Critical Review - Handler and Linnekin's "Tradition: Genuine or Spurious"

Handler and Linnekin state that tradition is often constructed as having a "commonsense" meaning in which it "refers to an inherited body of customs and beliefs"(1). This commonsense understanding of tradition is faulty because it implies a permanence that does not exist. Handler and Linnekin argue that tradition is a "wholly symbolic construction" that is always determined by interpretations in the present. Those who view tradition as completely naturalistic believe that there are essential characteristics of a culture that determine tradition as opposed to the culture's conscious decisions as to what is to be considered "traditional". They use naturalistic metaphors to establish boundedness: the collective culture as an entity, the collectivity as a collection of individuals, and the individuals who share fundamental attributes that allow them to carry on traditions. H and L oppose this approach because they believe that "there is no essential, bounded tradition; tradition is a model of the past as is inseparable from the interpretation of tradition in the present (4)." Traditions are fabricated because they are "necessarily reconstructed in the present (7)": elements selected for preservation are displayed in an entirely new context, elements mean new things to those who are viewing them as a sort of audience (by viewing the elements as being "traditional"), and elements included in "tradition" are deliberately chosen and consciously assigned a culturally-representative value. Unselfconscious tradition is actually paradoxical, for tradition requires a present-day "reinterpretation" that, due to temporal discrepancies, can't help but change the tradition in its contemporary context. Ultimately, "tradition is never wholly unselfconscious, nor is it ever wholly unrelated to the past (13)." Tradition is a "process of interpretation, attributing meaning in the present though making reference to the past (15)." Therefore, terms like "genuine" and "spurious" cannot apply to the idea of tradition because tradition is constantly being interpreted in the present and has no more validity at one instance than at another: if it is viewed as traditional within a culture at a given time, then it is traditional to that culture.

Question: what are the benefits of being "traditional"? In what way does being traditional enhance meaning or importance?