schemas can be "applied to a wide and not fully predictable range of cases outside the context in which they were initially learned." That capacity "is inherent in the knowledge of cultural schemas that characterizes all minimally competent members of society."

Agents may modify schemas even though their use does not predictably accumulate resources. For example, the effect of a joke is never quite certain, but a comedian may alter it based on the amount of laughter it garners regardless of this variability.

Agents may interpret a particular resource according to different schemas. E.g., a commander could attribute his wealth to military prowess, while others could see it as a blessing from the gods or a coincidental initial advantage.

Structures often overlap, confusing interpretation (e.g., the structure of capitalist society includes production from both private property and worker solidarity).

Technology
This theory was adapted and augmented by researchers interested in the relationship between technology and social structures, such as information technology in organizations. DeSanctis and Poole proposed an "adaptive structuration theory" with respect to the emergence and use of group decision support systems. In particular, they chose Giddens' notion of modalities to consider how technology is used with respect to its "spirit". "Appropriations" are the immediate, visible actions that reveal deeper structuration processes and are enacted with "moves". Appropriations may be faithful or unfaithful, be instrumental and be used with various attitudes.

Wanda Orlikowski applied the duality of structure to technology: "The duality of technology identifies prior views of technology as either objective force or as socially constructed product–as a false dichotomy." She compared this to previous models (the technological imperative, strategic choice, and technology as a trigger) and considered the importance of meaning, power, norms, and interpretive flexibility. Orlikowski later replaced the notion of embedded properties for enactment (use). The "practice lens" shows how people enact structures which shape their use of technology that they employ in their practices. While Orlikowski's work focused on corporations, it is equally applicable to the technology cultures that have emerged in smaller community-based organizations, and can be adapted through the gender sensitivity lens in approaches to technology governance.

Workman, Ford and Allen rearticulated structuration theory as structuration agency theory for modeling socio-biologically inspired structuration in security software. Software agents join humans to engage in social actions of information exchange, giving and receiving instructions, responding to other agents, and pursuing goals individually or jointly.

Four-flows-model
The four flows model of organizing is grounded in structuration theory. McPhee and Pamela Zaug (2001) identify four communication flows that collectively perform key organizational functions and distinguish organizations from less formal social groups:

 * Membership negotiation—socialization, but also identification and self-positioning;
 * Organizational self-structuring—reflexive, especially managerial, structuring and control activities;
 * Activity coordination—Interacting to align or adjust local work activities;
 * Institutional positioning in the social order of institutions—mostly external communication to gain recognition and inclusion in the web of social transactions.

Group communication
Poole, Seibold, and McPhee wrote that "group structuration theory," provides "a theory of group interaction commensurate with the complexities of the phenomenon."

The theory attempts to integrate macrosocial theories and individuals or small groups, as well as how to avoid the binary categorization of either "stable" or "emergent" groups.

Waldeck et al. concluded that the theory needs to better predict outcomes, rather than merely explaining them. Decision rules support decision-making, which produces a communication pattern that can be directly observable. Research has not yet examined the "rational" function of group communication and decision-making (i.e., how well it achieves goals), nor structural production or constraints. Researchers must empirically demonstrate the recursivity of action and structure, examine how structures stabilize and change over time due to group communication, and may want to integrate argumentation research.

Public relations
Falkheimer claimed that integrating structuration theory into public relations (PR) strategies could result in a less agency-driven business, return theoretical focus to the role of power structures in PR, and reject massive PR campaigns in favor of a more "holistic understanding of how PR may be used in local contexts both as a reproductive and [transformational] social instrument." Falkheimer portrayed PR as a method of communication and action whereby social systems emerge and reproduce. Structuration theory reinvigorates the study of space and time in PR theory. Applied structuration theory may emphasize community-based approaches, storytelling, rituals, and informal communication systems. Moreover, structuration theory integrates all organizational members in PR actions, integrating PR into all organizational levels rather than a separate office. Finally, structuration reveals interesting ethical considerations relating to whether a social system transform.

COVID-19 and structure
the COVID-19 pandemic had huge impact on society since the beginning. When investigating those impacts, many researchers found helpful using structuration theory to explain the change in society. Oliver (2021) used "a theoretical framework derived from Giddens' structuration theory to analyze societal information cultures, concentrating on information and health literacy perspectives." And this framework focused on "the three modalities of structuration, i.e., interpretive schemes, resources, and norms." And in Oliver's research, those three modalities are "resources", "information freedom" and "formal and informal concepts and rules of behavior". After analyzing four countries framework, Oliver and his research team concluded "All our case studies show a number of competing information sources – from traditional media and official websites to various social media platforms used by both the government and the general public – that complicate the information landscape in which we all try to navigate what we know, and what we do not yet know, about the pandemic."

In the research of interpreting how remote work environment change during COVID-19 in South Africa, Walter (2020) applied structuration theory because "it addresses the relationship between actors (or persons) and social structures and how these social structures ultimately realign and conform to the actions of actors" Plus, "these social structures from Giddens's structuration theory assist people to navigate through everyday life."

Zvokuomba (2021) also used Giddens' theory of structuration "to reflect at the various levels of fragilities within the context of COVID-19 lockdown measures." One example in the research is that "theory of structuration and agency point to situations when individuals and groups of people either in compliance or defiance of community norms and rules of survival adopt certain practices." And during pandemic, researched pointed out "reverting to the traditional midwifery became a pragmatic approach to a problem." One example to support this point is that "As medical centers were partly closed, with no basic medication and health staff, the only alternative was seek traditional medical services. "

Business and structure
Structuration theory can also be used in explaining business related issues including operating, managing and marketing.

Clifton Scott and Karen Myers (2010 )studied how the duality of structure can explain the shifts of members' actions during the membership negotiations in an organization by This is an example of how structure evolves with the interaction of a group of people.

Another case study done by Dutta (2016 ) and his research team shows how the models shift because of the action of individuals. The article examines the relationship between CEO's behavior and a company's cross-border acquisition. This case can also demonstrate one of the major dimensions in the duality of structure, the sense of power from the CEO. Authors found out that the process follows the theory of duality of structure: under the circumstances of CEO is overconfident, and the company is the limitation of resources, the process of cross-border acquisition is likely to be different than before.

Yuan ElaineJ (2011 )'s research focused on a certain demographic of people under the structure. Authors studied Chinese TV shows and audiences' flavor of the show. The author concludes in the relationship between the audience and the TV shows producers, audiences' behavior has higher-order patterns.

Pavlou and Majchrzak argued that research on business-to-business e-commerce portrayed technology as overly deterministic. The authors employed structuration theory to re-examine outcomes such as economic/business success as well as trust, coordination, innovation, and shared knowledge. They looked beyond technology into organizational structure and practices, and examined the effects on the structure of adapting to new technologies. The authors held that technology needs to be aligned and compatible with the existing "trustworthy" practices and organizational and market structure. The authors recommended measuring long-term adaptations using ethnography, monitoring and other methods to observe causal relationships and generate better predictions.

title: Structuration theory


text:
José Moscardó Ituarte

José Moscardó e Ituarte, 1st Count of the Alcázar of Toledo, Grandee of Spain (26 October 1878 – 12 April 1956) was the military Governor of Toledo Province during the Spanish Civil War. He sided with the Nationalist army fighting the Republican government and his most notable action was the defence and holding of the Alcázar of Toledo against Republican forces.

When still a Colonel and military governor of the province, Moscardó was described by the English Major Geoffrey McNeill-Moss as "a tall, reserved, gentle-mannered man, a little awkward, rather punctillious: happy enough with a few people he knew well, but shy in company. He had a strict sense of duty. He was religious. In a nation where most were slack, he was exact."

For some time leading up to the Civil War Moscardó had lived in semi-retirement, a middle-aged soldier. When conflict commenced he assumed the role of Commandant of the citadel in Toledo, with a total garrison of 1,028, which included six hundred Civil Guard under their own commander, 150 army officers, 35 Falangists, 10 Carlists, 25 members of the Monarchist Association, and 40 peasants and workmen. In addition there were 670 non-combatants including 100 men too old to serve, 520 women and 50 children.

Spanish Civil War
The Siege of the Alcázar commenced and Moscardó held out for General Francisco Franco's Nationalist forces for 70 days from 22 July to 27 September 1936. Day after day, the Colonel sent out his daily radio report: Sin novedad en el Alcázar ("Nothing new at the Alcázar," or "All quiet at the Alcázar", an ironic understatement). His defiance heartened the Nationalists everywhere and maddened the Republicans, who committed vast forces in vain assaults on the Alcázar.

On 23 July, Republican forces captured Moscardó's 24-year-old son, Luis. They called the Alcázar on the telephone and Moscardó himself picked up the receiver. The political officer of the Republican force informed him that unless he surrendered the Alcázar, Luis would be shot. Moscardó asked to speak to his son. He then told Luis, "Commend your soul to God and die like a patriot, shouting 'Long live Christ the King' and 'Long live Spain.'" "That," answered his son, "I can do." Although it has been viewed that Luis was immediately shot, other accounts provided that he was in fact shot a month later "in reprisal for an air raid".

During the siege, a blindfolded Major Rojo approached the badly battered citadel with a white flag on September 9. His mission was to offer the garrison their lives if they would surrender. His proposal was rejected, but on leaving he asked Moscardó if he could convey any requests to the outside. Moscardó asked that a priest might be sent to the garrison to baptise children born during the siege. The Republicans agreed and sent in Canon Vásquez Camarassa. Of the priests in Toledo, only seven who were in hiding escaped massacre by the Republicans, so the Canon was in that respect lucky to be alive, said to be because of his left-wing sympathies. He urged the civilians, the women and children in particular to leave under a white flag. The unanimous reply was a refusal.

When the Alcázar was finally relieved, Moscardó is said to have greeted the relief force's commanding Colonel. He had lost his son but saved his garrison. He stood stiffly to the salute and said, "No change to report."

The rebel forces executed some of the hostages Moscardó kept in the Alcázar; also 100 wounded interns at the Tavera Hospital had their throats slit, 20 pregnant women were taken out of the Maternity and were shot down because they were deemed "red", and a number of additional republican militiamen were killed in the ensuing repression, including those burned alive by the rebels in the College of Maristas, 80 in the Archbishopric Palace and more than 100 militiamen in the seminary Seminario.

A similar incident in Spanish history is that concerning Guzmán el Bueno, who chose the death of his son to surrendering the Tarifa fortress in 1296.

The defence of the Alcázar became a symbol of heroism in Francoist Spain. Moscardó was promoted to Army General after the relief of the Alcázar, and put in command of the Soria Division. In 1938 he was given command of the Aragon Army Corps, but took part in no further heroic episodes.

Franco, however, knew the value of propaganda and authorized Moscardó to wear a special black cloak of mourning for his son over his army uniform. This he did for the rest of his life, so that every soldier who saw him would know who he was.

In Francoist Spain
In late 1944, Moscardó, in command at Barcelona, led the successful defence against incursions by Spanish communists via the Val d'Aran into Lleida. In March 1945 he was named head of Franco's Casa Militar (personal military staff).

In 1948, he was created Count of the Alcázar de Toledo and a Grandee of Spain.

His singular passion remained football, and, to his pleasure, he coached the Spanish football team at the 1948 London Olympic Games and the 1952 Games in Helsinki.

In 1947, he was responsible for returning the Spain National Football Team main colour to red, which had been changed in 1939 due to its association with the Republicans.

Death
He died on 12 April 1956 in Madrid at 77 years old, and was then promoted to Capitán General del Ejército. On 17 September 2018, after the planned exhumation of Francisco Franco, it was proposed by Podemos to also exhume Jaime Milans del Bosch and Moscardó, but it was rejected by Vox.

title: José Moscardó Ituarte


text:
Janine Pommy Vega

Janine Pommy Vega (February 5, 1942 – December 23, 2010) was an American poet associated with the Beats.

Early life
Janine Pommy was born in Jersey City, New Jersey. Her father worked as a milkman in the mornings and a carpenter in the afternoons. At the age of sixteen, inspired by Jack Kerouac On the Road, she went with a friend to the Cedar Tavern in Greenwich Village, where they met Gregory Corso; in 1960, after graduating as valedictorian of her high school class, she moved in with Allen Ginsberg and Peter Orlovsky.

Career
She worked as a waitress and wrote Beat-inspired experimental poetry. In December 1962, she married the Peruvian painter Fernando Vega (painter) in Israel and moved with him to Paris, where she collected money for street musicians and modeled at the École des Beaux-Arts. After Vega's sudden death in Ibiza in 1965, she returned to the United States and moved to California. Her first book, Poems to Fernando, was published by City Lights in 1968 in their City Lights Pocket Poets Series, the third volume by a woman.

In the 1970s and 1980s Vega traveled widely, trekking in the Himalayas and living in Peru, Colombia, and Bolivia, including two years as a hermit on the Isla del Sol in Lake Titicaca on the Bolivian-Peruvian border, where she completed Journal of a Hermit (1974) and Morning Passage (1976). Tracking the Serpent: Journeys to Four Continents (1997) chronicles her 1980s travels to centers of ancient matriarchy.

In addition to her own books of poetry, the last of which was The Green Piano (2005), Vega was widely anthologized, including in City Lights Pocket Poets Anthology and Women of the Beat Generation. She also toured with a band called Tiamalu, performing in English and Spanish.

Teaching
Vega taught in schools in English and Spanish through arts in education programs including Teachers & Writers Collaborative, Poets in the Schools, Arts/Genesis, and New York City Ballet, and beginning in the mid-1970s in prisons through Incisions/Arts, becoming its director in 1987, and later through the Bard Prison Initiative run by Bard College. She served on the PEN Prison Writing Committee.

Later life and death
From 1999, Vega lived with poet Andy Clausen. On December 23, 2010, she died at home in Willow, New York, of a heart attack.

Awards
She won two Golda Awards, the second for The Green Piano, and was awarded many grants, including an annual grant from the New York State Council on the Arts for her work in prisons through Incisions/Arts.

Works

 * Poems to Fernando (1968)
 * Journal of a Hermit (1974); repr. with Under The Sky
 * Morning Passage (1976)
 * Here at the Door (1978)
 * The Bard Owl (1980)
 * Skywriting (1988)
 * Apex of The Earth's Way (1984)
 * Drunk on a Glacier, Talking to Flies (1988)
 * Island of the Sun (1991)
 * Threading the Maze (1992)
 * Red Bracelets (1993)
 * Tracking the Serpent: Journeys to Four Continents (1997)
 * The Road to Your House Is A Mountain Road (1995)
 * The Walker (2003)
 * Mad Dogs of Trieste: New & Selected Poems (2000)
 * The Green Piano (2005)

title: Janine Pommy Vega


text:
Talk:Janine Pommy Vega

Untitled
This article is part of WikiProject Poetry. See that page for guidelines.

title: Talk:Janine Pommy Vega


text:
Hardfloor

Hardfloor is a German electronic music duo, consisting of Oliver Bondzio and Ramon Zenker. Their most famous track is "Acperience 1" (often titled more simply as "Acperience" on many compilation albums) and chosen by Feargal Sharkey as one of his 'Inheritance Tracks' when interviewed on UK's BBC Radio 4.

Their distinctive acid house sound is attributed to their skill at manipulating Roland TB-303 bass synthesisers, using up to six of these machines at once. Their UK chart hits include "Hardtrance Acperience" (1992), "Trancescript" (1993) and the remix of the aforementioned "Acperience" (1997). Their 1996 album, Home Run, peaked at No. 68 in the UK Albums Chart.

Da Damn Phreak Noize Phunk
Hardfloor also released albums under the pseudonym Da Damn Phreak Noize Phunk. These songs tend toward the chillout and lounge genres.

Selected Hardfloor remixes

 * Robert Armani - "Circus Bells" 1993 Djax-Up-Beats
 * Rising High Collective - "Fever Called Love" 1993 Rising High Records
 * Sourmash - "Pilgrimage To Paradise" 1994 Prolekult Records
 * Mory Kante - "Yé ké yé ké" 1995 FFRR Records
 * Mary Kiani - "When I Call Your Name" 1995 Mercury Records
 * Bassheads - "Is There Anybody Out There?" 1995 Deconstruction Records (Desa Basshead)
 * New Order - "Blue Monday" 1995 London Records
 * Baby Doc And The Dentist - Mantra To The Buddha 1995 TEC (Truelove Electronic Communications)
 * TWA - "Nasty Girls" 1995 Mercury Records
 * The Shamen - "Destination Eschaton" 1995 Epic Records
 * Depeche Mode - "It's No Good" 1997 Mute Records

title: Hardfloor


text:
Talk:Rogers Commission Report

Edit request - Conclusion
The statement at the end of the article that...

Reforms to NASA procedures were enacted which attempted to preclude another occurrence of such an accident, and the Shuttle program would continue without serious incident until the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster on February 1, 2003.

...is technically true but grossly misleading. In fact, although reforms were attempted, they demonstrably failed. The Columbia Accident Investigation board traces the destruction of Columbia to the same institutional factors that lead to the loss of Challenger. The foam strike that destroyed Columbia was a serious problem which went back to the first shuttle launch and any type of tile damage was specifically detailed as unacceptable in the shuttle design. Despite this, every shuttle mission experienced foam strikes of various (sometimes serious) sizes, and these were institutionally "normalized" in exactly the same way the O-ring burn-throughs were normalized. Columbia crashed on it's 28th flight, and made for 2 shuttles lost catastrophically on 114 launches. These statistics closely match the 1/50 - 1/100 chance of disaster that Richard Feynman found on polling NASA engineers, and the 1/50 chance calculated by the USAF when they found the shuttle too risky to use as a launch vehicle for military satellites. NASA internal documents show serious organizational problems similar to those found by the Rogers commission still persisting throughout the 1990s. I lack the time right now to dig out the references, but they're a worthwhile project for any keen Wikipedian. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.234.246.223 (talk) 18:58, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I have attempted to do so by borrowing the sourced information from the extant Wikipedia article on the Challenger disaster, which raised the points you mention in regards to the inefficacy of attempted reforms.74.83.14.59 (talk) 10:39, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Image
Consider using this image of debris in hangar waiting to be identified http://images.jsc.nasa.gov/iams/images/pao/STS51L/10062423.htm Ke4roh 13:42, 17 Dec 2003 (UTC)

John Glenn needs to be listed as well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 166.56.102.219 (talk) 18:38, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Balanced?
This article is more about feynman than about the commission report.62.12.14.25 (talk) 11:31, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

 * 9 years later, but yeah. I'm a massive Feynman fan, but this is ridiculously undue weight on Feynman. The focus is the committee and the Challenger disaster report, not the celebrity genius who has a way with words, and who was only one of many members of the committee. Dcs002 (talk) 05:02, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

Where "The Nine Recommendations"?
The article says "The Rogers Commission offered nine recommendations on improving safety in the space shuttle program"... Many other sites and documents use this phrase, or a variation like "The Rogers Commission offered NASA nine recommendations that were to be implemented before shuttle flights resumed". But, neither the article nor the other sites, express in a summary these nine recommendations, that is an importantencyclopedic information.

Here a summary of the chapter of Recommendations:

 Design and Independent Oversight Shuttle Management Structure, Astronauts in Management and Shuttle Safety Panel Criticality Review and Hazard Analysis Safety Organization Improved Communications Landing Safety Launch Abort and Crew Escape Flight Rate

Maintenance Safeguards

The same (1986's) summary, with the summary of later 2000 NASA's response (as spaceline.org/challenger and hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History, using the abbreviation NR for "NASA's response"):

Design and Independent Oversight NR: The Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Boosters (SRB) were extensively redesigned.

A. Shuttle Management Structure, B. Astronauts in Management and C. Shuttle Safety Panel NR.A: The Administrator has appointed (...) to study every aspect of how NASA manages its programs, including relationships between various field centers and NASA Headquarters. (...) this group will address the roles and responsibilities of the Space Shuttle Program Manager to assure that the position has the authority commensurate with its responsibilities. NR.B: Rear Admiral Richard Truly, a former astronaut, has been appointed as Associate Administrator for the Office of Space Flight. Several active astronauts are currently serving in management positions in the agency. NR.C: A Shuttle Safety Panel will be established by the Associate Administrator for Space Flight not later than September 1, 1986, with direct access to the Space Shuttle Program Manager.

A. Criticality Review and B. Hazard Analysis NR.A: Numerous hardware, software and safety improvements were incorporated into the Space Shuttle. (...) The team has evaluated several design alternatives, and analysis and testing are in progress to determine the preferred approaches which minimize hardware redesign. NR.B: (...) the National Research Council (NRC) has established an Independent Oversight Group.

Safety Organization NR: New and strict risk identification and reduction programs were applied to all Space Shuttle operations.

Improved Communications NR: The Space Shuttle program was reorganized and decentralized to make sure all pertinent information was made available to management personnel at all levels.

Landing Safety NR: Documentation from all previous Space Shuttle missions was reviewed, and all documented waivers to existing flight safety criteria were revoked and forbidden.

Launch Abort and Crew Escape NR: Any technical issues arising during preparation for a particular Space Shuttle mission were opened up to review by independent government agencies (...).

Flight Rate NR: A series of open reviews were enacted to discuss all significant and outstanding issues prior to a particular Space Shuttle mission.

Maintenance Safeguards NR: A mechanism was put into place that would allow NASA and contractor personnel to provide open and anonymous reporting of Space Shuttle safety concerns without fear of reprisal.

 --Krauss (talk) 12:44, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

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title: Talk:Rogers Commission Report