Monsters and caricatures: spirit possession in Tana Toraja

Focusing on a specific healing ritual, this article explores the efficacy of spirit possession in Tana Toraja. Framed in terms of indigenous exegesis, this exploration centres on the link between spirit possession and death, which manifests an intrinsic connection between spirit possession and sacrifice. In articulating this connection, the article foregrounds the body of the healer and attempts to explicate its 'monstrous' potency.     

Reluctant Muslims: embodied hegemony and moral resistance in a Giriama spirit possession complex

This account of a form of spirit possession widely experienced among Giriama people of coastal Kenya challenges prevailing theories of possession as resistance. Giriama are routinely possessed by Muslim spirits which hold their bodies hostage, afflicting them with illness and vomiting until they agree to abandon their customary practices and embrace Islam. Those possessed apparently somatize a hegemonic system of oppressive meanings according to which Giriama ethnicity is essentially different from, and polluting to, Islam. Yet the same individuals who embody hegemony in this way may reflect upon their possession experience by articulating a defiant ideology of resistance against both the possessing spirit and the Muslim ethnic groups that the spirit represents. These observations thus highlight the complexity of the relationship between hegemony and the individual; they also provide a reminder that the idiom of possession does not necessarily articulate with power structures in a predictable and straightforward fashion.     

Transformation in <Emphasis Type="Italic">Dang</Emphasis>-<Emphasis Type="Italic">ki</Emphasis> Healing: The Embodied Self and Perceived Legitimacy

Since spirit possession in mediumship and shamanism resembles psychotic symptoms, early researchers perceived spirit mediums and shamans as psychiatric patients whose psychopathology was culturally sanctioned. However, other researchers have not only challenged this assumption, but also proposed that spirit possession has transformative benefits. The idiom of spirit possession provides cultural meanings for spirit mediums and shamans to express and transform their personal experiences. The present case study focuses on dang-ki healing, a form of Chinese mediumship practiced in Singapore, in which a deity possesses a human (i.e., dang-ki) to offer aid to supplicants. This study seeks to explore whether involvement in dang-ki healing is transformative; and if so, how the dang-ki’s transformation is related to his self and the perceived legitimacy of his mediumship. At a shrine, I interviewed 20 participants, including a male dang-ki, 10 temple assistants, and nine clients. The results obtained were supportive of the therapeutic nature of spirit possession. First, there is a relationship between his self-transformation and the perceived legitimacy of his mediumship. As his clients and community have recognized his spirit possession as genuine, and the healing power of his possessing god, he is able to make use of mediumship as a means for spiritual development. Second, he has developed his spirituality by internalizing his god’s positive traits (e.g., compassion). Deities worshipped in dang-ki healing can be conceptualized as ideal selves who represent a wide range of positive traits and moral values of Chinese culture. Thus, the possession of a deity is the embodiment of an ideal self. Finally, the dang-ki’s transformation may run parallel to his god’s transformation. In Chinese religions, gods have to constantly develop their spirituality even though they are already gods. An understanding of the god’s spiritual development further sheds light on the dang-ki’s self-transformation.     

Spirit possession and spirit mediumship from the perspective of Tulu oral traditions

The phenomenon of spirit possession is looked at in relationship to the broad cultural context in which it is found to exist in a region of southern India. The author critically reviews various attempts to explain spirit possession as solely a psychological or sociological event. Instead, he turns to the region's spirit possession and mediumship cults, oral traditions and social ideology for an ethnographically relevant interpretation of spirit possession.     

Spirit possession in South Asia,dissociation or hysteria? Part 2: Case histories

Psychoanalytic theory appears flawed in the way it has been traditionally applied in anthropological studies of spirit possession in South Asia. It is suggested that pathological spirit possession in South Asia has a similar etiology to multiple personality disorder in North America, which is caused by spontaneous trance reactions to extreme situations in the environment, particularly child abuse. Reanalyses of previously published case histories of spirit possession illnesses in South Asia are presented from the perspective of dissociation theory, highlighting possible etiology not considered relevant in earlier psychoanalytic theories.     

Traumatic Experience and Somatoform Dissociation Among Spirit Possession Practitioners in the Dominican Republic

Recent studies in African contexts have revealed a strong association between spirit possession and severe trauma, with inclusion into a possession cult serving at times a therapeutic function. Research on spirit possession in the Dominican Republic has so far not included quantitative studies of trauma and dissociation. This study evaluated demographic variables, somatoform dissociative symptoms, and potentially traumatizing events in the Dominican Republic with a group of Vodou practitioners that either do or do not experience spirit possession. Inter-group comparisons revealed that in contrast to non-possessed participants (n = 38), those experiencing spirit possession (n = 47) reported greater somatoform dissociation, more problems with sleep, and previous exposure to mortal danger such as assaults, accidents, or diseases. The two groups did not differ significantly in other types of trauma. The best predictor variable for group classification was somatoform dissociation, although those items could also reflect the experience of followers during a possession episode. A factor analysis across variables resulted in three factors: having to take responsibility early on in life and taking on a professional spiritual role; traumatic events and pain; and distress/dissociation. In comparison with the non-possessed individuals, the possessed ones did not seem to overall have a remarkably more severe story of trauma and seemed to derive economic gains from possession practice.     

Women and affliction in Maharashtra: A hydraulic model of health and illness

The anthropological literature on spirit possession cults offers a distinction between voluntary possession or mediumship and involuntary possession or illness. Fieldwork was carried out in a Mahanubhav healing temple. Contradictory interpretations of trance and affliction were found to be held by the different temple inhabitants.Beliefs about the nature of spiritual affliction, its epidemiology and aetiology vary according to gender, family structure and position within the family. One manifestation of affliction is thought to be madness. However, the experience of mental affliction is very varied, for example, the number of family members accompanying an afflicted person, the amount of money made available for treatment, the length of treatment, as well as the less tangible but equally important aspects of treatment such as the degree of empathy and concern felt, all vary according to the afflicted person's gender and status within the family. The inferiority of women's position in society and their precarious belonging in their husband's family comes to the fore in cases of mental illness. The greater shame attaching to women's mental illness means that more women seek temple treatment alone and that the level of family support and involvement is less for women. Recently married women and older childless women fare particularly badly in the division of concern and responsibility for the afflicted. In Maharashtra the recognition and experience of mental affliction varies according to the stage of family development and, most importantly, according to the gender of the patient.The material on which this paper is based was originally presented in Venice in September 1988 at the 10th European Conference for Modem South Asian Studies. An earlier version of this paper will be included in the Proceedings of that conference, Gender, Caste, and Power in South Asia— Social Status and Mobility in Transitional Societies, forthcoming, Manohar Publishers, New Delhi.     

Dissociative Symptoms and Reported Trauma Among Patients with Spirit Possession and Matched Healthy Controls in Uganda

Spirit possession is a common, worldwide phenomenon with dissociative features. Studies in Europe and the United States have revealed associations among psychoform and somatoform dissociation and (reported) potential traumatic events. The aim of this study was to explore the relationships among spirit possession, dissociative symptoms and reported potentially traumatizing events in Uganda. One hundred nineteen persons with spirit possession, diagnosed by traditional healers, were compared to a matched control group of 71 nonpossessed persons. Assessments included demographic items and measures of dissociation and potentially traumatizing events. Compared to the nonpossessed group, the possessed group reported more severe psychoform dissociation and somatoform dissociation and more potentially traumatizing events. The associations between these events and both types of dissociation were significant. Yet, consistent with the cultural perception of dissociative symptoms, the participants subjectively did not associate dissociative symptoms with potentially traumatizing events. In conclusion, spirit possession deserves more interest as a possible idiom of distress and a culture-specific expression of dissociation related to potential traumatizing events.     

The interpretations of fox possession: Illness as metaphor

Although fox possession is a rare phenomenon in contemporary Japan, it is a matter of concern in psychiatry and in folk healing. The case study presented here deals with the social process of role transformation, from client to shaman, as a way of self healing. The discussion then assumes that fox possession renders multiple interpretations and argues that it is, in fact, a metaphorical representation in much the same way that biomedical interpretation is. The argument also proposes that an etiological (causal) understanding of fox possession is less productive than a metaphorical one.     

The role of the state in the transformation of the nationalist movements of the 1960s: Comparing Wales and Quebec

This article examines the dynamics of ethnicity in Nigeria. It argues that ethnic debates and disputes are not just about the possession of power but also about the morality of power and the empowerment of civil society. Ethnicity is represented as the quest for dominance and the voice of civil society and accountability. The acute mistrusts and fears that condition ethnic conflict are analysed in the context of these rival visions of ethnicity as dominance and resistance.     

Spirit possession in South Asia,dissociation or hysteria?

Psychoanalytic theory appears flawed in its notions of universal oedipal conflict and repression, and unsuitable for the study of pathological spirit possession in South Asia. The biological theory of contemporary psychiatry is no more effective in this analysis because mental illnesses are constituted within culture-bound categories of experience. Dissociation theory offers a better theoretical tool for this type of research. A summary of the history of paradigm shifts in psychiatric theory relevant to spirit possession is presented.     

Women's Preponderance in Possession Cults: The Calcium-Deficiency Hypothesis Extended

The preponderance of women in spirit possession cults is linked with the likelihood of deficiencies in thiamine, tryptophan-niacin, calcium, and vitamin D in women in Old World traditional societies in which poverty and/or sumptuary rules restrict women's nutrient intakes more than those of men. The higher nutrient needs of pregnant and lactating women may exacerbate the inadequacy of their diets. It is postulated that involuntary symptoms of deficiencies affecting the central nervous system and muscles have been recognized in these societies as manifestations of spirit possession and institutionalized as a means of reducing victims' anxieties and restoring their ability to function normally     

'It's All To Do With Words': An Analysis of Spirit Possession in the Venezuelan Cult of María Lionza

Humans possessed by spirits are often described as ill or distressed, lacking power, control, and agency, and spirit possession has been described as a kind of ventriloquism in which mediums acquire a voice more powerful than their own as humans. What remains unsaid and unheard is what the spirits and humans talk about during possession episodes. This article suggests that the tendency to focus on the form and not the content of possession episodes has allowed for another form of ventriloquism, in which anthropologists themselves use the mediums to speak to their own agendas. Against this tendency, participants in the cult of María Lionza see words as central to the cult, to be listened to carefully. An analysis of the content of their possession episodes reveals how, far from being passive, deprived of agency, and 'muted', the possessed in the cult are actively engaged in an ongoing conversation with anthropologists, historians, the media, and the state.     

Learning Spirit Possession: An Introduction

Our introduction builds on existing approaches in possession studies to explore a less-developed path focused on processes of ‘learning possession’. We propose here an ontogenetic and pragmatic approach to spirit possession based on a historically and cognitively informed ethnography. Our main aim is to suggest an analytical framework able to take into account the interrelationality of cultural contexts and patterns of thinking, feeling and interacting involved in learning possession. Our epistemological framework is based on the notion of cultural expertise, defined as the culturally relevant matching of emotion, perception and reasoning in an assemblage pertaining to the process of learning a particular skill, as well as the creative and open-ended process in which experts learn to ‘play’ with shared social, aesthetic, moral and performative values.     

Of Shrimps and Spirit Possession:Toward a Political Ecology of Resource Management in Northern Madagascar

I present a case of ntual innovation and spirit possession in northern Madagascar that builds on Rappaport's interests in the systemic nature of human-environmental interactions, the relationship between the various levels of political scale, and the interaction between meaning and material relations. I go beyond his formulations in questioning concepts of homeostasis and dynamic equilibrium, and instead propose to understand perturbations as inherent in a system and a source of systemic transformation. In this analysis, I place ecological relations and ritual within an explicitly political framework and examine the processes of social and material change. In drawing on the concept of cognized models, I also illustrate how historical memory and ritual enactments provide ideological frameworks for negotiating control over the use and management of the environment, [ecosystem, political ecology. Madagascar, spirit possession, ritual]     

Influence of tetracycline exposure on tetracycline resistance and the carriage of tetracycline resistance genes within commensal Escherichia coli populations

AIMS: To assess the influence of incremental tetracycline exposure on the genetic basis of tetracycline resistance within faecal Escherichia coli. METHODS AND RESULTS: Through the adoption of a novel combination of multiple breakpoint selection, phenotypic characterization and the application of a polymerase chain reaction based gene identification system it proved possible to monitor the influence of antibiotic exposure on resistance gene possession. Using tetracycline as a case study a clear hierarchy was revealed between tet genes, strongly influenced by host antimicrobial exposure history. CONCLUSIONS: The antimicrobial exposure regime under which an animal is produced affects both the identity and magnitude of resistance gene possession of a selected bacterial population within its enteric microflora. Among the ramifications associated with such resistance gene selection is the degree of resistance conferred and the carriage of linked resistance determinants. This selection is applied by exposure to antibiotic concentrations well below recognized minimum inhibitory tetracycline concentration breakpoints widely adopted to characterize bacterial 'susceptibility'. SIGNIFICANCE AND IMPACT OF THE STUDY: This study confirms the ability of minimal antibiotic exposure to select for the continued persistence of resistance genes within the enteric microflora. It is clearly demonstrated that different antimicrobial regimes select for different resistance genes, the implications of which are discussed.     

Playing with perspectives: spirit possession,mimesis, and permeability in the buuta ritual in South India

The aim of this study is to investigate spirit possession through the lenses of mimesis, permeability, and perspectivity. Recent studies have explored the significance of perspective exchange as reciprocal subjectification. At the same time, the importance of reflexive self‐awareness amid perspective exchange has been noted. Linking studies on perspective exchange with those on spirit possession, this article tries to show an alternative understanding of perspective exchange as the de‐subjectification and generative transformation of self and other. Focusing on the buuta ritual in South India, I examine perspective exchange as the capability for freeing oneself from one's subjectivity enough to let various perspectives come and go through the permeable self. Being permeable and reflexive, the buuta impersonator plays with multiple perspectives to transform both his and others' perspectives to enable all to become ‘real’ humans in relation to the deity.     

Words of power: Personal empowerment and healing

This paper examines instances of ritual use of words in a diverse selection of alternative healing groups in a modern society. These words are distinguished by their users' belief that they are endowed with a power, an effectiveness, separate from and in addition to their literal meaning. Three specific features of ritual language contribute to its effectiveness: (1) its function as an objectification of power, (2) its transformative functions — especially its metaphoric and metonymic usages, and (3) its performative aspects. This paper argues that one of the key factors in healing illness is mobilizing resources of power, especially enhancing the ill person's sense of personal empowerment. Ritual language use in alternative healing is one of the foremost elements in this empowerment, because it both represents and objectifies power. Within a belief system in which they are significant, words of power indeed have the power to effect healing.