Open AccessThe Pentecostal War Against Afro-Brazilian ‘Demons’ – Politics, Selfhood and Shared Experience of Spiritual Work in Southeast Brazil
Author(s) -
Eleonora A. Lundell
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
revista del cesla
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2081-1160
pISSN - 1641-4713
DOI - 10.36551/2081-1160.2020.26.195-220
Subject(s) - acknowledgement , politics , ethnography , agency (philosophy) , sociology , gender studies , ethnology , political science , anthropology , social science , law , computer security , computer science
This article discusses the religious conflict between Afro-Brazilian and Pentecostal groups shedding light on the complex relations between cross-religious experiences and the official acknowledgement of ‘religion’ in Brazil. The study analyses devotees and clients’ experiences in the rituals of Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus and Umbanda addressing fluid selfhoods and the multiple human and other-than-human agencies in the making of individual life trajectories through ritual participation. Thus, regarding religious conflict merely through bounded identities, institutions or dogma, the study shows that behind the fortifying religious conflict between Pentecostal and Afro-Brazilian religious groups relies a politically complex, colonially framed concept of ‘religion’ which leaves out of academic and political consideration a large part of effective ritual knowledge and agency, continuously re-producing the inferior position of ‘Afro-Brazilian religions’ within the Brazilian society. The analysis in this article is based on ethnographic field research carried out in Southeast Brazilian states of Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo during 2008-2015.