The Devil's Book of Culture: History, Mushrooms, and Caves in Southern MexicoUniversity of Texas Press, 1 déc. 2003 - 272 pages Since the 1950s, the Sierra Mazateca of Oaxaca, Mexico, has drawn a strange assortment of visitors and pilgrims—schoolteachers and government workers, North American and European spelunkers exploring the region’s vast cave system, and counterculturalists from hippies (John Lennon and other celebrities supposedly among them) to New Age seekers, all chasing a firsthand experience of transcendence and otherness through the ingestion of psychedelic mushrooms “in context” with a Mazatec shaman. Over time, this steady incursion of the outside world has significantly influenced the Mazatec sense of identity, giving rise to an ongoing discourse about what it means to be “us” and “them.” In this highly original ethnography, Benjamin Feinberg investigates how different understandings of Mazatec identity and culture emerge through talk that circulates within and among various groups, including Mazatec-speaking businessmen, curers, peasants, intellectuals, anthropologists, bureaucrats, cavers, and mushroom-seeking tourists. Specifically, he traces how these groups express their sense of culture and identity through narratives about three nearby yet strange discursive “worlds”—the “magic world” of psychedelic mushrooms and shamanic practices, the underground world of caves and its associated folklore of supernatural beings and magical wealth, and the world of the past or the past/present relationship. Feinberg’s research refutes the notion of a static Mazatec identity now changed by contact with the outside world, showing instead that identity forms at the intersection of multiple transnational discourses. |
Table des matières
Introduction A Toyota in Huautla | xvii |
Historical and Geographical Overview The Master Narrative of the Past | 33 |
From Indians to Hillbillies Explicit Stories about the Mazatec Past | 57 |
Like Rock but Mazatec Fiestas in Huautla | 96 |
The Secret Past | 113 |
Quiere Hierba? Quiere Honco? Mushrooms Culture Experts and Drugs | 124 |
The Underground World | 189 |
ConcLusion The Devils Book | 227 |
Notes | 237 |
Bibliography | 249 |
265 | |
Autres éditions - Tout afficher
The Devil's Book of Culture: History, Mushrooms, and Caves in Southern Mexico Benjamin Feinberg Affichage d'extraits - 2003 |
Expressions et termes fréquents
American anthropologists asked Ayautla Benito Juárez borders caciques campesinos Casa cave cavers Chamula Chato Chikon Tokoxo Chilchotla coffee comerciantes construction curanderos curers customs described dominant drugs Earth Lord Estela Estrada ethnic experts fiesta foreigners García Dorantes gringo groups highlands hillbilly hippies Huautecos Huautla Huautla de Jiménez huipiles identity Indians indigenous intellectuals intermediary isolated Juárez language leaders linear style lived lowlands magical María Sabina Matzazongo Maya Mazatec culture Mesoamerica mestizo metacultural discourse Mexican Mexico City missionaries Mixtec mountains municipal president Neiburg Nindo Number Oaxaca outsiders particular past period pictorial Pike political Prehispanic region relationship Renato reporting culture representation represented revolution Ricardo role San Agustín says sell shamans Sierra Mazateca sort space Spanish stories talk Tehuacán Teotitlán things Tibón tion told tourists town traditional underground Veracruz Villa Rojas village Wasson wealth woman
Fréquemment cités
Page viii - Tylor's definition, almost a century ago, that "culture, or civilization, is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society," innumerable definitions of culture have been formulated, but they all seem to be aimed at the same thing.
Page xiii - We received substantial institutional support and personal encouragement from the Institute of Latin American Studies of the University of Texas at Austin. The...