Chapter 1. Ways to Embody the Divine in Brazil
Chapter 2. Vale do Amanhecer
Chapter 3. Spirits in Transition: The Multidimensional Self
Chapter 4. Jaguars of the Dawn: The Transhistorical Self
Chapter 5. Disobsessive Healing
Chapter 6. Mediumship
Chapter 7. Learning Spirit Mediumship: Ways of Knowing
Chapter 8. Spiritual Routes
Chapter 9. Therapeutic Trajectories

Conclusion

Appendix
Glossary
References
Index

Jaguars of the Dawn

Spirit Mediumship in the Brazilian Vale do Amanhecer

Emily Pierini

290 pages, 20 illus., bibliog., index

ISBN 978-1-78920-565-7 Hb Published (January 2020)

eISBN 978-1-78920-566-4 eBook

Details

“This is an exciting book for several reasons… it contributes original knowledge to theoretical debates on the relationship between humans and spirits and the ways in which spirit possession/mediumship is about a transformation of the self.” • Cristina Rocha, Western Sydney University.

The Brazilian Spiritualist Christian Order Vale do Amanhecer (Valley of the Dawn) is the place where the worlds of the living and the spirits merge and the boundaries between lives are regularly crossed. Drawing upon over a decade of extensive fieldwork in temples of the Amanhecer in Brazil and Europe, the author explores how mediums understand their experiences and how they learn to establish relationships with their spirit guides. She sheds light on the ways in which mediumistic development in the Vale do Amanhecer is used for therapeutic purposes and informs notions of body and self, of illness and wellbeing.

Emily Pierini is a Marie Curie Fellow in anthropology at Sapienza University of Rome and visiting professor at the Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina.