Distress, Dissociation, and Embodied Experience
Reconsidering the Pathways to Mediumship and Mental Health
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2474709 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Rebecca Seligman (0000-0002-9402-0322, Citigroup, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2005 |
| Volume | 33 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 71-99 |
| Publication date | 2005-03-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Ethos (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0091-2131 • E-ISSN: 1548-1352 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1525/eth.2005.33.1.071 |
| OpenAlex | W2122387238 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 31 |
| References cited | 32 |
This article explores the biocultural bases of spirit possession mediumship in the Afro-Brazilian religion, Candomblé. After a brief review of the literature, the article moves beyond the biomedical and social-structural explanations that have dominated the theoretical landscape, by attempting to construct an etiology of mediumship that is traced through the interface of individual characteristics with the cultural belief system that forms their context. Data were collected from a total of 71 individuals over the course of a year-long field study in Salvador, Brazil. Analyses of social ethnography, life history and semistructured interviews along with results from psychological inventories, suggest that altered states of consciousness should not be considered the central and defining element of mediumship. An alternative model is proposed, in which the combination of social conditions and somatic susceptibilities causes certain individuals to identify with the mediumship role, and predisposes them to dissociate. However in the context of Candomblé, dissociation is not a pathological experience, but rather a therapeutic mechanism, learned through religious participation, that benefits individuals with a strong tendency to somatize
Consciousness · Developmental psychology · Distress · Embodied cognition · Epistemology · Ethnography · Mental health · Possession (linguistics) · Psychoanalysis · Psychotherapist · Sociology · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Anthropology · Community Health and Development · Philosophy · Psychology · Religion, Spirituality, and Psychology · Social Psychology
Una Reflexión Metodológica, Ontológica Y Epistemológica Del Trabajo De Campo en Una Práctica Espiritista Posmoderna
Trance, Dissociation, and Shamanism
Spirit Possession in Jesus Research
Characteristics of Adolescents Affected by Mass Psychogenic Illness Outbreaks in Schools in Nepal
Cultural models of normalcy and deviancy
Investigating Mediumship/Possession-Relevant Experiences
From Mental Illness to Disability
Religious Dissociation and Economic Appraisal in Brazil
Narrative Dimensions of Dissociative-Psychosis
Enhancing one life rather than living two
Mental health and mediumship
Reframing voices and visions using a spiritual model. An interpretative phenomenological analysis of anomalous experiences in mediumship
Channeling
Traumatic Experience and Somatoform Dissociation Among Spirit Possession Practitioners in the Dominican Republic
A Village Possessed by “Witches”
Dissociative Symptoms and Reported Trauma Among Patients with Spirit Possession and Matched Healthy Controls in Uganda
Dissociative Experience and Cultural Neuroscience
Mu l tiple embodiment relations
Magical Flight and Monstrous Stress
Transformation in Dang-ki Healing
Possession trance covaries with measures of social rigidity in the Ethnographic Atlas
The Politics of Madness and Spirit Possession in Northern India
Social Support, Help-Seeking Behaviors, and Positive/Negative Affect Among Individuals Reporting Mediumship Experiences
Cultural and group differences in mediumship and dissociation
Physiologic correlates of culture-bound dissociation
A formal anthropological view of motivation models of problematic MMO play
Anxious Bliss
Guadalupan Devotion as a Moderator of Psychosocial Stress among Mexican Immigrants in the Rural Southern United States
The Absorption Hypothesis
The Unmaking and Making of Self
How I learned to channel
Religion, altered states of consciousness, and social change
Brazil
Medusa's Hair
Pituitary-Adrenal and Autonomic Responses to Stress in Women After Sexual and Physical Abuse in Childhood
The Interpretation of Cultures
Case studies in spirit possession
Comment On the Proposed Dsm-Iv Criteria for Trance and Possession Disorder
Ecstatic Religion
Race, Gender, and Development in Brazil
Technological Elites and Political Parties
Experiential canalization of behavioral development
Psychological Anthropology
Multiple Personality, Possession Trance, and the Psychic Unity of Mankind
Becoming a Possession-Medium in South India
Bargaining from Weakness
The Spectrum of Ritual
Culture, Socioeconomic Status, and Physical and Mental Health in Brazil
The Problem of "Spirit Possession" as a Treatment for Psychiatric Disorders
Spirits of Resistance and Capitalist Discipline, Second Edition
Possession Trance and Multiple Personality
From Affliction to Affirmation
Spirit Possession Revisited
Body/Meaning/Healing
| Unique citing works | 31 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1,72 |
| Citation span | 2008 - 2026 (19) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 28 |