Studying Spirit Possession in South Asia

Studying Spirit Possession in South Asia
South Asia is a region with a long history. Dominated by the Indian subcontinent, it is a region blessed with a variety of geographical features, from rainforests to grasslands, valleys and desserts, glaciers and seas. Its climate is also varied, with the south susceptible to tropical monsoons, and the north known to be more tropical. South Asia is a region of diversity, no single region has reigned dominant in the region, no specific language or identity can be associated with its people. Its people are Hindus, Buddhists and Muslims, so their lifestyles also differ from each other. Aside from its unique history under the British Empire, countries of South Asia have very little in common. Yet, it is this diversity, which allows the region as one of the best places to practice anthropology: its various cultures and belief systems are a source of unending questions aiming to understand the mysterious. Evidence of spirit possession is found in historical and religious documents as well as contemporary movies and texts. Evaluation of such evidence is commonplace and various theoretical frameworks have been developed over the years.
Much of the work about spirit possession may be found in Indian text. In a work by Frederick Smith ADDIN Mendeley Citation{c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Smith", "given" : "Frederick M." } ], "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2006" ] ] }, "publisher" : "Columbia University Press", "publisher-place" : "New York", "title" : "The self possessed: Deity and spirit possession in South Asian literature and civilization", "type" : "book" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(2006)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Smith 2006)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (2006), he said, "[e]thnographic work at the beginning of the twentieth century…shows that spirit or deity possession is a widespread epsteme - a historically situated discourse, phenomenon, and practice - in Indian thought, culture, religion, and medicine" (3). It is found in Mahabharata, Ramayana, in the Yogasutras of the Patanjali, the Jain Yogasastra of Hemacanda, Brahmasutras of Badarayana ADDIN Mendeley Citation{c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Smith", "given" : "Frederick M." } ], "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2006" ] ] }, "publisher" : "Columbia University Press", "publisher-place" : "New York", "title" : "The self possessed: Deity and spirit possession in South Asian literature and civilization", "type" : "book" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Smith 2006)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (Smith 2006) among many others. It is important to note, however, that knowledge of the subject as limited to accounts of Indologists and individuals who have access to high knowledge and traditions (those in the higher castes), so there is little known of the pervasiveness and practices related to possession. With modernization and the rise of academic research, knowledge of possession is veering away from spiritual. Rather, its importance is slowly being understand in terms of power relationships between classes and sexes, as well a psychological situations. Many scientific materialists see it as no more than an aberration, "a blemish on the face of epistemological order, a phenomenon subject to benign neglect, or, at most, sanitized into nonrecognition" ADDIN Mendeley Citation{c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Smith", "given" : "Frederick M." } ], "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2006" ] ] }, "publisher" : "Columbia University Press", "publisher-place" : "New York", "title" : "The self possessed: Deity and spirit possession in South Asian literature and civilization", "type" : "book" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(Smith 2006:4)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Smith 2006)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (Smith 2006:4). People who claim to be possessed bear the mark of primitivism. And because scholarship about spirit possession have found that the possessed are individuals belonging to lower ranks (lower castes, members of tribal groups, or women), and are typically uneducated, many scholars see it as a tool for "bestowing introspection, self-knowledge and control" ADDIN Mendeley Citation{c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Smith", "given" : "Frederick M." } ], "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2006" ] ] }, "publisher" : "Columbia University Press", "publisher-place" : "New York", "title" : "The self possessed: Deity and spirit possession in South Asian literature and civilization", "type" : "book" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(Smith 2006:4)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Smith 2006)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (Smith 2006:4). It is an experience alien to the learned, mainly unrecognizable, and despite attempts to tame it or render it harmless, spirit possession is still holds the attention of many anthropologists. In relation with published resources related to the topic, I.M. Lewis ADDIN Mendeley Citation{2d001a4a-61fe-4d65-a1d4-aed0f1d5ca6e} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Lewis", "given" : "I.M." } ], "edition" : "Third edit", "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2003" ] ] }, "publisher" : "Routledge", "publisher-place" : "London", "title" : "Ecstatic religion: A study of shamanism and spirit possession", "type" : "book" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=2d001a4a-61fe-4d65-a1d4-aed0f1d5ca6e" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(2003)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Lewis 2003)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (2003) raised an important concern:
[the] main interest [in spirit possession] has been in the expressive or theatrical aspect of possession; and they have frequently not even troubled to ask themselves very closely what precisely was being ‘expressed`- except of course a sense of identity with a super natural power. ADDIN Mendeley Citation{2d001a4a-61fe-4d65-a1d4-aed0f1d5ca6e} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Lewis", "given" : "I.M." } ], "edition" : "Third edit", "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2003" ] ] }, "publisher" : "Routledge", "publisher-place" : "London", "title" : "Ecstatic religion: A study of shamanism and spirit possession", "type" : "book" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=2d001a4a-61fe-4d65-a1d4-aed0f1d5ca6e" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(22)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Lewis 2003)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (22)
For Lewis, in order to gain better understanding of spirit possession and its significance, it is important to go beyond the belief and try to examine cases according to various social contexts. Meanwhile, Smith believes that anthropologists must re-examine classical texts to gather evidence of possession. Moreover, he cautions, "native and scholastic orthodoxies, does not represent the full spectrum of possession as revealed in the Sanskrit text" ADDIN Mendeley Citation{c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Smith", "given" : "Frederick M." } ], "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2006" ] ] }, "publisher" : "Columbia University Press", "publisher-place" : "New York", "title" : "The self possessed: Deity and spirit possession in South Asian literature and civilization", "type" : "book" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(Smith 2006: 4)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Smith 2006)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (Smith 2006: 4). The anthropologist must be ready to look at the evidence with fresh eyes and beyond the parameters set by previous researches. Possession in India alone cannot be reduced to a single category, it cannot be reduced to a specific experience or practice. This statement can then be expanded to cover the entire South Asian region. Ethnographic writing does not always take into consideration the fact that an ethnographer`s own constructs and language can cause problematic interpretations. For Janice Boddy ADDIN Mendeley Citation{435105ad-06b8-44b3-a7a7-b00f28bd4676} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Boddy", "given" : "Janice" } ], "container-title" : "Annual Review of Anthropology", "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "1994" ] ] }, "page" : "407-434", "title" : "Spirit possession revisited: Beyond instrumentality", "type" : "article-journal", "volume" : "23" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=435105ad-06b8-44b3-a7a7-b00f28bd4676" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(1994)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Boddy 1994)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (1994), "[w]hen spirit possession is at issue, the need to demystify analytical terms and resist being seduced into thinking that they dispassionately reflect reality is especially keen" (408). Many of the categories used by anthropologists to understand the phenomenon are loaded with cultural meaning, and repeated reformulations. Anthropologists must realize that such categories are necessary to facilitate understanding, but that they do not necessarily capture meaning nor explain an autonomous human behavior.
Like any topic in anthropology, there is no single definition for the term "spirit possession". Nirmala Salgado defines possession as a moment of ecstasy, a state "in which the individual demonstrates an apparent displacement of everyday consciousness and behavioral pattern" ADDIN Mendeley Citation{2bd6a949-544f-403a-8e3d-992dcfdfde4e} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Salgado", "given" : "Nirmala S." } ], "container-title" : "Ethnology", "id" : "ITEM-1", "issue" : "3", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "1997" ] ] }, "note" : "\u003cm:note\u003e\u003c/m:note\u003e", "page" : "213-226", "title" : "Sickness, healing, and religious vocation: Alternative choices at a Therav\u0101da Buddhist nunnery", "type" : "article-journal", "volume" : "36" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=2bd6a949-544f-403a-8e3d-992dcfdfde4e" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(Salgado 1997: 213)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Salgado 1997)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (Salgado 1997: 213). Emma Cohen echoes this definition of possession which for her is an occurrence wherein a "person is changed in some way through the presence in him or on him of a spirit entity or power, other than his own personality, soul, self or the like" ADDIN Mendeley Citation{6562ccb6-9fff-4e26-ad4f-5eca51cdf702} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Cohen", "given" : "Emma" } ], "container-title" : "Ethnos: Journal of Anthropology", "id" : "ITEM-1", "issue" : "1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2008" ] ] }, "note" : "\u003cm:note\u003e\u003c/m:note\u003e", "page" : "101-126", "title" : "What is spirit possession? Defining, comparing, and explaining two possession forms", "type" : "article-journal", "volume" : "73" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=6562ccb6-9fff-4e26-ad4f-5eca51cdf702" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(2008: 1)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Cohen 2008)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (2008: 1). Meanwhile, M.S. Thirumalai (2006) says that "spirit possession [can be] understood as a state of consciousness induced in a person by an alien spirit, demon or deity…the person possessed shows a dramatic change of physiognomy, voice and manner" ADDIN Mendeley Citation{b5cc506f-d989-42f6-95ac-13bd972e747f} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Thirumalai", "given" : "M. S." } ], "container-title" : "Christian Literature \u0026 Living", "id" : "ITEM-1", "issue" : "7", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2006" ] ] }, "note" : "\u003cm:note\u003e\u003c/m:note\u003e", "page" : "4", "title" : "What is spirit possession?", "type" : "article-journal", "volume" : "5" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=b5cc506f-d989-42f6-95ac-13bd972e747f" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(p. 4)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Thirumalai 2006)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (p. 4). The external entity mentioned in these definitions is assumed to be more powerful than the possessed; they are ontologically and ethnically alien. In some cultures, the possessing entity may be ghosts, divinities or ancestors. Depending on their nature and origin, these spirits may be exorcised, lodged permanently with the host, or occasionally take over the host`s bodily functions ADDIN Mendeley Citation{435105ad-06b8-44b3-a7a7-b00f28bd4676} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Boddy", "given" : "Janice" } ], "container-title" : "Annual Review of Anthropology", "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "1994" ] ] }, "page" : "407-434", "title" : "Spirit possession revisited: Beyond instrumentality", "type" : "article-journal", "volume" : "23" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=435105ad-06b8-44b3-a7a7-b00f28bd4676" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Boddy 1994)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (Boddy 1994). Perhaps one of the most inclusive definition of possession is that of Janice Boddy (1994): "Possession…is a broad term referring to an integration of spirit and matter, force or power and corporeal reality, in a cosmos where the boundaries between individual and her environment are acknowledged to be permeable, flexibly drawn, or atleast negotiable" ADDIN Mendeley Citation{435105ad-06b8-44b3-a7a7-b00f28bd4676} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Boddy", "given" : "Janice" } ], "container-title" : "Annual Review of Anthropology", "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "1994" ] ] }, "page" : "407-434", "title" : "Spirit possession revisited: Beyond instrumentality", "type" : "article-journal", "volume" : "23" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=435105ad-06b8-44b3-a7a7-b00f28bd4676" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(p. 407)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Boddy 1994)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (p. 407). Through this last definition, possession is no longer limited to custom and beliefs of a culture, but also, the power differentials, dynamics and complexities of a society.
A well-researched topic in many cultures, spirit possession is interpreted in various ways. It can be viewed as benign or malign, depending on how it affects the society. If it supports social norms, spirit possession is desirable, if it disrupts the social order, then it is viewed as evil ADDIN Mendeley Citation{b5cc506f-d989-42f6-95ac-13bd972e747f} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Thirumalai", "given" : "M. S." } ], "container-title" : "Christian Literature \u0026 Living", "id" : "ITEM-1", "issue" : "7", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2006" ] ] }, "note" : "\u003cm:note\u003e\u003c/m:note\u003e", "page" : "4", "title" : "What is spirit possession?", "type" : "article-journal", "volume" : "5" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=b5cc506f-d989-42f6-95ac-13bd972e747f" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(Thirumalai 2006:4)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Thirumalai 2006)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (Thirumalai 2006:4). Vaisnava Hindus celebrate this experience because it is understood as "the overflowing of God", a moment when God communicates with man while in the case of Theravada Buddhism, ecstatic possession is seen as useless or even detrimental to the Buddhist`s goal of nirvana. Meanwhile, people in the West have negative conception of spirit possession. Proof of this is the creation of various Hollywood films such as The Exorcist and The Exorcism of Emily Rose. In the movies, strange incidents happen around them - beds shake violently, and strange noises are heard. In the latter part of the movies, the girls become aggressive, and their physical looks become twisted. This view of possession, according to Smith (2006) is "founded on the assumption of a naturalized, identifiable, and unitary self that was breached by demonic possession" ADDIN Mendeley Citation{c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Smith", "given" : "Frederick M." } ], "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2006" ] ] }, "publisher" : "Columbia University Press", "publisher-place" : "New York", "title" : "The self possessed: Deity and spirit possession in South Asian literature and civilization", "type" : "book" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(xvi)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Smith 2006)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (xvi). This standard Western view also shows that possession can be demonic, sinister and evil. This, according to Smith, presents a limited understanding of the phenomenon and cannot be applied in the case of India. By reviewing classical texts, and looking for evidence of early possession, he discovered a rarely studied aspect of Indian cultural practice, religious experience and disease production.
According to Smith, he found no evidence of possession in classical literature. In the case of Tamil Hinduism, accounts showed that possession in families was extremely high and that it is a central component of the religious life. Yet, it is not the householder who writes these accounts, rather, it is the scholar or the highly privileged (who often have no experience of such possession). It is no longer a surprise, therefore, to discover that the texts focused on the "interaction between the devotee and the god who entered him, mastered or ‘possessed` him without destroying his empirical, sensually motivated, autarchic being" ADDIN Mendeley Citation{c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49} CSL_CITATION { "citationItems" : [ { "id" : "ITEM-1", "itemData" : { "author" : [ { "family" : "Smith", "given" : "Frederick M." } ], "id" : "ITEM-1", "issued" : { "date-parts" : [ [ "2006" ] ] }, "publisher" : "Columbia University Press", "publisher-place" : "New York", "title" : "The self possessed: Deity and spirit possession in South Asian literature and civilization", "type" : "book" }, "uris" : [ "/documents/?uuid=c5fb9504-4b18-49d5-ad5c-ba8773929d49" ] } ], "mendeley" : { "manualFormatting" : "(Smith 2006: 5)", "previouslyFormattedCitation" : "(Smith 2006)" }, "properties" : { "noteIndex" : 0 }, "schema" : "https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json" } (Smith 2006: 5), and provided little to no insights on what the possessed actually experience. Spirit possession became a higher "good", an indicator of man`s quest for perfection. While ethnographies studied by Smith provided vivid description of possession in Tamil texts, other Sanskrit texts do not provide insight on what the possessed actually do or experience. Most descriptions are built around the canonical wherein spirit possession is a paradigmatic experience happening to a paradigmatic figure. Human concerns such as emotional construction and personal identity cannot be derived immediately from these early texts without conferring the accounts with other resources to get a more meaningful understanding of the phenomenon.
Aside from difficulty in acquiring text that describes the personal experience of the possessed, Smith also cites the ascendance of reason and the primacy of academic scholarship which questioned the authenticity of claims as another problem in his attempt to characterize spirit possession...