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Mediums and Magical Things

Statues, Paintings, and Masks in Asian Places

Laurel Kendall author

Format:Hardback

Publisher:University of California Press

Published:30th Jul '21

Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back

Mediums and Magical Things cover

Statues, paintings, and masks—like the bodies of shamans and spirit mediums—give material form and presence to otherwise invisible entities, and sometimes these objects are understood to be enlivened, agentive on their own terms. This book explores how magical images are expected to work with the shamans and spirit mediums who tend and use them in contemporary South Korea, Vietnam, Myanmar, Bali, and elsewhere in Asia. It considers how such things are fabricated, marketed, cared for, disposed of, and sometimes transformed into art-market commodities and museum artifacts.

"Mediums and Magical Things makes a valuable contribution to the study of material religion, anthropology of religion, and religion in modernity. It is a timely volume that will no doubt fulfill Kendall’s hope that it ‘propel others down similar paths’." * Nova Religio *
"Mediums and Magic Things contributes to the study of material religion and the anthropology of religion in a very readable and easily accessible way." * Religious Studies Review *

ISBN: 9780520298668

Dimensions: 229mm x 152mm x 25mm

Weight: 590g

280 pages