Note Formerly published as an ebook titled Why People Believe in Spirits, Gods and Magic. Now available in paperback.
Across the globe and through time, diverse cultures have developed elaborate systems for understanding and interacting with strange forces and invisible beings. Since the nineteenth century anthropologists have theorised about the nature of the extraordinary experiences and beliefs recounted to them by their fieldwork informants, at home and abroad.
Spirits, Gods and Magic is an introduction to the anthropology of the supernatural. The book features introductory chapters outlining key anthropological perspectives on Shamanism and Spirit Possession, Witchcraft and Magic, and Ghosts, Spirits and Gods. It also includes chapters exploring the relationship between Ethnography and the Paranormal and what the fields of Anthropology and Parapsychology can learn from each other.
With a Foreword by anthropologist Dr. Fiona Bowie and an Afterword by parapsychologist Dr. David Luke, the book makes an important contribution to inter-disciplinary paranormal studies.