Power and Intimacy in the Christian Philippines / Edition 1

by Fenella Cannell

Overview

The lowland Philippines, in contrast to the apparently "exotic", "tribal" areas, has for many years been thought of as a strangely Westernized place, without a cultural life of its own. This innovative and important book shows that this perception is a myth, which reflects our own obsessions with defining culture and identity as something "unchanging." Through an absorbing account of arranged marriages, miraculous saint cults, spirit mediumship and gay beauty contests, the author describes the unexpectedness of daily life in rural Bicol and the resilience and imagination of the Filipino poor.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521646222
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	03/18/1999
Series:	Cambridge Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology , #109
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	344
Product dimensions:	6.02(w) x 8.98(h) x 0.91(d)

Table of Contents

List of illustrations; Acknowledgements; Glossary; Note on language and names; Introduction: mountains and plains; Part I. Marriage: 1. Marriage stories: speaking of reluctance and control; 2. Kinship and the ritualisation of marriage; Part II. Healing and the Spirits: 3. Introduction: healing and the 'people who have nothing'; 4. Spirit mediums and spirit-companions; 5. Spirit mediums and seance forms: changing relations to the spirit world; 6. Coda: the birthday-parties of the spirits; Part III. Saints and the Dead: 7. The living and the dead; 8. The funeral of the 'dead Christ'; 9. Kinship, reciprocity and devotions to the saints; Part IV. Beauty Contests: 10. Beauty and the idea of 'America'; 11. Conclusion: oppression, pity and transformation; Appendix; Notes; Bibliography; Index.

Editorial Reviews

"Cannell provides a reading of Bicolano culture that encompasses a history of colonialism and an explication of the ways that awareness of power and powerlessness infuses daily life." Choice

From the Publisher