(Neo-)Shamanic Chronicles of the Argentine Qom/Toba: Between Love, Power, and Healing

Abstract

In this paper, I chronicle two ethnographic cases of healing therapies among the Argentine Chaco region Qom/Toba of Formosa province, and the culturally situated hermeneutics they carry out about them. One case stars Feliciano Castorino, a Qom shaman, illustrating traditional shamanism which incorporates elements of the surrounding criollo (creole) culture. The other, Cresencio Justo’s, shows the dilemmas a member of the Qom contemporary native churches, generally known as Evangelio (Gospel) has in his ambiguous dealings with the realm of powerful nonhuman beings, and actual healing situations. My conceptual perspective is shaped by hermeneutical and existential anthropology, complemented by a political economy of cultural symbols. I argue that Evangelio could be defined as a contemporary ethnically bound phenomenon of neo-shamanism.