ABSTRACT
Spirit possession or spirit mediumship was fairly common among the traditional religious systems of East Africa. 1 There are signs today of a development—even an increase—in these practices. That this is related to the experience of widespread change seems undeniable. Beattie has noted the function of spirit possession to comprehend and incorporate change and Turner has introduced us to the concept of the ‘liminal’ ritual which is a prolongation of the liminal phase in a rite de passage, through which individuals find strength to meet the demands of a complex and highly structured society. 2 Liminal rituals characterize liminal periods of history when an old social order is passing away and a new one has not yet clearly taken shape. Turner has also described the ‘community of affliction’ whereby a group of individuals come to terms with an affliction or a sickness as a group, 3 and Mary Douglas has shown how the physical body, its sufferings and pains, must be correlated to the categories in which society is seen. 4 The growing preoccupation with rituals to cure bodily ills reflects the sickness of the old social order and the unconscious desire to repair it.
