Telegraph Spirits and Muertos Chinos: Technologies of Proximity and Distance in the Material Commemoration of the Dead in Cuba
As a technology for the production of historicized spirit forms, espiritismo continually forges its own cosmology from the raw materials of a Cuban syncretistic imagination, with permutations of figures such as the Congo and the Indio bringing its more visible agencies to the forefront. These yi...
Main Author: | |
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Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
Journals Online & Print: | |
Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
Published: |
The Pennsylvania State University Press
2018
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In: |
Journal of Africana religions
Year: 2018, Volume: 6, Issue: 2, Pages: 208-231 |
Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Cuba
/ Spiritism
/ Spirits
/ Materiality
/ Mediality
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IxTheo Classification: | AE Psychology of religion AG Religious life; material religion AZ New religious movements KBR Latin America RC Liturgy |
Online Access: |
Volltext (Verlag) |
Summary: | As a technology for the production of historicized spirit forms, espiritismo continually forges its own cosmology from the raw materials of a Cuban syncretistic imagination, with permutations of figures such as the Congo and the Indio bringing its more visible agencies to the forefront. These yield extensive material formsdolls, statues, photographs, altars, vessels, and consumables. In this article I ask whether understandings of the substance of spirits are tied to, or yield, concepts of the self, and vice-versa. Are selves deeper, more connected to the beyond, if the spirits are anonymous? Are they flatter and more material, the more aesthetically personalized they become? In order to answer these questions I explore two ethnographic contexts divided by ontological assumptions as well as by practitioners. The first is a scientific spiritist society, and the second is made up of individuals who worship Chinese spirits from their extended families. Each context exemplifies an extreme of personalization and distance. |
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ISSN: | 2165-5413 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: Journal of Africana religions
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