Kusamira music in Uganda : spirit mediumship and ritual healing / Peter J. Hoesing.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hoesing, Peter J., 1981- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Music therapy--Uganda.

Music therapy.

Music, Influence of--Uganda.

Music, Influence of.

Spiritual healing--Uganda.

Spiritual healing.

Uganda.

Medical Subjects:

Uganda.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Place of Publication:

Urbana : Urbana University of Illinois Press, [2021]

Language Note:

Includes Bantu (Luganda and Lusoga) lyrics with parallel English translations

Summary:

"A comprehensive ethnographic study of the ritual healing and spirit mediumship tradition called kusamira. Based on extensive ethnographic fieldwork in the Buganda and Busoga regions of southern Uganda, this study demonstrates how the performance of music in kusamira ritual supports the creation and maintenance of social relations that serve mutual aid and health goals. The author deploys performance as a category of analysis to document how a social reproduction of well-being serves as both the goal and the process of kusamira ritual. The study also articulates the relevance of expressive culture-specifically ritual performances of the kusamira repertory-to understanding African modes of knowledge production within broader discourses on development and public health"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Cover

Half Title

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations

Notes on Languages and Orthography

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Situating Kusamira and Nswezi as Repertories of Well-Being

Repertories of Well-Being

Geographic and Fieldwork Context

Pathways to the Healer's Shrine

The Music: Instrumentation, Idioms, and Heterophony

Broader Impacts of Kusamira for Ethnographic Theory

From Divination to Diagnosis to Intervention

The Path Ahead

1. Ritual Work in Twenty-First-Century Uganda: From Folk Well-Being to Ex-Colonial Professionalization

From (In)Visibility to Audibility: Traditional Healers in the Ugandan Ex-Colony

Struggles for Control and Productive Simultaneities in the Ugandan Ex-Colony

The Social Basis of Ugandan Health, Past and Present

"Living Positively": Indigenous Music and Medicine in the Time of AIDS

New Struggles for Control in Uganda

Ritual Musicking as Ritual Work

Conclusion

2. Ecologies of Well-Being: Hearing the World through Ritual Repertories

Invoking the Twins

Ssewasswa: Performing Idioms of Risk and Abundance

Community and Ecology across Two Regions

Mayembe: Binding Spiritual Work and Ecology into Concentrated Space

Hunting, Gathering, and Joining: Ddungu the Hunter

Pantheons and Litanies, Fauna and Flora: Repertories of Practice

From Animals Back to Plants Again

Rivers and Other Waters, Trees and Other Plants

3. Possessing Sound Medicine: Gathering Resources, Strengthening Networks, Composing Knowledge

Sanctuaries of Tradition

Spirit Mediums: Flexible Persons, Conduits to Networks, and Bearers of Knowledge

Okwaza: Searching for Spirits

Mayembe: The Musical Socialization of Spiritual Power

Gimme Shelter: Meeting Spirits' Demands for Places to Call Their Own.

The Ritual Seriousness of Play

Ritual Innovation: High-Tech(nē) Hymnody

4. Sacrifice and Song: Ritual Exchange and the Production of Relational Ideals

The Cultural Logic of Sacrifice: Singing and Praying, Blessing and Feeding

Hunting Productive Power: Sacrifice, Sexuality, and the Contours of Liminality

Omukolo gw'Emisambwa: The Rite of the Misambwa

Omukolo gwa Kiwanuka: The Rite of Kiwanuka

Rituals of New Life, Open Doors, and Fertility

Omukolo gwa Sserugulamilyango: The Ritual of the One Who Opens Doorways

Omukolo gw'Abakyala: Rite of the Women

Interlude: Kalalu (Little Wild One)

Omukolo gw'Amayembe: The Rite of the Mayembe (Working Spirits)

A Contrasting Example of Sacrifice: Irondo

5. From Tea and Coffee Berries to Beer and Meat: Sound, Hospitality, and Feasting in Repertories of Well-Being

Coffee Berries, Groundnuts, and Banana Beer

Cleansing and Gratitude

Dancing with the Spirits: Well-Being beyond Therapeutics

Conclusion: Listening to Kusamira's Lessons on Well-Being Now

Notes

Introduction

1. Ritual Work in Twenty-First-Century Uganda

2. Ecologies of Well-Being

3. Possessing Sound Medicine

4. Sacrifice and Song

5. From Tea and Coffee Berries to Beer and Meat

Bibliography

Interviews and Other Primary Sources

Secondary Sources

Index.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780252043826

0252043820

OCLC:

1287098988