Possessed by a slave, not slavery
Suomen Antropologi April 14, 2022 DOI: 10.30676/jfas.v45i4.101278 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Citations | 2 |
| Key points | Proposes that the concept of 'apomimesis' offers a way to understand the emergence of a non-slave identity through negative dialectics, displacing but not replacing earlier mimetic and formulaic forms of historical imagination in Cuban spirit possession. |
Abstract
The present paper is divided into three large steps around the themes of spirit possession and the historical imagination of slavery in Cuba. These three steps reflect both ethnographic dimensions of these themes and broader theoretical approaches towards them. The last step, ‘apomimesis’, is the one proposed by the author, not by way of replacement but displacement. The first step, ‘formulaic’ historical imagination, covers the ground of a direct expression of slavery as historical trauma through spirit possession. The second step, ‘mimesis’, displaces the first by adding into it the possibility of reversal, of empowerment, the slave becoming an anti-slave. The third creates another simultaneous condition. Through the negative dialectics of apomimesis the non-slave emerges.