pluralarchives | Entries tagged with demographic:possession

Source Name: Trance and Possession in Bali: A Window on Western Multiple Personality, Possession Disorder, and Suicide

Creator/s: Luh Ketut Suryani and Gordon D. Jensen

Years Active: 1993

About: "This book deals with Balinese psycho-social experiences in trance-possession states during traditional healing, religious ceremonials, dance, drama and gamelan performances, as well as in several mental disorders. It concludes that trance-possession in Bali is the same, phenomenologically, as multiple personality disorder (MPD) in the West. It also presents criteria for the diagnosis of possession in any culture, a new theory of possession, and multifold comparisons of trance-possession in Bali with MPD in the West."

Notes: Available only on paper, out of print, and expensive because academia. This review I found on ResearchGate complains about an ethnocentric bias. I loathe citing Astraea for anything, since they extorted money and stole a truck, but they did transcribe some of it here.

lb_lee

Source Name: The validity of DSM-IV dissociative disorders categories in south-west Uganda

Creator/s: Marjolein Van Duijl, Etzel Cardeña, and Joop T. V. M. De Jong

Years Active: 2005

About: (from abstract) "This study evaluates the fit of the DSM-IV classification and concepts of these disorders with local concepts, experiences and local presentations in south-west Uganda. We conducted focus group discussions with medical students, traditional healers, religious leaders, counselors, community members and other health workers (n = 48). They were supplemented by key informant interviews with religious people, traditional healers and leaders (n = 11). The responses were subjected to thematic analysis. Dissociative amnesia and depersonalization were generally recognized and seen as the result of traumatic experiences and were useful categories in Uganda. However, dissociative fugue did not match local concepts and was confused with spirit possession and other conditions such as alcoholic fugues and dementia. The description of dissociative identity disorder was always interpreted as a possession trance disorder by the local healers. We found only partial support for the validity of the DSM-IV classification of dissociative disorders in Uganda."

Archives: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1363461505052666?url_ver=Z39.88-2003&rfr_id=ori:rid:crossref.org&rfr_dat=cr_pub%20%200pubmed (locked/paywalled)

Notes: Predates the DSM 5

lb_lee

Source Name: The Nine Emperor Gods: A Study of Chinese Spirit Medium Cults

Creator/s: Cheu Hock Tong

Years Active: 1988

About: I can't find a blurb for this stupid book better than "During the first nine days of the ninth lunar month, Chinese in Malaysia and Singapore will celebrate the Festival of the Nine Emperor Gods. This book offers an interesting survey about the survival of such traditional customs among ethnic Chinese."

Archives: Seems to only exist on paper, and be out of print. The same author in 2020 put out a book called The Festival of the Nine Emperor Gods: Myth, Ritual, and Symbol, but it's unclear to me if this is the same book, a different one, or an updated edition. (And that book seems to be on paper only as well.)

Notes: Haven't read it, but want it on record somewhere. Only know of it because Zen Cho references it for her fiction book Black Water Sister.

lb_lee

"This is a love story—a love story disguised as a piece of scholarly research."

Source Name: Spirit Marriage

Creator/s: Megan Rose

Years Active: 2022 (adding it despite the "must have been not updated for five years" because... it's a book. It's no longer being revised.)

About: "Megan Rose, Ph.D., examines the practice and purpose of spirit marriage around the world, presenting transcultural evidence of this form of sacred union. [...] She shares her in-depth interviews with ten contemporary practitioners of spirit marriage, including a Faery Seer, a Shakta Tantric, a West African Shrine Keeper, a New Orleans Voodoo Mambo, Haitian Vodou practitioners, and a ceremonial magician," along with her own spirit marriage.

Archives: Available in paper and ebook forms. I have both.

Notes: Hub for a bunch of spirit marriage citations, which has substantial overlap with various forms of spiritual plurality. Heads up for at times dicey discussions involving racism and cultural appropriation. Peoples/faiths involved include Dagara (Burkina Faso), Shakta Tantra (Nepal/South Asia), Haitian Vodou and New Orleans Voodoo, Faery Seership, a USA witch doctor, ceremonial magician, and homebrew.

lb_lee

"Each person is thought to have a partner of the opposite sex in the spirit world. If one is having difficulties, the diviner may blame one's spirit mate who feels neglected..."

Source Name: Designs for Living

Creator/s: Monni Adams, published under the Carpenter Center for Visual Arts in cooperation with the Peabody Museum of Ethnology and Archaeology

Years Active: 1982

About: This is a book overwhelmingly about African art design, but it briefly mentions various spirit relationships (including possession) in passing, which may be of interest. Dig around in the citations. Peoples/regions discussed include the Baule (Cote d'Ivoire), Ibibio (Nigeria), and Yoruba (Nigeria).

Archives: Available on paper. Someone scanned it into archive.org, but it's not screenreadable. I also plaintext transcribed some of it here, but it's very incomplete.

Notes: Plurality has such a whitewashing problem that I feel the need to link even tangential sources that prove that no, white doctors didn't invent multiplicity, nor do they have the fullest conception of what it is and can be. So there will be a bunch of tangential sources here, just so everyone knows they exist.

Plural Archives

Entries tagged with demographic:possession

Trance and Possession in Bali, by Suryani and Jensen (religious book, 1993)

The validity of DSM-IV dissociative disorders categories in south-west Uganda, by Van Dijl et al

The Nine Emperor Gods: A Study of Chinese Spirit Medium Cults, by Cheu Hock Tong (1988)

Spirit Marriage, by Megan Rose (religious book, 2022)

Designs for Living, by Monni Adams (book, 1982)

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