Uncertain Persons in Nyole Divination

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Periodical article

Title:	Uncertain Persons in Nyole Divination
Author:	Whyte, Susan R.
Year:	1990
Periodical:	Journal of Religion in Africa
Volume:	20
Issue:	1
Period:	February
Pages:	41-62
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Uganda
Subjects:	divination Luyia witchcraft Religion and Witchcraft Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/1581424.pdf
Abstract:	This article examines the uncertainty in the face of misfortune which is addressed in divination. The paper is based on fieldwork carried out in Bunyole County, Bukedi (now Tororo) District, Eastern Uganda, in 1969-1971. Among the Nyole dwelling in this area, misfortune posed questions about persons, their relations, motivations, and dispositions. In divination, these questions were examined and answers proposed. Both client and diviner should begin a seance in a state of uncertainty. This uncertainty was not simply 'there'. It was constructed. The author uses two divinations as case studies to illustrate the ways in which a suffering individual is analysed as a person, a being with a mind/body related to the world in certain ways. She emphasizes that there are qualities of personhood that constantly require further exploration and creation, because there is always a degree of uncertainty about persons. Thus, uncertainty is never fully resolved. What is important about Nyole divination is not that it provides a simple answer, but that it constitutes a framework for questioning. Bibliogr., notes.