African Diasporic Religions in the Americas

Eugenia Rainey | Edited by Aaron Michael Ullrey

Years ago, in Chicago, a lone man went out on a pier in Lake Michigan. As he went, he looked around cautiously to make sure the area was vacant. He had gone for a divination reading

with a local priest of Lucumí. The man was suspicious of the religion, perhaps coming to “test” the priest’s abilities. Unfazed, the priest advised him to take an offering to Olokun, the mysterious orisha of the depths of the ocean, and to petition that orisha for help with his problem. Olokun would grant him a solution. Lake Michigan served as a nearby substitute for the ocean and an appropriate place for a petition. Once the man was confident the pier was empty, he looked out at the lake and told Olokun of his troubles, and then he deposited his offering. He turned to go, but a figure blocked his path. Olokun, fully embodied, proceeded to explain the solution to his problem. A moment later, the man fled in terror. “He never came back!” the priest would burst out laughing when he retold the story.[1] Americans prefer their gods in the ether, nothing to face. 

In African diasporic traditions, the world is not limited to the material. In the orisha traditions of Lucumí (aka Santería, aka La Regla de Ocha) and Candomblé and the lwa tradition of Vodou as well as the European occult tradition of Spiritism that is often practiced concomitantly with these African diasporic traditions, “Spirit” does not shy from the material. The atmosphere is positively thick, populated with divinities (orisha & lwa) and spirits of multiple types (deceased ancestors, heavenly spirits, and other mysterious entities). These entities regularly manifest in the human world in visible and tangible ways. Spirits are found in specific locations, features of the landscape, natural phenomenon, or at times are found in a human body. In this entry, spirit possession refers to  when a human’s personality exits the body and a divine or spirit personality enters, allowing the spirit visitor a temporary opportunity to experience being material and connect physically with those in the immediate area. These African diasporic traditions are structured by religious families, which I will refer to as houses, where stories from the house are shared to illustrate the fluidity and intimacy that characterize devotees’ relationships with these spirit entities. Not all devotees regularly experience spirit possession but all benefit from it. Devotees who experience spirit possession are referred to in this entry as mediums or mounts—as a horse is mounted by a divine rider. Mediums and mounts must be properly trained through regular religious practice and devotion so they will not be harmed by this physically intense experience and so that spirit possession can benefit the community effectively.

For some, the practice of spirit possession, found in a diversity of places across the globe, challenges notions of rationality and bodily autonomy. Scholars from different disciplines have provided accounts of this phenomenon in varied contexts which address such notions.[2] This entry primarily focuses on the religious and social value placed on spirit possession and the training of mediums in Cuban Lucumí and Spiritism but also addresses possession in Haitian Vodou and Brazilian Candomblé. Spirit possession provides the community a means to interact directly with the spirits of deceased ancestors or with divinities (also referred to as saints) which are concentrated in features of the landscape like mountains and rivers, natural phenomena like thunderstorms and tornadoes, or in human endeavors like agriculture and motherhood. 

Spirit possession or mounting is part of how these traditions awaken devotees to the world around them in tangible and vibrant ways. Ogun, the orisha of iron and technology, for instance, can mount one of his initiated devotees and speak directly to members of the religious community, instructing them to honor him with rum at the railroad tracks they pass daily. His instructions are not universal but conveyed for those there to hear the message. To put it simply, spirit possession is critical to these traditions because it provides value to these communities. It is a material experience—experience being the center of all things—that cannot be had otherwise; for the religious communities cultivating spirit possession, these events are a direct opportunity for individuals to receive advice, ask for solutions to their problems, be healed from ailments, or have their own spirit cleansed. The value is that all parties are in concrete relationship with one another.

The Transatlantic Slave Trade brought numerous religions to the Americas that are indigenous to the African continent. These practices exist throughout the Western Hemisphere, but they are concentrated in the Caribbean and the northeast coast of South America. There is great religious diversity in these traditions because they stem from different groups of people and different parts of the African continent. Three traditions rooted in West Africa—Lucumí, Vodou, and Candomblé—employ a complex of religious techniques to interact with the spirit world. Cuban Lucumí and Brazilian Candomblé are creole incarnations of the worship of orisha and practices indigenous to Yorubaland in West Africa’s Nigeria, Togo, and Benin. Haitian Vodou is the creole incarnation of the worship of the lwa, those deities indigenous to the historic Kingdom of Dahomey in modern day Benin, with additional influences from the Yoruba as well as the Kongo. In each of these religious communities, people also maintain altars and perform rituals for the dead. Biological and religious ancestors are very important, and any failure to honor and engage them can result in a disruption in the relationship between a devotee with the orisha or the lwa. The dead always come first. 

In Latin America, Spiritism or Espiritismo is a practice to engage spirits of the dead, but Spiritism originated in nineteenth-century Europe rather than Africa. The Spirits Book by Allan Kardec (aka Hippolyte Rivail) became available in 1857 and enjoyed wide-spread popularity.[3] While Kardec considered Spiritism a “science,” the techniques used, specifically the spirit mass (misas espirituales) and the boveda altar for spirit guides, are widely adopted by many in African diasporic religious communities.[4] In Lucumí, many religious houses, for instance, hold regular spirit masses. In Brazil, Spiritism is wildly popular, and its practices vary. Some Spiritists reject African diasporic traditions altogether, others include African diasporic traditions alongside or intertwined with Spiritist practices, and other still are purely African houses of Candomblé that don’t entertain Spiritism at all. For those that include Spiritism, it is used to augment a devotee’s relationship with the dead. Maintaining a spirit altar, keeping glasses of water refreshed, preparing special foods, lighting candles and incense—all these activities facilitate alignment with the dead, a necessary element to successful religious rituals and leading a positive life. 

The African diasporic traditions in this entry are practice-based, primarily focused on the “here and now” rather than eschatological concerns. Devotees are not threatened with-- or promised-- an eternal afterlife of bliss or pain but a continuation of life as a spirit and also through reincarnation. Ancestors are concerned with the wellbeing of their family members after death, and they continue to assist them. The African diasporic traditions discussed here are initiatory religions with diverse and extensive bodies of rituals, complex divination systems, dance, music, and spirit possession. All these elements engender transformative effects on communities and on individuals through directly connecting them to the spirits, who confer advice and healing. While spirit possession is the subject of this piece, it is only one element of a whole system that should be understood as supporting the whole and not existing autonomously.

If we understand transcendent experience as a connection with something beyond the self and beyond the material world, and if we understand the ecstatic to relate to out-of-body experiences, then spirit possession involves transcendence and ecstasy. While the story about the man encountering Olokun on the Chicago pier involves a spontaneous event experienced by an individual and illustrates the ability of orisha to manifest materially, none of these religious traditions rely strictly or entirely on the spontaneous or unpredictable. Spirit possession by the deities and the deceased is part of religious structure cultivated by those with a capacity for it. 

In these contexts, out-of-body experiences do not solely benefit the person having the experience but are used for healing and to promote the social wellbeing of community members. Because the person experiencing possession is not conscious during the possession event, they generally do not experience feelings of euphoria or other comparable emotions. In the words of ethnographer and avant-guard filmmaker Maya Deren, “[T]he possessed benefits least of all men from his own possession.”[5] People remark with amazement that possessed bodies perform shocking or impossible feats, yet they show no signs of having performed:like consuming burning hot food without being burned or the elderly and infirm doing somersaults and regaining consciousness without pain in their bodies. This makes sense, in a way, because the individual possessed is not present to experience these feats.

Lucumí, Vodou, and Candomblé maintain complex understandings of what constitutes a person: To say a person is spirit and body is only an entry point. Yes, Human beings are understood to be composed of immaterial spirit and material body, and, in this respect, they are already part of the spirit world. But, more critically, people are composites of multiple pieces, multiple spirits, that are not fully autonomous but are able to exist separate from the physical  body. These separate and composite pieces are acknowledged and treated accordingly.

In Vodou, a person is understood to have a nam (the animating force), a gwo bonanji (big guardian angel), a ti bonanji (little guardian angel), and a zetwal (star) in addition to a mèt tèt, the lwa who “owns” their head.[6] The star or zetwal of a person watches them as they live life  on earth. The big and small guardian angels, gwo bonanji and ti bonanji, occupy the body together, but when a person sleeps one angel stays near the body to protect it while the other angel goes traveling, engaging in spiritual tasks or adventures that are impossible while tied to a body. When a person feels unwell, not quite “right” or psychologically exhausted, this is the result of the suffering of the ti bònanji little guardian angel , and rituals can refresh and reinvigorate it. When a person is mounted by a lwa, there is often a period of violent thrashing when the gwo bònanji big guardian angel and the lwa tussle over possession of the body, like a horse being broken. Eventually, if the mounting is completed, the gwo bònanji leaves and the lwa enjoys the benefits of a body: They dance, eat, bless devotees, talk to them, maybe chastise them, give instructions and advice. Once the lwa is satisfied with their time occupying the body, it leaves and the gwo bònanji returns.

In the orisha traditions of Lucumí and Candomblé, the guiding force of the human being is their orí. The word orí has no direct translation, but it is often described as the “inner head,” and it relates to the quality of a person’s integrity, destiny, and character. Prior to incarnating, a spirit goes before Olodumare, the source of all creation, and the spirit receives or chooses an orí as well as a vocation. Prior to being born, the spirit forgets everything, but the quality of a person’s orí becomes evident as their life progresses. In Cuba, there are rituals to refresh the orí and to help clear the way for a person to think more clearly. In Brazil, as in West Africa, there are shrines to a person’s orí to guide one in leading their fullest life. Nonetheless, the orí is not described as “leaving” the body in spirit possession though the personality is understood to leave as the personality of the orisha takes over the body.[7]

In all these traditions, questions of gender are fluid regarding the spirits. The orisha and the lwa are understood to have gender, with only a few exceptions. This is understandable, for, given their vocation of looking after humanity, divinities need to experience gender to connect with the human experience of gender. As anthropologist Karen McCarthy Brown explains, “Vodou spirits are larger than life but not other than life.”[8] That said, orisha and the lwa are not human, and they are not limited to gender categories any more than they are limited to locations or bodies. Gender is not the most important part of an orisha, nor is gender a stable category for orisha. The orisha mount devotees regardless of gender identity: male orisha mount male, female, and nonbinary devotees alike, and female orisha mount female, male, and non-binary devotees as well. A person’s gender is irrelevant to the question of their tutelary deity. A devotee does not pick a tutelary deity; the deity picks them.

Though spirit possession and tutelary deity gender identity are fluid, questions of sexuality are not understood in the same way. For tutelary deities, sexuality and gender are independent of one another. A cisgender male  who has a female orisha, like Yemaya the orisha of the ocean and motherhood, as his tutelary orisha thinks little of it. In contrast, spirit possession is likened to sexual penetration in Lucumí and Candomblé: A man who mounts spirits can suffer homophobic social stigma because of his association, regardless of his own personal sexual identity. Women who mount spirits are not subject to any social questioning of their sexual preferences. Both men and women mounted by an orisha are recognized embodying the gender of that orisha, not their own gender if their genders conflict with the gender of the orisha. A mount’s behavior is considered that of the orisha mounting them, and they are not held accountable for that behavior. 

Spirit possession in Spiritism varies more. Deceased spirits are still described through gender frameworks. Women are generally represented in higher numbers in both African diasporic and Spiritist traditions and are more likely to experience spirit possession; men are still present and men mount spirits. Spirit possession in spirit masses sometimes cause the possessed person to lose consciousness, but just as often, the person will remain conscious and present during the experience, sharing the spirit’s messages while the person possessed is in a light trance. The notion of men mounting spirits is not as widely tied to homosexuality in Spiritism as it is in Lucumí and Candomblé.

Spirit possession by divinities happens in large-scale celebrations with beautifully staged altars and elaborate costumes. Open, semi-public, spirit possession rituals for orisha and lwa involve professional drumming and singing: These events are referred to as bembes, toques, fundamentos, drums, or “parties.” Experienced ritual musicians or priests call different divinities through the drumbeats and songs specific to each deity. This requires drummers and singers to know an extensive number of songs for each divinity and how to interact with each spirit once mounted. Through the guidance of the drummers and singers, divinities mount those initiates trained in spirit possession. When mounted, deities get to enjoy the hospitality of the host, and  provide advice and healing to devotees attending the events.  

While ritual musicians are critical to spirit possession, the attending crowd of initiated people also have an essential impact. Dancing is expected and considered an offering. Dancing bodies support the mounts as they transition. An experienced ritual singer  is familiar with individual mounts’ specific process: Some people mount slowly and with great effort, while others mount quickly and seamlessly. Participants sing and dance to raise the energy in a space and to encourage divine presence. Initiates dance close to the mount, prepared to encircle the mount, offering protection when the possession process begins. As Yvonne Daniel, an anthropologist of dance, describes it, “The dancing bodies accumulate spirit, display power, and enact as well as disseminate knowledge. Worshipping performers reenact what they had learned, what they have been told, what they feel, and what they imagine. They re-present feelings, ideas, understandings, and knowledges.”[9] Once the orisha or lwa arrives, participants recognize the divinity according to how the deity manifests in body language, carriage, the type of dances the mounts perform, how they speak and interact with those present, and by the energy that engulfs mounts and other  participants. 

People who experience possession by a divinity report remembering nothing at all. One medium I spoke to explained the process of mounting Elegua, her tutelary deity, in this way:

Elegua [her tutelary orisha], I’ve only passed him in drumming, but it isn’t like I have to dance to pass him. The times that I have, the best, I was going to the drum and we were parked two blocks away and I remember turning to say something and I was hit by a jolt of whatever and when I came back it was night time and I can’t tell you what happened. That has happened to me on several occasions and I’ve tried to avoid it, I’ll stay in the corner and avoid everyone and he comes. And it’s like a thunder bolt. Those are the ones that I really count. When I first started passing him and come back I was so drained, I would sleep for days. He’d taken all of my energy.[10] 

Her testimony shows how disorienting possession can be for the mount. During one drumming event, the same person mounted Elegua and climbed a tree, speaking to people from the branches. Elegua is the orisha of the crossroads and communication; in Cuba, Elegua is often characterized as childlike and given appropriate offerings such as sweets and toys. The mount only had the information she disclosed from secondhand reports related by others in attendance, for she had no personal memory of what happened. 

 In Vodou, possession by a lwa is described similarly. In the groundbreaking ethnography of Vodou, Mama Lola: A Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn by Karen McCarthy Brown, Alourdes, aka Mama Lola, describes her experience of possession by the lwa Ogou, providing another instance of disorienting forgetting: 

When the spirit going to come to your head, you feel very light, light like a piece of paper …very light in your head. You feel dizzy in your head. Then after, you pass out. But the spirit come, and he talk to people, and he look at the table you make for him … you know. Then he leaves and … and you come from very far, very, very far. But when the spirit in your body, in your head, you don’t know nothing. They have to tell you what the spirit say, what message he leave for you.[11]

These second-hand accounts of what a lwa or orisha says in possession are essential for relating the divinity’s advice for the mount. It is important that those in attendance share with the mount the advice given  by the deity. This is yet another layer of the community bonds fomented through spirit possession, the mounts allowing themselves a high degree of vulnerability to provide a service to their community; in turn, the members of the community look after the mount’s best interest.

Spirit possession involves the loss of consciousness, which can make people feel vulnerable and frightened. It takes time and training to effectively mount a divinity and provide the spirits’ guidance to specific people and the community. In Vodou and Lucumí, people who are outsiders to the religion or who are novices are not encouraged to mount spirits. In the Lukumí community, if an outsider shows signs of mounting, elders prevent spirit possession from fully manifesting by removing the person from the music and dancing, allowing that person to regain full consciousness. In this respect, the religious protocols for the process of spirit possession protect unprepared attendees from potential harm and reinforces the functionality of spirit possession so that the community can best benefit from direct contact with orisha. 

Not all possession by orisha is as immediate as the instance described by the Elegua mount. The manifestation of an orisha is unique to the personality of that orisha and to the individual mount. Elegua is associated with swift action and playfulness. His possession is described to be “like a thunder bolt,” as a swift action—but he should not to be confused with Shango the orisha of thunder. Elegua’s playful spirit is shown above when he climbs a tree and jests with participants from up in the branches. The lwa Ogou Badagre is described as “brave, assertive, loyal,” not inclined to explosive anger but showing quiet and insular anger when upset.[12] The orisha of communicable disease and epidemics, Babalú Ayé, is known for being exiled from his own kingdom to travel to another land but eventually regaining his status in a foreign place; his experience makes him a mature orisha, different from the childlike Elegua. One of Yvonne Daniel’s participants in Brazil, a mount for Babalú Ayé, describes going into possession very differently from the Elegua mount:

I feel ice in my feet when Baba [the oricha Babaluayé] starts to come and even though I try to keep the rhythm, I can see my feet don’t do it. Then I try to make my arms go forward and back like they should, and I see my hands—but the ice is coming, and then I don’t remember . . . All I remember is me trying to make my feet and [arms] do the steps right, and cold ice coming up from my feet to my back.[13]   

Some mounts take a long time to become fully possessed, and musicians have to continuously work to draw the deity fully into the body. At times, ritual singers chastise or insult the orisha, suggesting the orisha is unable to mount the horse and inadequate. Sometimes angering an orisha in this way allows the possession to finally be complete.

Details of the possession process show that the individual mounts play an important role, but the bodies of the trained ritual musicians and participants both of whom have gone through specific initiations are equally important. In turn, this shows that possession should be understood as a primarily communal practice rather than as an individual experience. The presence of the community, their singing and dancing and their creation of a protective circle around the divinities as they mount, are important collective elements of trance possession that reflect the centrality of community to this transcendent experience. As Yvonne Daniel describes, 

Worshipers in the religions I study generally view ritual or ceremonial dance/music performances as a series of sacred offerings. The congregation performs the dances until specialists in divine manifestation emerge. These lead and intensify the performance, moving the ritual forward from extraordinary activity (ritual behavior) through transcendence or transformation (spiritual behavior).[14] 

Consequently, while only one person has an out-of-body experience, the community as a whole has a transcendent experience when mundane reality shifts to accommodate the bodily presence of the divine. All the physical effort put forth beating the drums, singing the chorus, moving to the rhythm, and watching intently for the shift in energy indeed comes to fruition and out bursts the otherworldly call of the divine, loud above all the other sounds. 

Once possession is complete, the mount is whisked away into another room and dressed in a specially prepared ornate outfit, an outfit representing the colors, style, accessories, and emblems associated with the mounted orisha. A given drum ceremony is hosted for a specific divinity, and the host sets up an elaborate altar to honor that deity, complete with offerings of food that will be distributed at the close of the ceremony. Still, it’s not unusual for other divinities to show up or for multiples of the specific deity being honored to show up: An event for the female lwa Èzili Dantò may see the lwa Azaka show up as well, a ceremony for the orisha Iansã may see multiple children of Iansã mount, and so on. In the case of multiple deities, the host must scramble to dress the other divinities who arrive and attend. The outfits for these unexpected guests are generally not as elaborate as those of the most honored guest deity, but all  divine guests who show up are given appropriate clothing. When they return to the party in their finery, the honored deities are greeted by attendees with prostrations (moforibale) and offerings. Some participants place cash on the mounts, the bills held in place by sweat; warrior orisha are offered rum; the orisha of rivers, the sweet water, Ochun, is offered honey; and Yemaja, the orisha of the sea, is offered cane syrup. The orisha get to dance and salute the drums, expressing their appreciation for the pleasure of incarnating and for the offerings the host arranged. They also address attendees, and they generally do so in order of years of initiation and the degree of closeness to the house. 

Possession may be a spectacle, but the credibility of the possession does not rely on the theatricality of the mount. Credibility is determined by a mount’s messages and ability to follow ritual protocol. As it becomes more popular and more people participate, many in the community complain about the degradation of practice. When orisha mount, they are expected to follow a set of ritual protocols. If a person behaves as if mounted but does not follow protocol, people are suspicious that the mount is fraudulent. When orisha mounted their devotees in years gone by, according to some Lucumí elders, those deities could tell a complete stranger numerous personal details about themselves—right down to “what was in your purse.” When people mount today, elders  complain, some mounts only speak to the people they already know, a very suspicious sign which causes distrust in the community.

Spirit possession is part of the Spiritist tradition credited to Allan Kardec, although this system has a very different structure. Gatherings in Spiritism are for earthly spirits, not deities: The spirits who possess are the deceased who are guides for those in attendance. The African diasporic religions discussed above are, for the most part, initiatory religions but Spiritism is not. In fact, many in the community would not describe Spiritism as a religion per se.[15] There are Spiritist communities that have no involvement in African diasporic religions and vice versa. In places where both traditions are present, they tend to overlap or be practiced concomitantly. In African diasporic traditions devotees develop spiritually, religiously, and personally through an initiatory framework—having rituals performed for them and participating in the rituals of others—but Spiritist mediums develop through the guidance of elder mediums and spirits not in specific initiation rites but by actively participating in masses, praying, meditating, and maintaining spirit altars.

Not only do spirits intersect with the living on a regular basis, whether it is acknowledged or not, but people are understood to be born with a specific set of non-familial, non-ancestral spirits who accompany them throughout their lives. These spirits can be from anywhere, reflecting the global mass movement of people created by colonization. A spirit medium cultivates a relationship with this group known as a “spiritual cord,” and mediums act as a conduit to relay messages to the living from this group of spirits as well as other unattached spirits.[16] This lifelong collaboration benefits both spirits and mediums. Spiritism generally characterizes these benefits as facilitating “progress” for the medium and also the spirits. This progress can only be obtained by helping others, both human and spirit, manage the problems arising in their lives and providing healing. Spirits reincarnate and spiritually progress through the lives they live physically on Earth and in the spirit world. In contrast, the Yoruba concept of reincarnation is not framed in terms of spiritual progress but as a reinforcement of familial relationships. It is a circular understanding of reincarnation where spirits return within the family, reflecting the high value placed on family bonds.[17] The role, and the joy, for spirits comes of earthly experience within the family, consequently bolstering the family and wider community.[18]  

Spiritist traditions are structured around the ritual of the spirit mass, commonly referred to as misas espirituales. In the process of a spirit mass, everyone in the room has to be spiritually cleansed. A developmental misa is a specific type of mass hosted by a couple of experienced mediums, and is intended to provide a space for people in attendance to develop their own mediumnity and receive messages from the spirits. Sometimes spirits possess a medium in order to give a message to a person in the room; other spirits come to spiritually cleanse someone in the room or the entire group. In more serious cases, a misa may be held to manage a specific issue, and two experienced mediums target a person or group’s specific spiritual problem. In either case, a boveda is set up, which is an altar constructed for the spirit guides that contains clear glasses of water, lit candles, and cologne, at the very least, sometimes cigars, flowers, and herbs are also arranged on the altar. Attending these developmental spirit masses teaches individuals the prayers they ought to use, how to spiritually cleanse themselves, how to open a mass and how to close one. It also gives attendants time to meditate,  and to receive assistance interpreting any messages they receive.

As mentioned previously, spirits communicate in different ways, and some spirits only manifest in possession; likewise, not all spirit mediums experience spirit possession. Spirit communication can come in multiple modalities: hearing spirits, sensing spirits, seeing images that require interpretation, freewriting, and so on. All forms of mediumnity require some training, practice, and guidance. An elder medium will guide a younger one in how to work with spirits, and that guidance will include how to set up a boveda at home so that a young medium will have a place to engage with spirits in their daily routine and also how to effectively mount a spirit in a controlled manner. It is important for a developing medium to learn to fully engage with their physical environment in this way, for spirits are a natural part of the environment. One medium told me about her experience as a teenager when she was guided by an elder medium in how to channel a spirit close to her since childhood:

The lady I worked with, she was a great spiritist … Before I even walked into the room (living room) she’d written down everything that was going to happen ... I was in the living room and to the left there was a record player. It looked like a piece of furniture, two big speakers. Big piece of furniture. I’m sitting there and I could hear her “you’re almost there, come down a little bit more” I don’t know what she’s talking about, but I’m hearing her, she’s talking to me. “Come down a little bit more” and then she says “Say good evening” and I’m thinking why doesn’t he just say good evening, I feel like saying good evening but why doesn’t he? And she asked one more time and I think if he doesn’t say good evening, I’m going to and she asks again and I say “good evening.” And she asks more questions and I’m thinking the answers and I don’t know why he won’t answer. Then I realize that she thinks that I’m him and I’m like this is ridiculous she thinks he’s thinking through me. And I get up and go to turn on the record player and she gets up and says “you’re not going to do that, go sit back down” and she closes the record player and I sat back down and then I started talking about why I came and I’m thinking the whole time, what’s going on, I must be making all of this up … All this time I’m thinking I am the one saying these things, the thoughts come into my head so I assume that it is me. But when it is all over she hands the paper to my mother and she’d written down the entire thing before anything had happened. That’s how I realized that it was the spirit that was placing these details in my head not me making it up.[19] 

Within the Spiritist world, spirits are not abstractions; they inhabit places and have tangible effects on us all. It is through learning to process and understand these spirits’ effects and becoming attuned to them that the skill of mediumnity develops. It is also a process of testing and building trust between the medium and the spirit. Within this framework, the body by design is not an autonomous closed thing but a porous interface taking in the spirits. Learning to be an effective medium is learning to attune oneself to these encounters, to recognize them, to gain insight from them, and to articulate the information from these encounters to the person whom the spirits’ message is intended to help. It is also necessary to learn ways to manage the barrage of spirits a medium encounters so the medium is not overwhelmed or even misguided: Spirits, like people, come in all sorts.

Learning how to achieve possession and receive information from the spirit world is not purely a matter of the mind but involves the entire body. Rather than learning a rote set of pre-existing facts, developing mediumnity involves a holistic process through which the body develops into a particular type of self. The human body is a porous interface between worlds; consequently, the body itself is the site of development for a medium in Spiritism. According to anthropologist Diana Espírito Santo, “[F]or Cuban espiritistas the experience of human-spirit interaction is far from confined to ‘event’ formats such as moments of ecstasy or revelation; it is a normal extension of the development of a particular kind of self, one that is aware of and connected to a landscape in which the dead are incipient and immanent, and in which perception can be naturally educated over time.”[20] This is a fundamentally creative process that draws upon and changes the self and also alters the environment composed of spiritual and material elements that constantly intersect the human interface.

Developing mediumnity often involves a great deal of self-doubt. As mediums receive messages, they need to test them. A major challenge is learning to differentiate the individual medium’s thoughts from the messages received from spirits. According to the medium above, at one time she doubted the messages of her most prolific spirit guide because she was fully conscious during the time she received his messages. She was concerned these were not “real” messages but were only her own thoughts. At one point, her self-doubt led her to stop delivering the spirit guide’s messages all together:

And so I vowed not to tell anyone and hide it. So everything went bad for me for a while and then we went to the mall and there was a big big fountain and there was a big big area . . .  and he mounts me there and when I came too there were people all around and one wanted my number and others were looking at me like I was crazy and I didn’t know what was happening and I was all wet. And when I got home he came again and asked “So ask her which way she wants me to come that way or the way that I have always come?” He said when I come you will be aware of me but later it will be like a dream, you’re there and when you wake up it vanishes. That’s the way it will be but you have to get there. Because if you get possessed and you’re gone, you are very vulnerable and anything can happen. You’re there for your own protection.[21]

Through a back and forth process, medium and spirit learn to work together. Spirits are understood to have perception different than human beings’ perceptions, and this aids them when they provide guidance; at other times, spirits can fail to appreciate the wider perspective of human needs. As ethnographer Kelly Hayes observes about spirit mediums in Brazil, spirits sometimes disrupt people’s lives in negative ways as they seek spiritual balance, failing to recognize the material balance needed by the mediums and consultees they work with.[22] Given this reality, experienced spirit mediums and the spirits they work with must learn to manage each other’s needs, but it takes time to balance the two. 

In a spiritist misas, the messages are generally intended for those in the room. Misa attendants are understood to bring spirits with them: A medium may relay a message from a spirit attached to a person or may relay a message from one of the medium’s own spirits. As mediums develop, they share messages with others to see if those are confirmed or denied. Messages can be tested by requesting confirmation from spirits. A person might, for example, receive a message from their late grandmother that she wants to have a brightly wrapped gift box put on the altar for her birthday. After the box has been placed on the altar and dedicated to the spirit, the person waits for some form of confirmation, generally something unexpected like a phone call from an elusive family member that one dreamt of the night before, finding a lost item, or getting a new job offer. The person will know if they get the confirmation or not. Developing mediumnity and keeping it sharp is ongoing, and keeping the boveda and tending to the spirits changes both mediums and spirits over time. 

Often when a spirit begins to mount a medium, the spirit behaves in the same way it did in its last material incarnation. If this incarnation was problematic, the spirit may trouble rather than help those attending the misa. Part of a senior mediums’ role is helping spirits behave in socially expected ways for the medium’s social context. Sometimes the spirit does not speak the correct language and must be convinced to do so in order for their messages to be communicated. Sometimes the spirit doesn’t speak at all, or lies on the floor, or is overly flirtatious, or it otherwise behaves inappropriately. Senior mediums work with these spirits to help them  clearly communicate and best work as a spirit. Spirits don’t only provide communication: Some provide cleansing, and others may assist a medium in exorcising spirits who are causing harm.

Messages relayed to people in a spirit mass  confer guidance through the spirit world, but this spiritual guidance is often cryptic. Laypeople sometimes liken mediumnity to lifting a veil and everything behind that veil is clear, but this is far from the truth. When a medium receives a message from a spirit, especially in a developmental misa, the message is often not clear, partial, or the medium has no idea how to interpret it. It may be that another medium in the room has to clarify the message or that another medium receives the rest of a partial message or in some other way must assist with interpretation. At other times, the person for whom the message is intended needs to contribute to the message to facilitate the process. Often a medium begins by asking a question of the person that they believe the message is intended for, and if the person shuts down that line of inquiry, then the message never fully emerges. It is not unusual for novices attending misas to hamper messages because they imagine a medium who has to ask a question must be a fraud or a novice. In the process of developing mediumnity, it is important for a medium to express their messages, regardless of the messages’ quality, in order to maintain the flow of the process. As mentioned earlier, sometimes in a spirit mass a message will be split between people: One medium will get part of a message and another medium another, and if anyone is holding back because of uncertainty, the message remains incomplete. 

The different ways that mediums receive messages may relate to the spirit’s manner of communicating or be determined by the specific ways a medium relates the spirits’ messages. Some mediums hear messages, others feel them, others see spirits directly, and others need paper and something to write or draw with. Any method through which the spirit communicates is fine, the important question is accuracy. If the message is understood by the person who it is intended for, then it is an accurate message and the medium can be confident in it. If the recipient fails to understand the message, more work is in order. 

Some mediums provide messages through spirit possession rather than sensing, hearing, or receiving messages in other ways. Active Spiritists who often mount spirits generally mount the same spirits with whom they regularly work and whose altars they tend. People all experience possession differently and this is often due to the nature of the spirit. Some spirits possess a medium “lightly,” meaning that the medium remains conscious or semi-conscious during the process. The mediums speak and share messages in a spirit mass, but they still see the people in the room. Once the message is complete, they don’t remember anything that they said. This all depends on the spirit. For other spirits, a medium may lose consciousness entirely. When some spirits leave, a person may feel a sense of contentment, euphoria, exhaustion, or some other distinct emotion that they come to associate with the spirit. Though they are not conscious during the possession, possessed people recognize the spirit and the spirit’s identity from what is felt afterward. 

Spirit possession is a foundational pillar of African Diasporic religions in the Americas. Consequently, examinations of possession must take into account the roles it plays socially and in religious experience. Spirit possession, whether by a divinity or an ancestor, builds relationships between the members of the community and otherworldly personalities. Communities cultivate possession as a ritual technology serving important social functions: to provide solutions to problems, to cleanse, and to heal. Given the practical nature of these religions and their investment in the “here and now,” it is critical to examine how spirit possession serves quotidian needs. 

At times, the spectacular features of spirit possession—incredible bodily feats, otherworldly calls, phantasmal dancing—make this phenomenon challenging for outside observers because it runs counter mainstream notions of bodily autonomy and the presumed singularity of human personality. Given the widespread practice of spirit possession and the social productivity it engenders, perhaps this disjuncture provides a productive starting point to examine the limitations of mainstream understandings of personhood and reconsider those understandings. Spirit possession also provides an entry point to reconsider mainstream notions of community as ritualized spirit possession enables people to engage with a more expansive social network that encompasses lwa, orisha, ancestors, and humans alike. 

[1] For more on this Lucumí community see Eugenia Rainey, “From the margins in: what an Afro-Cuban/Neopagan religious group can tell us about spiritual seeking in the United States,” Culture and Religion 24, no. 1 (2024): 41-59.

[2] Janice Boddy, “Spirit Possession Revisited: Beyond Instrumentality,” Annual Review of Anthropology 23 (1994): 407–34; Peter Fry, “Male Homosexuality and Spirit Possession in Brazil,” Journal of Homosexuality 11 (1985): 137–53; Patricia B. Lerch, “Spirit Mediums in Umbanda Evangelizada of Porto Alegre, Brazil: Dimensions of Power and Authority,” in A World of Women: Anthropological Studies of Women in Societies of the World, ed. Erika Bourguignon, 129–59 (Praeger, 1980); Barbara Lex, “The Neurobiology of Ritual Trance,” in The Spectrum of Ritual: A Biogenetic Structural Analysis, ed. Eugene d’Aquili et al. (Columbia University Press, 1979); Gananath Obeyesekere, Medusa’s Hair: An Essay on Personal Symbols and Religious Experience (University of Chicago Press, 1981); Paul Stoller, Embodying Colonial Memories: Spirit Possession, Power, and the Hauka in West Africa (Routledge, 2014).

[3] For an early English edition, see Allan Kardec, The Spirits’ Book, trans. Anna Blackwell (George Red, 1898).

[4] For more on the contours of this religious landscape see Eugenia Rainey, “Pigeons at the Bedside: Lucumí Negotiations around Ritual Space in the Hospital,” Nova Religio 27, no. 3 (2024): 7-28.

[5] Maya Deren, Divine Horseman: The Living Gods of Haiti (Vanguard Press, 1953), 153 and 250.

[6] Karen McCarthy Brown, “Afro-Caribbean Spirituality: A Haitian Case Study,” in Vodou in Haitian Life and Culture: Invisible Powers, ed. Claudine Michel and Patrick Bellegarde-Smith, 1–27 (Palgrave MacMillan, 2006); Alfred Métraux, “The Concept of Soul in Haitian Vodu,” Southwest Journal of Anthropology 2, no. 1 (1946): 84-92.

[7] M. Akin Makinde, “An African Concept of Human Personality: The Yoruba Example,” Ultimate Reality and Meaning 7, no. 3 (1984): 189–200; William Bascom, Sixteen Cowries: Yoruba Divination from Africa to the New World (Indiana University Press, 1980); Wande Ambimbola, “The Yoruba Concept of Human Personality,” in La Notion de Personne en Afrique Noire, ed. G. Dieterlen, 73–89 (Colloques Internationaux du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1971).  

[8] Karen McCarthy Brown, Mama Lola: A Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn (University of California Press, 1991), 6. 

[9] Yvonne Daniel, Dancing wisdom: Embodied Knowledge in Haitian Vodou, Cuban Yoruba and Bahian Candomble (University of Illinois Press, 2005), 59.

[10] Personal Communication, January 24, 2025.

[11] McCarthy Brown, Mama Lola, 352–53.

[12] McCarthy Brown, Mama Lola, 113.

[13] Daniel, Dancing Wisdom, 65.

[14] Ibid., 55.

[15] There is not an agreed upon definition of religion in religious studies scholarship and debates regarding the term are beyond the scope of this writing. Within the communities in question, African Diaspora traditions are commonly referred to as religion and Spiritism is not.

[16] Diana Espírito Santo, “Imagination, Sensation and the Education of Attention among Cuban Spirit Mediums,” Ethnos 77, no. 2 (2012): 252–71.

[17] George Brandon, Santeria from Africa to the New World: The Dead Sell Memories (Indiana University Press, 1997), 88.

[18] Mary Ann Clark, Santería: Correcting the Myths and Uncovering the Realities of a Growing Religion. (Praeger Publishers, 2007).

[19] Personal communication, January 24, 2025.

[20] Espírito Santo, “Imagination,” 253–54.

[21] Personal communication, January 24, 2025.

[22] Kelly E. Hayes, “Caught in the Crossfire: Considering the Limits of Spirit Possession A Brazilian Case Study,” Culture and Religion 7, no. 2 (2006): 155–75.

Abimbola, Wande. “The Yoruba Concept of Human Personality.” In La Notion de Personne en Afrique Noire, edited by G. Dieterlen, 73–89. Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1971. 

Bascom, William. Sixteen Cowries: Yoruba Divination from Africa to the New World. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1980.

Boddy, Janice. “Spirit Possession Revisited: Beyond instrumentality.” Annual Review of Anthropology 23 (1994): 407–34.

Brandon, George. Santeria from Africa to the New World: The Dead Sell Memories. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1997.

Clark, Mary Ann. Santería: Correcting the Myths and Uncovering the Realities of a Growing Religion. Praeger Publishers, 2007. 

Daniel, Yvonne. Dancing Wisdom: Embodied Knowledge in Haitian Vodou, Cuban Yoruba and Bahian Candomblé. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2005. 

Deren, Maya. Divine Horseman: The Living Gods of Haiti. New York: Vanguard Press, 1953. 

Espírito Santo, Diana. “Imagination, sensation and the education of attention among Cuban spirit mediums.” Ethnos 77, no. 2 (2012): 252–71.

Fry, Peter. “Male Homosexuality and Spirit Possession in Brazil.” Journal of Homosexuality 11 (1985): 137–53. Reprinted in The Library of Essays on Sexuality and Religion: Indigenous Religions, edited by Stephen Hunt, 211–28. London: Routledge, 2010. 

Hayes, Kelly E. “Caught in the Crossfire: Considering the Limits of Spirit Possession. A Brazilian Case Study.” Culture and Religion 7, no. 2 (2006): 155–75.

Kardec, Allan. The Spirits’ Book. Translated by Anna Blackwell. London: George Redway, 1898.

Lerch, Patricia B. “Spirit Mediums in Umbanda Evangelizada of Porto Alegre, Brazil: Dimensions of Power and Authority.” In A World of Women: Anthropological Studies of Women in the Societies of the World, edited by Erika Bourguignon, 129–59. New York: Praeger, 1980. 

Lex, Barbara. “The Neurobiology of Ritual Trance.” In The Spectrum of Ritual: A Biogenetic Structural Analysis, edited by Eugene d’Aquili, Charles Laughlin, Jr., and John McManus, 117–51. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979. 

Makinde, M. Akin. “An African Concept of Human Personality: The Yoruba Example.” Ultimate Reality and Meaning 7, no. 3 (1984): 189–200.

McCarthy Brown, Karen. “Afro-Caribbean Spirituality: A Haitian Case Study.” In Vodou in Haitian Life and Culture: Invisible Powers, edited by Claudine Michel and Patrick Bellegarde-Smith, 1–27. London: Palgrave MacMillan, 2006.

McCarthy-Brown, Karen. Mama Lola: A Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991.

Obeyesekere, Gananath. Medusa’s Hair: An Essay on Personal Symbols and Religious Experience. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014.

Rainey, Eugenia. “Pigeons at the Bedside: Lucumí Negotiations around Ritual Space in the Hospital.” Nova Religio 27, no. 3 (2024): 7–28. 

———. “From the Margins In: What an Afro-Cuban/Neopagan Religious Group Can Tell Us about Spiritual Seeking in the United States.” Culture and Religion 24, no. 1 (2024): 41–59.

Stoller, Paul. Embodying Colonial Memories: Spirit Possession, Power, and the Hauka in West Africa. London: Routledge, 2014.

Rainey, Eugenia. "African Diasporic Religions in the Americas." Archive of Mystical Experiences. Center for the Study of World Religions, Harvard Divinity School, 2026.