Tuesday
05
DEC

05:15 PM

Medical Anthropology Forum - Wintersemester 2023/2024

The Birth of the (Exorcism) Clinic

Prof. William Sax, PhD

This paper deals with the exorcism clinic, a new and growing institution catering to middle-class Muslims worldwide. In these clinics hijama (wet cupping) and ruqya (exorcism based upon the chanting of Quranic verses) are combined under the banner of "prophetic medicine," effectively clothing traditional practices in modern garb. I argue that the very rapid growth of these practices can partly be explained by the fact that they save modern subjects from the embarrassment of being possessed by "medicalising" their condition; and I document how practitioners try to legitimise themselves by publishing ‘scientific’ studies in various journals.

Prof. William S. Sax, PhD obtained degrees from the University of Washington in Seattle and Banaras Hindu University before earning his M.A. (1982) and PhD (1987) in Anthropology at the University of Chicago. He taught for two years at Harvard University and eleven years in Christchurch, New Zealand before becoming head of the Department of Anthropology in 2000. His research focuses on the Ethnography of India, Anthropology of Religion, and Medical Anthropology. His geographical focus is the western Himalayan region.

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