Seductive spirits : deliverance, demons, and sexual worldmaking in Ghanaian Pentecostalism / Nathanael J. Homewood.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Homewood, Nathanael J., author.

Series:

Spiritual phenomena.

Spiritual phenomena

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Pentecostalism--Ghana.

Pentecostalism.

Demoniac possession--Ghana.

Demoniac possession.

Spirit possession--Ghana.

Spirit possession.

Sex--Religious aspects--Pentecostal churches.

Sex.

Demonology--Pentecostal churches.

Demonology.

Experience (Religion).

Physical Description:

1 online resource (294 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Stanford, California : Stanford University Press, [2024]

Summary:

Pentecostalism, Africa's fastest-growing form of Christianity, has long been preoccupied with the business of banishing demons from human bodies. Among Ghanaian Pentecostals, deliverance is primary among the embodied, experiential gifts—a loud, messy, and noisy experience that ends only when the possessed body falls to the ground silent and docile, the evil spirits rendered powerless in the face of the holy spirit-wielding-prophets. And nowhere is Ghanaian Pentecostal obsession with demons more pronounced than with sexual demons. In this book, Nathanael Homewood examines the frequent and varied experiences of spirit possession and sex with demons that constitute a vital part of Pentecostal deliverance ministries, offering insight into these practices assembled from long-term ethnographic engagement with four churches in Accra, the capital of Ghana. Relying on the uniqueness of the Pentecostal sensorium, this book unravels how spirits and sexuality intimately combine to expand the definition of the body beyond its fleshy boundaries. Demons are a knowledge regime, one that shapes how Pentecostals think about, engage with, and construct the cosmos. Deliverance Pentecostals reiterate and tarry with the demonic, especially sexually, as a realm of invention whereby alternative ways of being, sensing, and having sex are dreamed, practiced, and performed. Ultimately, Homewood argues for a distinction between colonial demonization and decolonial demons, charting another path to understanding being, the body, and sexualities.

Contents:

Frontmatter

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Introduction

One Historical and Contemporary Scenes

Two Indecent Scenes

Three Singular Scenes

Four Scenes of Struggle

Five Spousal Scenes

Six Serpentine Scenes

Conclusion: Decolonial Demons

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

Other Format:

Print version: Homewood, Nathanael Seductive Spirits

ISBN:

9781503638075

1503638073

OCLC:

1409607887