Abbasi M (2020)
Publication Language: English
Publication Type: Book chapter / Article in edited volumes
Publication year: 2020
Publisher: Routledge
Edited Volumes: The Shamaness in Asia: Gender, Religion and the State
City/Town: London
Open Access Link: https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9780429319808-15/mirroring-values-possession-ritual-maryam-abbasi
In the Hormozgān province of Iran, the word “zār” is a general word for a powerful spirit, which might attack people at different stages of life and cause illnesses. This word is also used for the whole process of treating illnesses, which is carried out in the form of a party. According to data gathered through participant observation and interviews from 2010 to 2016, zār participants consider possession a way of coming together to temporarily fulfil values of their social life that are especially desirable yet otherwise unattainable. At the same time, the ritual deals with unfulfilled desires, as well as with the opposite of what their society idealizes as values worth pursuing.
Participants follow this ritual by going through interrelated ritual phases and are affected in the process by their social and financial background. In this way, they end up occupying different positions in relation to the ritual and the dynamics of its unfolding. In order to examine empirically the various ways in which values come to be made, three biographic-narrative interviews with female participants of the zār ritual will be presented and analyzed. Each woman can be considered a kind of example for other women in a similar situation pursuing their own values.
This research will answer the questions: What is the zār ritual? What are the values related to the zār ritual? How are the female participants tied into this ritual? How do the values experienced by following a ritual process have an effect on social hierarchy?
APA:
Abbasi, M. (2020). Mirroring Values in Possession Ritual: A Biographic-Narrative Study of Female Participants in the Zār Ritual in the Hormozgan Province of Iran. In Davide Torri, Sophie Roche (Eds.), The Shamaness in Asia: Gender, Religion and the State. London: Routledge.
MLA:
Abbasi, Maryam. "Mirroring Values in Possession Ritual: A Biographic-Narrative Study of Female Participants in the Zār Ritual in the Hormozgan Province of Iran." The Shamaness in Asia: Gender, Religion and the State. Ed. Davide Torri, Sophie Roche, London: Routledge, 2020.
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