Marrying the “Bush Spirits-Parents” personal destiny and divination among the Sèmè of Burkina Faso

ÉPOUSER SES « GÉNIES-PARENTS ». DESTIN PERSONNEL ET DIVINATION CHEZ LES SÈMÈ DU BURKINA FASO

Anne Fournier (1)

1 PALOC - Patrimoines locaux, Environnement et Globalisation

Among the Sèmè, a little-known society in the Voltaic area, some men receive at home a couple of bush spirits through which they get access to divination. They form groups of followers of the spirits. The rite implemented borrows its fabric from marriage, a long process that extends over a woman's entire life. The follower "marries" the bush spirits according to an original marriage arrangement without sexuality. He is bound to these bush spirits by a prenatal promise, his symbolic parents, who were assemblers of his person.

Mots clés: Burkina Faso; Voltaic cultural area; personal bush spirit; personal destiny; prenatal alliance; transformation; displacement

Domaines: Anthropologie sociale et ethnologie

Anne Fournier. Marrying the “Bush Spirits-Parents” personal destiny and divination among the Sèmè of Burkina Faso. Anthropos -Freiburg-, 2019, 114 (2), pp.383-398. ⟨10.5771/0257-9774-2019-2-383⟩. ⟨hal-02486893⟩