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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Stifling the imagination: a critique of anthropological and religious normalization of witchcraft in Africa
Author:Ngong, David T.
Year:2012
Periodical:African and Asian Studies (ISSN 1569-2094)
Volume:11
Issue:1-2
Pages:144-181
Language:English
Geographic term:Subsaharan Africa
Subjects:witchcraft
anthropology
Christianity
External link:https://doi.org/10.1163/156921012X629367
Abstract:Recent anthropological and religious, especially Christian, discourses on African witchcraft normalize the witchcraft imagination on the continent by failing to show how damaging the imagination has been to Africa's move toward modernization. While anthropologists normalize it by studying the phenomenon ahistorically and by rationalizing and reinterpreting it, scholars and preachers of African Christianity see it as the context necessary for the growth of Christianity on the continent. However, this normalization of the witchcraft imagination stifles the African imagination because it does not encourage Africans to think in scientific ways that may be more helpful in the transformation of the continent in the modern world. This article attempts to liberate the African imagination by critiquing the witchcraft imagination from a rational and theological perspective. It also proposes policies that need to be taken in order to overcome this ruinous imagination and facilitate Africa's dignified participation in the modern world. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. [Journal abstract]
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