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Book Book Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:In sorcery's shadow: a memoir of apprenticeship among the Songhay of Niger
Authors:Stoller, PaulISNI
Olkes, CherylISNI
Year:1987
Pages:235
Language:English
City of publisher:Chicago; London
Publisher:The University of Chicago Press
ISBN:0226775429; 0226775437
Geographic term:Niger
Subjects:Songhai
witchcraft
Abstract:This book is the memoir of Paul Stoller's sojourn among sorcerers in western Niger. In 1976 he returned to the area where he had served as a Peace Corps volunteer and began his doctoral research among the millet-farming Songhay people. After six months he discovered that he had been lied to systematically by his informants. Dropping his original agenda, he began to live among the Songhay in a less formal fashion. By the end of the year, he made the decision to become an apprentice to sorcerers in the hope of gaining an understanding of a hidden dimension of Songhay culture. Over the next eight years, his apprenticeship took him to the villages of Mehanna, Tillaberi and Wanzerbe. It was in Wanzerbe that, fearing for his life, he abandoned his apprenticeship in 1984. Cheryl Olkes joined her husband for several years among the Songhay.
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