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Syncretism - the synthesis of different religious - is a contentious word. Some regard it as a pejorative term, referring to local versions of notionally standard `world religions' which are deemed `inauthentic' because saturated with indigenous content. Syncretic versions of Christianity do not conform to `official' (read `European') models. In other contexts however, the syncretic amalgamation of religions may be validated as a mode of resistance to colonial hegemony, a sign of cultural survival, or as a means of authorising political dominance in a multicultural state. In Syncretism/Anti-Syncretism the contributors explore the issues of agency and power which are integral to the very process of syncretism and to the competing discourses surrounding the term.
Syncretism - the synthesis of different religious traditions - is a
contentious word. Some regard it as a pejorative term, referring to
local versions of notionally standard "world religions" which are
deemed "inauthentic" because saturated with indigenous content.
Syncretic versions of Christianity do not conform to "official"
(read "European") models. In other contexts however, the syncretic
amalgamation of religions may be validated as a mode of resistance
to colonial hegemony, a sign of cultural survival, or as a means of
authorizing political dominance in a multicultural state. In
"Syncretism/Anti-Syncretism" the contributors explore the issues of
agency and power which are integral to the very process of
syncretism and to the competing discourses surrounding the term.
Through war crimes prosecutions, truth commissions, purges of
perpetrators, reparations, and memorials, transitional justice
practices work under the assumptions that truth telling leads to
reconciliation, prosecutions bring closure, and justice prevents
the recurrence of violence. But when local responses to
transitional justice destabilize these assumptions, the result can
be a troubling disconnection between international norms and
survivors' priorities.
"Localizing Transitional Justice" traces how ordinary people
respond to--and sometimes transform--transitional justice
mechanisms, laying a foundation for more locally responsive
approaches to social reconstruction after mass violence and
egregious human rights violations. Recasting understandings of
culture and locality prevalent in international justice, this vital
book explores the complex, unpredictable, and unequal encounter
among international legal norms, transitional justice mechanisms,
national agendas, and local priorities and practices.
How is the slave trade remembered in West Africa? In a work that
challenges recurring claims that Africans felt (and still feel) no
sense of moral responsibility concerning the sale of slaves,
Rosalind Shaw traces memories of the slave trade in Temne-speaking
communities in Sierra Leone. While the slave-trading past is rarely
remembered in explicit verbal accounts, it is often made vividly
present in such forms as rogue spirits, ritual specialists'
visions, and the imagery of divination techniques.
Drawing on extensive fieldwork and archival research, Shaw argues
that memories of the slave trade have shaped (and been reshaped by)
experiences of colonialism, postcolonialism, and the country's
ten-year rebel war. Thus money and commodities, for instance, are
often linked to an invisible city of witches whose affluence was
built on the theft of human lives. These ritual and visionary
memories make hitherto invisible realities manifest, forming a
prism through which past and present mutually configure each
other.
Through war crimes prosecutions, truth commissions, purges of
perpetrators, reparations, and memorials, transitional justice
practices work under the assumptions that truth telling leads to
reconciliation, prosecutions bring closure, and justice prevents
the recurrence of violence. But when local responses to
transitional justice destabilize these assumptions, the result can
be a troubling disconnection between international norms and
survivors' priorities. Localizing Transitional Justice traces how
ordinary people respond to-and sometimes transform-transitional
justice mechanisms, laying a foundation for more locally responsive
approaches to social reconstruction after mass violence and
egregious human rights violations. Recasting understandings of
culture and locality prevalent in international justice, this vital
book explores the complex, unpredictable, and unequal encounter
among international legal norms, transitional justice mechanisms,
national agendas, and local priorities and practices.
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