Surfing and ocean-based death ritual: the paddle-out ceremony

Abstract

This paper is based on interviews with self-identified surfers from both Australia and Hawaii who have extensive histories of participation in the surfing funeral or post-funeral ritual of the paddle-out ceremony. The paddle-out is an ocean-based death ritual in which the deceased are symbolically, and often materially through cremains, placed in the ocean and farewelled through highly physical ritual actions. In a paddle-out, surfing communities located at specific, and sometimes multiple places, come together to acknowledge, remember and tell stories of a member who is missing in the line-up. As a rite of passage, the paddle-out does not neatly fit anthropology’s, and particularly van Gennep’s idea of the funeral as primarily a separation ritual. Indeed, our research suggests that ideas of separation and connection, departure and continuing to mingle with the living all operate in how the ritual is experienced and interpreted. While co-extensive with Hawaiian surfing traditions, the paddle-out is also an adaptive, modern, flexible ritual open to personalisation in its form and meaning. The paddle-out ceremony is a rite passage for both the living and the dead and the deeply physical nature of the ritual provides a transformational experience of emotional release while also creating and renewing bonds and group solidarity. The circle formation, a key symbolic practice in the ritual, is central to production and self-recognition of community as participants face each other with the bereaved often placed inside the circle’s centre in a visual, physical act of support. The deceased are also symbolically placed in the centre as the ritual mourns their loss and invariably celebrates their life and surfing identity.