Pilgrimage can be better understood as a particular kind of semiotic activity, that is, as a process of production, transmission, and reception of meaning through languages, texts, and discourses. This book proposes a new under-standing of this cultural practice, through the methodological lens of contemporary continental semiotics. Through historical and ethnographic examples as well as case studies conducted in Japan, pilgrimage emerges as a trans-formative process involving subjects in search of identity. This process strategically employs ritual space, narration, and memory through the performative use of body and experience.