Divination's Grasp
African Encounters with the Almost Said
1st Edition
Published on 15. November 2015
346 pages
978-0-253-01895-3 (ISBN)
Description
Richard Werbner takes readers on a journey though contemporary charismatic wisdom divination in southern Africa. Beginning with the silent language of the divinatory lots, Werbner deciphers the everyday, metaphorical, and poetic language that is used to reveal their meaning. Through Werbner's skillful interpretations of the language of divination, a picture of Tswapong moral imagination is revealed. Concerns about dignity and personal illumination, witchcraft, pollution, the anger of dead ancestors, as well as the nature of life, truth, cosmic harmony, being, and becoming emerge in this charged African setting.
Reviews / Votes
Werbner's Divination's Grasp documents a long and distinguished career in the service of anthropology. It will be a touchstone for anthropological studies of divination for years to come. * American Ethnologist *All prices
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Bloomington, IN
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
US School Grade: College Graduate Student and over
Illustrations
3 Tables, black and white; 21 Illustrations, black and white
File size
3,10 MB
ISBN-13
978-0-253-01895-3 (9780253018953)
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
Book
11/2015
Indiana University Press
€81.50
Shipment within 10-20 days
Person
Richard Werbner is Professor Emeritus in African Anthropology at the University of Manchester. He is author of Reasonable Radicals and Citizenship in Botswana (IUP).
Content
Preface
Introduction
Part I. Socio-linguistics and poetics
1. Deep Dialogue with Evans-Pritchard
2. In Praise of the Moral Imagination
3. Acrobatic Stylistics, Agonistic Vision
Part II. From Tablet Archive to Wisdom Seances
4. Poetics and Archives
5. Family Seances: Rhetoric, Deliberations and Decisions
6. Cosmic and Personal Understandings: Diviners, Headmen, Strangers
Part III. From Hooved Archive to Charismatic Seances
7. A Charismatic Diviner's Archive: Hooved Divination
8. The Cross-Over: Originality, Hybridity and Metamorphosis
9. The Charismatic Seance: Arguments, Intimacy and Intimations
Conclusion: In Comparison
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Introduction
Part I. Socio-linguistics and poetics
1. Deep Dialogue with Evans-Pritchard
2. In Praise of the Moral Imagination
3. Acrobatic Stylistics, Agonistic Vision
Part II. From Tablet Archive to Wisdom Seances
4. Poetics and Archives
5. Family Seances: Rhetoric, Deliberations and Decisions
6. Cosmic and Personal Understandings: Diviners, Headmen, Strangers
Part III. From Hooved Archive to Charismatic Seances
7. A Charismatic Diviner's Archive: Hooved Divination
8. The Cross-Over: Originality, Hybridity and Metamorphosis
9. The Charismatic Seance: Arguments, Intimacy and Intimations
Conclusion: In Comparison
Notes
Bibliography
Index
