A Brazilian Challenge to Lewis's Explanation of Cult Mediumship
نویسندگان
چکیده
Recruitment into peripheral possession trance cults has been explained as attempts to compensate for socio-economic deprivation and jural impotence. This model, best developed by I. M. Lewis, is reviewed and its predictions are tested against two types of Brazilian data. Firstly, national census gures of religious afliation are compared with measures of socio-economic stress for a diachronic analysis. A second, synchronic analysis involves 62 respondents in Rio de Janeiro who completed questionnaires on socio-economic status, cultic afliation, and perceptions of stress and gender inequality. The results offer only weak support for Lewis’s original model, which may therefore prot from supplementation from other theoretical perspectives.
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