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ment. It is virtually impossible to discuss social interaction, self-identity, and cognitive process in an African context without consideration of divination, especially diviner-client interaction and the modes of analysis employed. Political and sociological studies of African societies need to recognize the role of divination systems in the enactment and validation of African legal systems and political structures. Investigation of a divination complex reveals a wealth of historical data in divinatory texts, esoteric terminology, and diviner's paraphernalia. Because many diviners are also herbalists, their diagnostic and treatment methods can aid the study of traditional healing systems. No aspect of life is not touched by divination, and so the process becomes critical to any study of African cultures and peoples. |
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With our emphasis on divination as a system of knowledge in action, we are reminded that our scientific tradition is but one way of knowing and that we can gain much from other systems proven effective over the centuries. African divination systems involve a combination of (as we commonly label cognitive processes) "logical-analytical" and "intuitive-synthetical" modes of thinking, while in the European tradition the separation of these modes is rigidly maintained. |
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In addition, the European tradition tends to characterize the diviner as a charismatic charlatan coercing others through clever manipulation of esoteric knowledge granted inappropriate worth by a credulous and anxiety-ridden people. Instead, we have found diviners to be men and women of exceptional wisdom and high personal character. The critical input of the divinatory congregation, especially that of the consulter/adviser and the particularizing discussions between diviner and client(s), serves to demythologize the domineering diviner image. By approaching divination as a dynamic, determining process, we are no longer limited to simple product analysis of the divinatory diagnosis. |
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Another guiding principle of the contributors to this book was to provide an overview of sub-Saharan African cultures and contemporary divination scholarship. The contributions are based on extensive fieldwork among peoples from Burkina Faso, Kenya, Madagascar, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Sudan, Togo, Uganda, and Zaire. Not only do these studies provide new theoretical approaches to a variety of divination systems; they also present much new ethnographic material, including several divination forms never described previously. While we hope that this anthology will aid in focusing future research on divination, we did not attempt to confine it to a single analytical approach. Most contributions, nonetheless, are in concert with what Devisch (1985) terms internal, semiotic and semantic, and praxeological approaches. Therefore, despite the diversity of peoples, divination systems, scholars, and academic orientations represented, a number of significant common points emerge to unify the collection. |
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Although each essay discusses numerous aspects of a divination system, the essays are grouped to enhance their major contributions, and section introductions provide brief analytic and comparative commentaries to highlight the groupings. The first section, as a kind of prelude to the whole volume, is devoted to one of the earliest recorded accounts of the process of becoming a diviner. Taken from Henry Callaway's classic ethnographical study, The Religious System of the Amazulu, it describes a future diviner's experiences and the cultural institutions |
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