Spit, knock, defuse: Apotropaic rituals in contemporary urban culture

The article explores apotropaic practices in contemporary urban culture, focusing on two of the most widespread gestures: spitting over the left shoulder and knocking on wood. The study examines the historical and cultural foundations of these rituals, their semantic functions within Slavic folk tradition, and their transformations in urban everyday life. In traditional contexts, such practices served as explicit magical means of averting the evil eye, illness, or misfortune, whereas in modern settings they are preserved primarily as automatic or ironic actions. Special attention is given to the process of symbolic reduction, whereby material gestures are replaced with verbal formulas (“tfu-tfu-tfu”, “knock on wood”), while retaining their protective function. The analysis of empirical data highlights the ambivalence of contemporary perception: on the level of rational consciousness, these rituals are regarded as “superstition” or “joking behavior”, yet on the level of embodied practice they continue to be performed as culturally meaningful and socially transmitted actions.

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