Beyond rationalism : rethinking magic, witchcraft and sorcery

Author(s)

• Kapferer, Bruce

Bibliographic Information

Beyond rationalism : rethinking magic, witchcraft and sorcery

edited by Bruce Kapferer

Berghahn Books, 2003

• : pbk

Note

"First published in...Social analysis, volume 46, issue 3, fall 2002"--T.p. verso

Includes bibliographical references and indexes

Description and Table of Contents

Description

This book seeks a reconsideration of the phenomenon of sorcery and related categories. The contributors to the volume explore the different perspectives on human sociality and social and political constitution that practices typically understood as sorcery, magic and ritual reveal. In doing so the authors are concerned to break away from the dictates of a western externalist rationalist understanding of these phenomena without falling into the trap of mysticism. The articles address a diversity of ethnographic contexts in Africa, Asia, the Pacific and the Americas.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Outside All Reason - Magic, Sorcery and Epistemology in Anthropology B. Kapferer Chapter 1. Anthroposophy and Voodoo in Dominican-Haitian Borderlands M. Brendbekken Chapter 2. The Smell of Death: Theft, Disgust and Ritual Practice in Central Lombok, Indonesia K.G. Telle Chapter 3. Sorcery, Modernity and the Constitutive Imaginary: Hybridising Continuities B. Kapferer Chapter 4. The Sorcerer as the Absented Third Person: Formations of Fear and Anger in Vanuatu K. Rio Chapter 5. Sorcerous Technologies and Religious Innovation in Sri Lanka R. Bastin Chapter 6. Maleficent Fetishes and the Sensual Order of the Uncanny in South West Congo R. Devisch Chapter 7. Fantasy in Practice: Projection and Ontrojection, or the Witch and the Spirit-Medium M. Lambek Chapter 8. The Discourse of 'Ritual Murder': Popular Reaction to Political Leaders in Botswana O. Gulbrandsen Chapter 9. Strange Fruit: The South African Truth Commission and Demonic Economies of Violence A. Feldman Notes on Contributors Bibliography Index

by "Nielsen BookData"

Details

• NCID: BA62079207
• ISBN:
  • 1571814183
• LCCN: 2002043661
• Country Code: us
• Title Language Code: eng
• Text Language Code: eng
• Place of Publication: New York ; Oxford
• Pages/Volumes: vi, 273 p., [14] p. of plates
• Size: 23 cm
• Classification:
  • LCC : GN475
  • DC21 : 306.4
• Subject Headings:
  • LCSH : Witchcraft -- Cross-cultural studies
  • LCSH : Occultism -- Cross-cultural studies
  • LCSH : Rationalism -- Cross-cultural studies