New World African Ritual: Genuine and Spurious

Abstract

Following traditions established by Melville J. Herskovits and Roger Bastide, the literature on African-American religions emphasizes accommodation, acculturation, and syncretism at the level of culture, without adequate attention to the role of individual decision making in religious change. As a result, many anthropological studies stress the adaptability of religious systems but pay scant attention to the limits of religious accommodation. Using examples including Spiritual Baptism and its mourning ceremony, this paper shows that Afro-Caribbean religion is highly adaptable but not infinitely so. Throughout the New World, however, the degree of African religious tradition preserved during the Diaspora varies widely and is a matter of lively concern to adherents. Edward Sapir's contrast between genuine and spurious culture is especially useful in understanding the issues of origin, acculturation and authenticity now important to Afro-Caribbean religious believers as well as to scholars.