Re: [xmca] Levy-Bruhl, concrete psychology and "primitivism"

[Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com>]

I've been reflecting on the Babalawo and "participatory" consciousness. Do
others see an analogy with mesmerism and magnatism.
These ideas I've re-collected from Andrew Piper [Dreaming in Books]

Classical mesmerism focused on DIRECT CONTACT [immediacy] with another.
What Piper refers to as "Hoffmannian magnetism" in contrast focuses on the
MEDIATION  of mesmerism. { Andrew argues the roots of Freudian
psychoanalysis are in Hoffmaaian magnetism}
Hoffmannian magnetism operates from the FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE of semiotic
DISTANCE BETWEEN subjects [gaps] and posits MEDIATED rather than IMMEDIATE
mesmerism.  Mesmerism as semiotic distance focuses on TECHNIK [technologies
and techniques] such as literary reactivation & recollection,  materiality
of the book, etc. Hoffman was reflecting on the more GENERAL techniks of
narration, linguistic, and material techniques that were USED to SHAPE the
semiotic distance.
Secondary mediatiating movements then BRIDGED the distance created.
Piper is exploring a communicative framework. In particular the
transformation of European culture at the turn of the 19th century when the
culture became saturated with books and especially "collected editions".
However, his exploration of the fundamental shift with understandings of
mesmerism [animal magnetism] FROM notions of natural IMMEDIACY TO notions
of  the techniks of MEDIATED SEMIOTIC DISTANCE [and the secondary bridging
of the distance created] seems to be have something to add to the
discussion of the Babalawo and how culture "organizes ways of dwelling in
the world.

The tension between DIRECT immediacy & INDIRECT mediacy is the theme I'm
questioning.

Larry

On Fri, Feb 24, 2012 at 10:51 AM, Steve Gabosch <stevegabosch@me.com> wrote:

> Oh dear, looking at too many posts and getting mixed up where I saw what.
>  Martin already posted the slide I just asked him for.  Here it is.
> - Steve
>
> On Feb 21, 2012, at 9:54 AM, Martin Packer wrote:
>
> Steve mentioned the presentation I gave at ISCAR, on a study conducted by
> a student here in Colombia (Silvia Tibaduisa) of the babalawo. I discussed
> an excerpt from a divination session; here it is:
>
> Let me ask a little question. You live in a aparte-studio... in an
> apartment, with other people. What person wears your clothing?
>
> Yes. Sometimes my cousin or my sister uses them
>
> Orula says not to lend your clothes any more, because that is stealing
> your luck. That the person who wears someone’s clothes steals their astral,
> steals their luck. If not, make an observation yourself, of how your cousin
> lives and how you live. She's all happy, all content, and you’re not. That
> is how someone’s luck, stability, leaves them. Because [when] one lends
> their astral, although one washes it 100 times, it takes holds of the
> astral of the other person as well, and if it’s a negative astral, it also
> includes one. We, the religious, don’t loan our clothing, we don’t bathe
> with the same towel or the same soap. We don’t lend underwear, socks,
> shoes, anything. Because these are one's personal things and that takes
> hold of your astral. Nor wear the clothes of another person.
>
> The English reads a little oddly because I prefer literalish translations.
> There are a number of interesting characteristics to this exchange, but I
> want to focus on the reasoning involved. I would suggest that it is
> perfectly recognizable to us. Substitute a more familiar premise: not "when
> someone wears your clothes they steal your astral" but "when someone uses
> your toothbrush they give you bacteria" and the rest follows logically,
> doesn't it?
>
> Martin
>
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