Graduated Publics: Mediating Trance in the Age of Technical Reproduction

• Autores: Martin Zillinger
• Localización: Current anthropology: A world journal of the sciences of man, ISSN 0011-3204, Nº. Extra 15, 2017 (Ejemplar dedicado a: New Media, New Publics?), págs. 41-55
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • The notion of a �public sphere� has been widely discussed in the anthropology of Islam and, as elsewhere, criticized for its normative assumptions. Focusing on how actors redefine the scope of their actions in (media) networks of Moroccan trance brotherhoods, in this paper I explore how adepts and skeptics of trance relate to and compete with each other in generating, negotiating, and shunning publicity for their practices and �issues of concern.� In order to take media practices that aim to �make things public� as a point of departure, attention is drawn to �ritual boundary objects� that help to mediate between different viewpoints and enable ritual cooperation across sites. Without such boundary objects, the use of new media and the collapse of carefully distinguished spheres of action are likely to lead to scandals and the violent drawing of boundaries. I argue for a concept of �graduated publics� that makes it possible to rethink Eurocentric imaginaries of unified public or counterpublic spheres and challenges their binary conceptions of public and private realms. The focus on situated mediation practices makes it possible to zoom in on the modalities and materialities of circulation and uptake that expand or delimit publicity for different �issues� in different locales.