Based on fieldwork carried out since 2006 in southwestern Togo, this article analyzes the political, cultural, and social meanings of a vodu ceremony as a contested site where meanings, ritual practices, and discourses are constantly renegotiated by subjects in asymmetrical power relations. Moreover, it will also illustrate what consequences the process of politicization and mediatization of the ceremonies has had in changing the forms and the contents of a ritual practice that today appears as a privileged arena in reinforcing or contesting state power in a region, which has been historically the centre of the opposition to Eyadéma's dictatorship.
Gardini, M. (2014). Nowadays spirits allow themselves to be photographed. Renegotiating the Political Role of Yam Ceremonies in Agou (Southwestern Togo). ANTHROPOS, 109(1), 33-44 [10.5771/0257-9774-2014-1-33].
Nowadays spirits allow themselves to be photographed. Renegotiating the Political Role of Yam Ceremonies in Agou (Southwestern Togo)
GARDINI, MARCO
2014
Abstract
Based on fieldwork carried out since 2006 in southwestern Togo, this article analyzes the political, cultural, and social meanings of a vodu ceremony as a contested site where meanings, ritual practices, and discourses are constantly renegotiated by subjects in asymmetrical power relations. Moreover, it will also illustrate what consequences the process of politicization and mediatization of the ceremonies has had in changing the forms and the contents of a ritual practice that today appears as a privileged arena in reinforcing or contesting state power in a region, which has been historically the centre of the opposition to Eyadéma's dictatorship.
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