The cyclic calendar
I thought of this reading Joe Strickland's post about Thanksgiving: do
cultures (national cultures, which I think are probably describable as
amorphous and yes, fairly loose complexes of memes) that have a cyclic
calendar of events benefit from... rehearsal? In fact, it helps ensures
transmission of cultural elements to all generations of offspring, doesn't
it? Must've been totally crucial to survival of pre-literate cultures.
Actually come to think of it I'm sure that cruising the old archives of this
list I read someone writing about repeated tradition being a kind of
broadcast mechanism, only I guess the way it gets to lots of people is over
time, rather than across space. Sorry if I'm crapping on too much.