Where Humans and Spirits Meet
The Politics of Rituals and Identified Spirits in Zanzibar
1st Edition
Published on 1. June 2008
Book
Hardback
184 pages
978-1-84545-055-7 (ISBN)
Description
Zanzibar, an island off the East African coast, with its Muslim and Swahili population, offers rich material for this study of identity, religion, and multiculturalism. This book focuses on the phenomenon of spirit possession in Zanzibar Town and the relationships created between humans and spirits; it provides a way to apprehend how society is constituted and conceived and, thus, discusses Zanzibari understandings of what it means to be human.
Reviews / Votes
"...a fascinating account of spirit possession in Zanzibar...[that] contributes to and sheds new light on debates on ethnicity, identity, and gender... Its particular value lies in its excellent ethnographic data, which demonstrate the author's deep knowledge of Zanzibari society and its interconnections with the wider world, both 'East' and 'West', and highlight the value of long-term ethnographic fieldwork." ? JRAI"Kjersti Larsen's book raises significant anthropological questions about much writing on spirit possession in Africa...Larsen's work makes important and detailed considerations of [the] problem [of racial identity], perhaps more sensitively than many others." ? Social Anthropology/Anthropologie sociale
"...a sensitive and rich portrayal of the phenomenon of spirit possession in Zanzibar Town." ? American Ethnologist
"[The author] provides a sensitive account of people's experiences of possession and the ways in which they relate to their spirits. It is refreshing to read an account like this in which some of the uncertainties and differences of opinion about spirit possession are highlighted." ? Tanzanian Affairs
"Written as a reflexive and phenomenological account, and organized into nine short chapters, the book traverses theoretical terrain in ways that challenge theories that reduce spirit possession to an effect of social marginality." ? Social Anthropology/Anthropologie sociale
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Oxford
United Kingdom
Target group
College/higher education
Product notice
Library binding
Illustrations
1 Maps
Dimensions
Height: 235 mm
Width: 157 mm
Thickness: 15 mm
Weight
426 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-84545-055-7 (9781845450557)
DOI
10.3167/9781845450557
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Kjersti Larsen
Where Humans and Spirits Meet
The Politics of Rituals and Identified Spirits in Zanzibar
E-Book
06/2008
Berghahn Books
€111.99
Available for download
Person
Kjersti Larsen is Associate Professor of Social Anthropology and African Studies at the Department of Ethnography, Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo. She has carried out fieldwork in Zanzibar since 1984 and since 1997 has also conducted fieldwork in Northern Sudan.
Content
Map of the Western Indian Ocean
Preface and Acknowledgements
Chapter 1. Introduction
Considering perspectives on spirit possession
The fieldwork: people, engagement and context
The fieldwork: ritual participation
Performance, meaning and reflexivity
Ritual, communication and enactment
Knowledge, experience and forms of negotiation
The book
Chapter 2. Introduction to Zanzibar: the place, its politics and organization
A view of the past and the present
Identity, social privileges and political reorganization
A plural society
Gender, distinctions and effects in everyday and ritual life
Gender, ritual participation and knowledge
Chapter 3. Spirits, possession and personhood
The position of spirits
Spirits are beings with a worldly existence
Spirit possession and practices
Personhood, notions of strength and self-control
Experiencing spirits
Chapter 4. Makabila, people and spirits
Articulation of differences and the problem of identity
Identification of a spirit
The demands of spirits belonging to different makabila
The world of spirits and human beings
Chapter 5. Human concerns, spirits and recreation of relationships
How the spirits reveal their presence in the human world
Communication between humans and spirits
The ritual group and the ritual framework
Ngoma ya sheitani: a celebration and a cure
Chapter 6. Between self and other: body and mind
Ngoma ya ruhani
States of body and states of mind
A bodily experience of spirits
Losing oneself to the spirit
Altered states of body, altered states of mind
Chapter 7. Gender: relations, markers and sexuality
Gender and complementarity
Concealment and disclosure
Acts of disclosure and moral ambiguity
Enactment and perceptions of the body
Strict categories in a flexible universe
Gender images and human practices
Chapter 8. Women, men and gendered spirits
A ngoma ya kibuki ritual
Matters of affection, pride and self-control
Presentation, representation and excess
Comedy, parody and the ways of humans and spirits
Body, aesthetics, and gender images
On reflections and acts of transgression
Chapter 9. Conclusion: social identities and dramatization of the other
An aesthetic moving together
Improvisation, play and the dramatization of a life-world
Reflections on embodiment and modes of knowing
Glossary
Bibliography
Index
Preface and Acknowledgements
Chapter 1. Introduction
Considering perspectives on spirit possession
The fieldwork: people, engagement and context
The fieldwork: ritual participation
Performance, meaning and reflexivity
Ritual, communication and enactment
Knowledge, experience and forms of negotiation
The book
Chapter 2. Introduction to Zanzibar: the place, its politics and organization
A view of the past and the present
Identity, social privileges and political reorganization
A plural society
Gender, distinctions and effects in everyday and ritual life
Gender, ritual participation and knowledge
Chapter 3. Spirits, possession and personhood
The position of spirits
Spirits are beings with a worldly existence
Spirit possession and practices
Personhood, notions of strength and self-control
Experiencing spirits
Chapter 4. Makabila, people and spirits
Articulation of differences and the problem of identity
Identification of a spirit
The demands of spirits belonging to different makabila
The world of spirits and human beings
Chapter 5. Human concerns, spirits and recreation of relationships
How the spirits reveal their presence in the human world
Communication between humans and spirits
The ritual group and the ritual framework
Ngoma ya sheitani: a celebration and a cure
Chapter 6. Between self and other: body and mind
Ngoma ya ruhani
States of body and states of mind
A bodily experience of spirits
Losing oneself to the spirit
Altered states of body, altered states of mind
Chapter 7. Gender: relations, markers and sexuality
Gender and complementarity
Concealment and disclosure
Acts of disclosure and moral ambiguity
Enactment and perceptions of the body
Strict categories in a flexible universe
Gender images and human practices
Chapter 8. Women, men and gendered spirits
A ngoma ya kibuki ritual
Matters of affection, pride and self-control
Presentation, representation and excess
Comedy, parody and the ways of humans and spirits
Body, aesthetics, and gender images
On reflections and acts of transgression
Chapter 9. Conclusion: social identities and dramatization of the other
An aesthetic moving together
Improvisation, play and the dramatization of a life-world
Reflections on embodiment and modes of knowing
Glossary
Bibliography
Index