Sacred Possessions - Vodou, Santeria, Obeah, and the Caribbean (Paperback, New)

"A marvelous example of African Diaspora Studies . . . challenges our usual scholarly and everyday articulations of religion, even as it clearly articulates the possibilities and limits of Caribbean African retentions in Vodou, Santeria, and Obeah." --Barbara Christian, University of California, Berkeley Sacred Possessions is an unprecedented collection of thirteen comparative and interdisciplinary essays exploring the cross-cultural dynamics of African-based religious systems in the Caribbean. The contributors analyze the nature and liturgies of Vodou, Santeria, Obeah, Quimbois, and Gaga as they form one central cultural matrix in the region. They ask how these belief systems were affected by differing colonial histories and landscapes, how they affected other cultural expressions (from the oral tradition to popular art and literature), and how they have been perceived and (mis)represented by the West. The book is a unique contribution to the study of the Caribbean as a site of mutliculturalism, demonstrating the linkages between anthropology, religion, literature, and popular culture. Also included are a stunning photoessay on Cuban Santeria, a glossary of terms, and an insightful introduction by the editors. Margarite Fernandez Olmos is a professor of Spanish at Brooklyn College. She is coeditor and translator with Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert of Pleasure in the Word: Erotic Writing by Latin American Women and Remaking a Lost Harmony: Stories from the Hispanic Caribbean. Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert is a professor of Caribbean and Latin American literature in the department of Hispanic studies at Vassar College. She is the coeditor of Green Cane and Juicy Flotsam: Short Stories by Caribbean Women and author of Phyllis Shand Allfrey: A Caribbean Life.