Electric Santería: Racial and Sexual Assemblages of Transnational Religion (Gender, Theory, and Religion) - Softcover

Beliso-De Jesús, Aisha

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0231173172 ISBN 13: 9780231173179

Publisher: Columbia University Press, 2015

Synopsis

Santería is an African-inspired, Cuban diaspora religion long stigmatized as witchcraft and often dismissed as superstition, yet its spirit- and possession-based practices are rapidly winning adherents across the world. Aisha M. Beliso-De Jesús introduces the term "copresence" to capture the current transnational experience of Santería, in which racialized and gendered spirits, deities, priests, and religious travelers remake local, national, and political boundaries and reconfigure notions of technology and transnationalism.

Drawing on eight years of ethnographic research in Havana and Matanzas, Cuba, and in New York City, Miami, Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay area, Beliso-De Jesús traces the phenomenon of copresence in the lives of Santería practitioners, mapping its emergence in transnational places and historical moments and its ritual negotiation of race, imperialism, gender, sexuality, and religious travel. Santería's spirits, deities, and practitioners allow digital technologies to be used in new ways, inciting unique encounters through video and other media. Doing away with traditional perceptions of Santería as a static, localized practice or as part of a mythologized "past," this book emphasizes the religion's dynamic circulations and calls for nontranscendental understandings of religious transnationalisms.

About this title

Book Description:

Santería is an African-inspired, Cuban diaspora religion that is rapidly winning adherents across the world. Aisha M. Beliso-De Jesús introduces the term "copresence" to capture the transnational experience of Santería, in which racialized and gendered spirits, deities, priests, and religious travelers remake local, national, and political boundaries and reconfigure notions of technology and transnationalism. Conducting research in Havana and Matanzas, Cuba, and in New York City, Miami, Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay area, Beliso-De Jesús maps the emergence of copresence in transnational places and historical moments, exploring assemblages of race, imperialism, gender, sexuality, and diaspora. Emphasizing Santería's dynamic circulations, this book advances a nontranscendental understanding of religious transnationalisms.

About the Author:

Aisha M. Beliso-De Jesús is associate professor of African American religions at Harvard Divinity School. A cultural and social anthropologist, she studies media, circulation, and religious travel of African diaspora religions from a transnational feminist approach.

About this edition

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 0231173172
• ISBN 13: 9780231173179
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 304