Place and spirit in Taiwan : Tudi Gong in the stories, strategies, and memories of everyday life / Alessandro Dell'Orto.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Dell'Orto, Alessandro, 1959-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Gods, Chinese--Taiwan.

Gods, Chinese.

Taiwan--Religious life and customs.

Taiwan.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (220p. ) ill.

Place of Publication:

London ; New York : RoutledgeCurzon, 2002.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Based on fieldwork in Taiwan, this work examines the cult of Tudi Gong, both as a religio-social phenomenon and as an appropriate medium for exploring and analysing the social changes that have been occurring in Taiwan.

Based on field-work in Taiwan, this book examines the ancient, indigenous religious cult of Tudi Gong both as a religio-social phenomenon and as an appropriate medium for exploring and analysing the social changes that have been occurring in contemporary Taiwan, and the people's strategic adaptations to these changes. In this comprehensive ethnography of Tudi Gong, Dell'Orto engages in a theoretical discussion of the practices, processes and strategies of ethnography and ethnographic writing, and contributes to the construction of an anthropology of place by analysing a number of key concepts related to the notion of place and space. The study combines the use of personal ethnography with raconteurs' own accounts as a way of tracing senses of place and memories of the past. This is a pioneering foundation text for an anthropology of non domestic place and space and brings the most important recent work of social geographers into the field of anthropology. Based on field-work in Taiwan, this book examines the ancient, indigenous religious cult of Tudi Gong both as a religio-social phenomenon and as an appropriate medium for exploring and analysing the social changes that have been occurring in contemporary Taiwan, and the people's strategic adaptations to these changes. In this comprehensive ethnography of Tudi Gong, Dell'Orto engages in a theoretical discussion of the practices, processes and strategies of ethnography and ethnographic writing, and contributes to the construction of an anthropology of place by analysing a number of key concepts related to the notion of place and space. The study combines the use of personal ethnography with raconteurs' own accounts as a way of tracing senses of place and memories of the past. This is a pioneering foundation text for an anthropology of non domestic place and space and brings the most important recent work of social geographers into the field of anthropology.

Contents:

List of Illustrations Foreword Preface Acknowledgements Intro duction Part I. Telling stories about place 1. Datong district 2. Yongxing village Part II. Writing place and the place of writing 3. 'Siting' and 'sighting' texts Part III. Telling stories about Tudi Gong 4. The 'territories' of Tudi Gong 5. Fragments from 'popular tradition': telling stories and other representations of Tudi Gong Part IV. Conclusion 6. Retelling stories about place and Tudi Gong: retrospectives and prospectives Notes Selected glossary Bibliography Index

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references (p. 283-293) and index.

ISBN:

1-135-79038-8

0-7007-1568-1

1-280-18045-5

0-203-22111-7

9780203221112

OCLC:

475879381