Spiritual Politics in Caribbean History

几个世纪以来，欧洲和北美一直通过其以非洲为主导的宗教形式来想象加勒比海，从19世纪初英国和北美舞台上的牙买加“欧比”，到20世纪40年代好莱坞银幕上的海地“巫毒”，再到今天互联网上广泛的加勒比宗教和治疗现象。虽然“obeah”这个词在加勒比地区和加勒比侨民之外不再广为人知，但在18世纪后期，它或术语“obi”（意思相同）是讨论加勒比奴隶制和加勒比文化的常见参考点，出现在严肃的辩论小册子、小说和诗歌中，以及伦敦的舞台上。在英国在加勒比海的殖民地和后来的独立国家，它仍然是一个重要的术语。在法律上被定义为巫术的一种形式，obeah也被理解为一种精神治疗，一种权力的术语，是加勒比宗教的一个元素，也是该地区文化的一个方面，与非洲特别相关。这项奖学金的主要目的是使我能够完成一本名为《加勒比历史中的精神政治：宗教文化、奥拜和国家1760-1980》的书，并与学术界以外的人建立关系，以便更广泛地交流研究。这本书重构了从18世纪到20世纪70年代整个加勒比地区的奥拜礼历史，重点关注奥拜礼的表现形式之间的关系，这些表现形式经常被用来制造特殊的政治案件，而那些实践被称为奥拜礼的人，通常以其他方式理解他们自己的实践。它没有寻求obeah的精确和稳定的定义，而是强调该术语的含义随着时间和不同地方的差异而变化。该研究将考察该术语的变化和当地特定含义，以及被描述为obeah的行为（尽管通常不是由这些行为的执行者进行）被解释和使用的方式。它将调查对奥比厄的刑事定罪以及针对奥比厄的各种法律的重新制定，这些法律的执行，以及奥比厄在一系列关于加勒比和加勒比人民的重要辩论中的特点：关于奴隶贸易的结束；关于废除奴隶制的；以及20世纪30年代到60年代的非殖民化。我收集了从19世纪末到20世纪初，在牙买加和特立尼达，人们因拜神和其他宗教罪行（包括违反特立尼达的“禁止呼喊法令”，该法令规定精神浸信会的宗教活动是非法的）而被起诉的数百起案件的细节。对这些案例的分析是研究的重要组成部分，将成为本书的重要组成部分，同时分析从传教士、人类学家、殖民官员和奴隶主的论文中收集的材料，以及从出版的书籍、小册子、官方报告和报纸文章中收集的材料。该项目的目的是注意官方和非官方政治和文化渠道中关于obeah的讨论，注意被称为obeah的实地做法，以及注意执法的做法，包括维持治安和起诉。在这些不同层次的分析之间移动，产生了一种比传统的社会史，或传统的文化和政治史更复杂的历史写作，后者关注的是话语和/或高级政治。除了写这本书之外，我还将花部分时间制作一个网站，让更多的人可以获得关于这个项目的信息和案例研究。我还将为那些在向更广泛的公众传播历史方面发挥作用的非学者举办两个讲习班，并将为《牙买加拾荒者》（Jamaica Gleaner）报纸写一篇文章。

The Caribbean has for centuries been imagined in Europe and North America through its African-oriented religious forms, from Jamaican 'Obi' on British and North American stages in the early nineteenth century, through Haitian 'Voodoo' on Hollywood screens of the 1940s, to the wide range of Caribbean religious and healing phenomena available on the internet today. While the word 'obeah' is no longer widely known outside the Caribbean and Caribbean diaspora, in the late eighteenth century it or the term 'obi' (which meant the same thing) was a common reference point in discussions of Caribbean slavery and Caribbean culture, appearing in serious polemical tracts, in novels and poetry, and on the London stage. In the British colonies in the Caribbean and the independent states that succeeded them, it has remained a significant term. Legally defined as a form of witchcraft, obeah has also been understood as a kind of spiritual healing, a term for power, an element of Caribbean religion, and an aspect of the region's culture that is particularly connected to Africa. The main purpose of this fellowship is to enable me to complete a book entitled Spiritual Politics in Caribbean History: Religious Culture, Obeah, and the State 1760-1980, and to develop relationships with people outside academia in order to communicate the research more widely. The book reconstructs the history of obeah across the Caribbean from the eighteenth century to the 1970s, focusing on the relationship between representations of obeah, which were frequently used to make particular political cases, and the people who were practicing what was described as obeah, who often understood their own practices in other ways. Rather than seeking precise and stable definitions of obeah, it emphasizes that the meanings of the term changed over time and difference in different places. The research will examine the changing and locally specific meanings of the term and the way practices that have been described as obeah--though often not by those conducting them--have been interpreted and used. It will investigate the criminalization of obeah and the various reformulations of the law against it, the enforcement of those laws, and the way in which obeah featured in a series of important debates about the Caribbean and Caribbean people: about the ending of the slave trade; about the abolition of slavery; and about decolonization from the 1930s to 1960s. I have collected details of hundreds of cases from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries when people in Jamaica and Trinidad were prosecuted for obeah and other religious crimes (including breaches of the 'Shouters Prohibition Ordnance' in Trinidad, which made the practice of the Spiritual Baptist religion illegal). Analysis of these cases is an important part of the research and will form a substantial part of the book, alongside analysis of material collected from the papers of missionaries, anthropologists, colonial officials, and slaveowners, and from published books, pamphlets, official reports and newspaper articles. The project is designed to pay attention to discussions of obeah in official and unofficial political and cultural channels, to on-the-ground practices termed obeah, and to the practice of law enforcement, including policing and prosecution. Moving between these different levels of analysis produces a more complex kind of historical writing than either traditional social history, or traditional cultural and political history which focuses on discourse and/or high politics.In addition to working on the book, I will devote part of my time to producing a website which will make information about, and case studies from, the project more widely available. I will also run two workshops for non-academics who have a role in communicating history to a wider public, and will write an article for the newspaper the Jamaica Gleaner.