Naming the Witch (Hardcover)

Naming the Witch explores the recent series of witchcraft accusations and killings in East Java, which spread as the Suharto regime slipped into crisis and then fell. After many years of ethnographic work focusing on the origins and nature of violence in Indonesia, Siegel came to the conclusion that previous anthropological explanations of witchcraft and magic, mostly based on sociological conceptions but also including the work of E.E. Evans-Pritchard and Claude Levi-strauss, were simply inadequate to the task of providing a full understanding of the phenomena associated with sorcery, and particularly with the ideas of power connected with it. Previous explanations have tended to see witchcraft in simple opposition to modernism and modernity (enchantment vs. disenchantment). The author sees witchcraft as an effect of culture, when the latter is incapable of dealing with accident, death, and the fear of the disintegration of social and political relations. He shows how and why modernization and witchcraft can often be companiens, as people strive to name what has hitherto been unnameable.

General

Imprint:	Stanford University Press
Country of origin:	United States
Series:	Cultural Memory in the Present
Release date:	November 2005
First published:	2006
Authors:	James Siegel
Dimensions:	229 x 152 x 24mm (L x W x T)
Format:	Hardcover - Cloth / Cloth
Pages:	280
ISBN-13:	978-0-8047-5194-0
Categories:	Books > Humanities > Religion & beliefs > Alternative belief systems > Occult studies > Witchcraft Books > Religion & Spirituality > Alternative belief systems > Occult studies > Witchcraft Promotions
LSN:	0-8047-5194-3
Barcode:	9780804751940

Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate? Let us know about it.

Does this product have an incorrect or missing image? Send us a new image.

Is this product missing categories? Add more categories.

Review This Product

No reviews yet - be the first to create one!