Chapter 14. Moved by God

Performance and memory in the Western Himalayas

William Sax | University of Heidelberg

Karin Polit | University of Heidelberg

We review the history of the anthropological study of “body memory” and argue that it was developed in a fruitful way only with the advent of practice theory and performance studies, which focused on embodied meanings in addition to purely linguistic ones. We provide two case studies of embodied memory. In the first, collective memories of oppression and exploitation are activated by the recitation of particular stories, sometimes resulting in mass possession. In the second, practices associated with the periodic processions of a Western Himalayan deity are shown to be based on local forms of embodied memory.

Keywords: anthropology, collective memory, India, performance, ritual

Published online: 25 January 2012
https://doi.org/10.1075/aicr.84.17sax

Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Koch, Sabine C., Christine Caldwell & Thomas Fuchs

2013. On body memory and embodied therapy. Body, Movement and Dance in Psychotherapy 8:2 ► pp. 82 ff.

Winfield, Taylor Paige

2021. Embodied Theodicy: From Conceptual to Bodily Engagements with Suffering. Journal of the American Academy of Religion 89:1 ► pp. 204 ff.

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