Spirit Service

<p><b>Known in the Dominican Republic and Togo as Vodu in Benin as Vodún and in Haiti as Vodou West African religion has for hundreds of years served as a repository of sacred knowledge while simultaneously evolving in response to human experience and globalization. </b><br /><br /><i>Spirit Service: Vodún and Vodou in the African Atlantic World</i> explores this dynamic religion its mobility and its place in the modern world. By examining the systems--ritual practices community-based spirit veneration and spiritual means of securing opportunity and well-being--alongside the individuals who worship this rich collection offers the first comprehensive ethnographic study of West African spirit service on a broad scale. Contributors consider social encounters between African/Haitian practitioners and European / North American spiritual seekers economies and histories funerary rites and spirit possessions and examinations of gender and materiality. <br /><br />Offering much-needed perspective on this historically disparaged religion <i>Spirit Service</i> reminds us all that the gods are growing assimilating and demanding recognition and respect.</p>