ABSTRACT
Introduction Festivals are performed in most Japanese communities with varying frequencies. They are organised by members of the communities in which they take place. Various organisational forms required to carry out the festival reflect the social organisation and management practices of the given community. In a broader more general view the reflect general organisational forms common in Japanese society. Festivals are loci in which we can identify different social forms in Japan. The central event of most festivals is a shrine ritual. In the ritual the major participants in managing and running the festival take part. Using the data from my own fieldwork in Yuzawa-shi, Akita Prefecture, and comparing it to other data, I suggest a mode of analysis whose results have broader theoretical implications for the understanding of Japanese society.1
