The History and Practices of Voodoo Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

The History and Practices of Voodoo - Essay ExampleIn the documentary, Witchcraft & Magic, Patrick Macnee suggests that glamour is generally perceived as tribal black dissimulation practiced in primitive cultures. Ross Heaven, the first white priest of Vodou in Europe, explains that Vodou is a spiritual tradition of Africa and Haiti (Heaven 7). Brandi Kelley, the Director of the Voodoo Museum in New Orleans, states that hoodoo is a compromise between African voudon and Catholicism (Macnee). While all of these statements are applicable, the history of voodoo and its exploitation is somewhat nebulous. In the book for diaphragm school students, The Real Monsters, Sudipta Bardhan-Quallen discusses perception and reality, sometimes movies and books portray voodoo as a dark and evil religion that is dominated by black antic and pin-struck voodoo dolls. In reality, these things are not a part of traditional voodoo practices (45). Bardhan-Quallen relates the observations of photographe r Lynne Warberg, who has documented Haitian voodoo for years. Participation in voodoo ritual reaffirms ones relationships with ancestors, personal history, community relationshipsand the cosmos. Voodoo is a way of life (qtd. in Bardhan-Quallen, and Cochran 45). Slavery played a defining function in the history of voodoo. ... Linking their deities to Catholic saints, slaves could pretend to pray to St. Barbara, for example, while really delivering their wishes to the vo-du thunder god, Songo (Davis 8) Open to suggestion and seeking answers within the social constructs that confined them, slaves authentic a new religion in which transplanted voudon borrowed freely from native Indian cultures, European witchcraft, and another(prenominal) non-voudon African slave religions, for example the Kongo-based palo mayombe. And it co-opted precisely as frequently Catholicism as locally necessary to prevent the African content from being crushed by the Europeans (Davis 8). In the words of Ro d Davis, a newsman who researched and studied Voodoo for his book, American Voudou Journey into a Hidden World, Voudou took as many guises as necessary to survive, hoodoo, root medicine, spiritual healing, ju-ju, black magic, and dozens of other euphemisms and forms (75). Davis states that in different areas, voudou has different rituals and doctrines (9). One can deduce that differing circumstances in each location, as well as other religions and cultures in the region, influenced the evolution of the religion. According to Davis, in Haiti, the religion metamorphosed into vodun or vaudoux in Cuba, Santeria in Brazil, candomble in Trinidad, Shango Baptist in Mexico, curanderismo in Jamaica, obeah. In the American South, it became voodoo and, in the most primitive caricature, hoodoo, the petty hexing (pins in dolls, love potions, etc.) which most people, black and white, confuse with the real thing (Davis 9). In discussing peoples attitudes toward voodoo in early