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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:'The gold and the spirits are close': popular religion and social transformation in Sukumaland, north-west Tanzania
Author:Wijsen, FransISNI
Year:1995
Periodical:Exchange: Journal of Contemporary Christianities in Context
Volume:24
Issue:1
Pages:45-60
Language:English
Geographic term:Tanzania
Subjects:animism
social change
Sukuma
gold mining
External link:https://doi.org/10.1163/157254395X00045
Abstract:This paper on popular religion and social transformation in Geita District, Sukumaland, northwest Tanzania, assumes that the generative capacity of symbolic thought is one of the primary factors in cultural change. A semiotic analysis is used to discover the transformations in society as a whole or aspects of it by way of an analysis of the transformations in cultural symbolism. The paper identifies two opposite but closely related trends. The first trend is that the world is becoming a global village, as evidenced by the incorporation of gold digging in Geita District into the world market. The second trend is that there is a resurgence among all people of the world of a sense of their own cultural identity, as shown by the development of new spirit cults in the Geita gold mines. To a certain extent the second trend is a reaction to the first. The paper concludes that the Sukuma are not a conservative people, but that they do resist changes from which they do not profit. The implication is that they will change their behaviour if they have reason to do so. Bibliogr.
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