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Ernesto de Martino was a major critical thinker in the study of vernacular religions, producing innovative analyses of key concepts such as 'folklore', 'magic' and 'ritual'. His methodology stemmed from his training under the philosopher Benedetto Croce whilst his philosophical approach to anthropology borrowed from Marx and Gramsci. Widely celebrated in continental Europe, de Martino's contribution to the study of religion has not been fully understood in the Anglophone world though some of his works - 'Primitive Magic: the Psychic Powers of Shamans and Sorcerers' and 'The Land of Remorse: a Study of Southern Italian Tarantism' - have been translated. This volume presents a comprehensive overview of de Martino's life and work, the thinkers and theories which informed his writings, his contribution to the study of religions and the potential of his methodology for contemporary scholarship.
Guilty Males and Proud Females is the first complete study on the Bengali gajan festival dedicated to Dharmaraj, a village god in the Rarh region of Bengal. The gajan is the dramatic representation of an hierogamy--the marriage of a god and goddess--and a recreation of the life-cycle of earth. As Fabrizio M. Ferrari explains one of the most fascinating aspects of the gajan is its approach to gender. The central deity of the gajan is a goddess identified with the earth. To please such a goddess, male devotees must acknowledge the pain they inflict towards the female world and become "ritual women." Conversely, as part of the festival, women display their generative power and provoke the jealousy of men by ritually mocking conception and delivery. The outcome of the ritual is that their suffering is acknowledged and transformed into power. Much more than an ethnography of Bengali popular religion, Guilty Males and Proud Females contributes to new studies on gender transformation in the Bengal region and will be of interest to scholars of South Asian religions, folklore, and gender studies.
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Volume 1: International, Albania to Libya. Volume 2: Madagascar to Zimbabwe, Indexes.
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