THE MATERIALITY OF RELIGIOUS CONVERSION: FROM THE BODY OWN TO THE POLITICAL ECONOMY

Abstract

In this paper I analyze the process of conversion of aboriginal qom or tobas (Formosa, Argentina) to a religious movement denominated evangelio, in this movement, the elements that come from pentecostal churches and of the shamanism characteristic of the group they are reprocessed. I describe the main structure of the conversion speech, considering that the biographical singular stories are built starting from a socially legitimated speech on that that the conversion “should be” The before and the one after the conversion is characterized by a series of significant linkages that they embrace from personal behaviors that involve the body particularly until more general conceptions on the own sociocultural history. In second place, I analyze the different causes that condition the conversions. On one hand, I highlight, the role of the sensations and emotions lived in the ritual performances in the acquisition of the certainty of the faith. For another, how these conversions with the changes in the behavior that they imply, constitute a strategy that favors the socio-economic reproduction of the group, parallelly to a strongly dependent articulation with the mechanisms “clientelares” of the local political power.