The reflactin of Cultural taransformatins on weman's religious ritual Abstract

Throughout the history the religious gatherings have taken various forms as a center for achieving and manifesting the ritual aspect of religion in connection with cultural, social, and economical background of the believer society. This paper is aimed to indicate the manifestation of Iran socio-cultural changes that had occurred until the late 1980s in the women's ritual rites in Tehran, according to the type of gatherings. This is done based on functionalist theories and by using the documentary method, field study, direct observation, and semi-structured interview. The findings show that in addition to the traditional and conventional forms of women's threnodies that have been commonly held since Qajar era in a very simple way and in eulogist/speaker structure by giving a very emotional speech full of advice, preaches, and un-translated prayer for the old local illiterate or low-literate audience, two other forms of " popular" and "cognition-oriented" gatherings have got prevailing among the modern urban cultured women since 1970s.The popular gatherings are held in a very luxurious and glamorized way and in eulogist/musician structure. As for the content, it is very informal and understandable for all, which is addressed to usually younger, unemployed audience with various social status and average education. In contrast, cognition-oriented" gatherings are held in a splendid luxurious style with more formalities, with eulogist/speaker and eulogist/ speaker/ musician structures. The content is more rational, argumentative, and cognitive. The audience is young and highly educated from high social class and professions. The findings manifest the women's new and various cultural demands in connection with the cultural context of society.