Congregating by cassette
Recording and participation in transnational Haitian religious rituals
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12601693 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Karen Richman (University of Notre Dame, corresponding author), T Rey (0000-0002-7643-6236, Temple University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2009 |
| Volume | 12 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 149-166 |
| Publication date | 2009-02-25 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | International Journal of Cultural Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1367-8779 • E-ISSN: 1460-356X |
| Publisher | SAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/1367877908099497 |
| OpenAlex | W2014684169 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 3 |
| References cited | 5 |
A single communications device has transformed interactions between members of widely dispersed transnational Haitian religious communities: the audiocassette recorder. Messages, hymns and prayers taped on them crisscross the sea between Haiti and its diaspora, engaging distantly separated co-religionists in sporadically sequenced, yet effectively intimate conversations and rituals. For both Vodouist and Catholic religious congregations, tape recordings in Haitian Creole effectively circumvent scriptural French and help cement transnational ties by creating vast transnational performative spaces. This article draws on ethnographic research in Haiti and Florida to describe and theorize the important role that audiocassettes have played, in the transnational Haitian case, in cementing `assembled groups' and recreating `certain mental states of those groups' in ways that Durkheim might not have imagined when developing his epic argument about the socially cohesive function and essence of religion, an argument from which we take our theoretical orientation
Aesthetics · Argument (complex analysis · Diaspora · EPIC · Ethnography · Function (biology · Literature · Media studies · Performative utterance · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Transnationalism · Anthropology · Caribbean and African Literature and Culture · Gender Studies · Law · Philosophy
| Unique citing works | 3 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,25 |
| Citation span | 2014 - 2018 (5) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 3 |