Witchcraft and welfare : spritual capital and the business of magic in modern Puerto Rico / Raquel Romberg.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Romberg, Raquel.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Witchcraft--Puerto Rico.

Witchcraft.

Magic--Puerto Rico.

Magic.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (336 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Austin : University of Texas Press, 2003.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Persecuted as evil during colonial times, considered charlatans during the nation-building era, Puerto Rican brujos (witch-healers) today have become spiritual entrepreneurs who advise their clients not only in consultation with the spirits but also in compliance with state laws and new economic opportunities. Combining trance, dance, magic, and healing practices with expertise in the workings of the modern welfare state, they help lawyers win custody suits, sick employees resolve labor disability claims, single mothers apply for government housing, or corporation managers maximize their commercial skills. Drawing on extensive fieldwork among practicing brujos, this book presents a masterful history and ethnography of Puerto Rican brujería (witch-healing). Raquel Romberg explores how brujería emerged from a blending of popular Catholicism, Afro-Latin religions, French Spiritism, and folk Protestantism and also looks at how it has adapted to changes in state policies and responded to global flows of ideas and commodities. She demonstrates that, far from being an exotic or marginal practice in the modern world, brujería has become an invisible yet active partner of consumerism and welfare capitalism.

Contents:

Frontmatter

CONTENTS

PREFACE

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

INTRODUCTION: RITUAL ALCHEMY

Part I SHIFTING FACES

CHAPTER ONE GATEKEEPERS AND HERETICS: DISPUTING SACRED TERRITORIES

CHAPTER TWO NATION BUILDING AND THE SECULARIZATION OF SPIRITUALITY

CHAPTER THREE SPIRITUAL LAISSEZ-FAIRE AND THE COMMODIFICATION OF FAITH

Part II THE TECHNOLOGIES OF COSMIC AND WORLDLY SUCCESS

CHAPTER FOUR BRUJOS, SAINTS OR BROKERS?

CHAPTER FIVE SPIRITUAL ASSETS AND THE ENTANGLEMENTS OF POWER

CHAPTER SIX THE GLOBAL BAZAAR OF SPIRITUAL ENTERPRISE

CHAPTER SEVEN THE MORAL ECONOMY OF BUREAUCRATIC PROVIDENCE

CHAPTER EIGHT ADVOCATES AND LAWYERS OF ANOTHER ORDER

EPILOGUE: THE HALLOWEEN EXTRAVAGANZA

NOTES

BIBLIOGRAPHY

INDEX

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references (p. 289-303) and index.

ISBN:

0-292-79783-4

OCLC:

60334031