The Making of a Bewitchment Narrative

Abstract

By analysing the formation of one bewitchment narrative, the paper argues that narratives on bewitchment primarily serve as communicative devices by which one can negotiate his social position in the community, even in cases when overt social conflict is not involved. In case of misfortune the local bewitchment theories give rise to several competing interpretations in the community (a Hungarian village in Romania). The different versions also assign different roles to the bewitched: some put them into the position of the guilty while others show them as wholly innocent victims. By following the interpretational strategies applied during the construction of the bewitchment narrative of a family whose social position was shaken, the paper aims to show how the bewitched managed to reach a version which has put them into a favourable position, and how this narrative was employed to 'save their faces'.Key words: bewitchment, curse, discourse, Eastern Christianity, narrative Romania, witchcraft Most of the anthropological, socio-historical and folkloristic studies of witchcraft see the essence of the institution in its function to express and channel existing social tensions by interpreting them as pretexts for certain misfortunes. While this is evidently true for certain periods, communities and cases, the few anthropological studies on contemporary rural witchcraft show that the importance of witchcraft may lie elsewhere than in manifesting social conflicts.The first to challenge the absolute validity of this interpretation was Jeanne Favret-Saada, who in her thorough study on contemporary witchcraft in France (Favret-Saada 1980) argued that in reality witchcraft accusations were mostly targeted at people engaged in a rather neutral affair with the victims (neighbours), instead of being aimed at those with whom the bewitched had tense relationships (relatives). In her view, witchcraft was to be considered a special language constituting a discourse which, putting otherwise unexplainable events to a certain perspective, offered the bewitched an explanation and solution to their problems. During her fieldwork, and in her analysis as well, J. FavretSaada decidedly took the perspective of the bewitched 1 and concentrated on bewitchment narratives as "inner" explanations -explanations that the behttp://haldjas.folklore.ee/folklore/vol37/hesz.pdf

White man law versus black magic women. Racial and gender entanglements of witchcraft policies in Romania

“…Pop-Curșeu notes that the social marginality of the Rroma is highlighted even more in their superficial or unsuccessful Christening efforts, as well as their refusal to align to accepted forms of modernity. Agnes Hesz (2007) suggests that narratives on bewitchment serve primarily as communicative devices by which people negotiate their social position in the community, even in cases when overt social conflict is not involved. Hesz analyzes the construction of the bewitchment narrative of one peasant family living in a Hungarian village in Romania, to argue that bewitchment narratives -besides their obvious psychological effects -are used as communicative means for negotiating one's position in a particular social space.…”