À propos de la conférence
The Hyolmo people, in an effort to define their identity, claim ancestral bonds with a specific portion of the Nepalese landscape, i.e. the Helambu Valley (Yolmo). To this valley, they link their origin as a group, their mythology and their cultural specificity. Helambu is conceived, in fact, as a sacred ‘hidden valley’, a popular topic in Himalayan folklore, linked to the mystical activities of renowned Buddhist masters and saints of the past. The landscape, here, appears not only sanctified by the actions of those saintly figures, but also – well before and perhaps beyond their activities – a sanctuary of other-than-human entities, variously localized and emplaced in the geographical features of the area. For the Hyolmo people, Buddhism, by itself, seems to provide legitimacy to their claims of specificity and appears to be the single most visible element of their identity. But to describe Helambu, and the Hyolmowa, only from a Buddhist perspective, would not be totally correct. A significant part of their religious life is, in fact, articulated along a different set of practices and beliefs. Shamanic religious specialists compete and in fact coexist with the lamas, in a unified yet asymmetrical system characterized by crucial entanglements and debates over the ritual field, which is constantly negotiated by all the actors involved: shamans, lamas, their sponsors and even the other-than-human entities.
Zoom : https://uqam.zoom.us/j/869948693239 - ID de réunion : 869 4869 3239
À propos du conférencier : Davide Torri
Davide Torri is Senior Researcher at the University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’.
While his main areas of research are shamanism, Himalayan indigenous religions and minorities, his interests also include politics, the Anthropocene and multi-species anthropology. He published several papers on shamanism and its interactions with Buddhism in the Himalayas. He is the author of Landscape, Ritual and Identity among the Hyolmo of Nepal (2020) and Il lama e il bombo. Sciamanismo e Buddhismo tra gli Hyolmo del Nepal (2014). In addition, he co-edited the volumes Dealing with Disasters
Perspectives from Eco-Cosmologies (in press) with Diana Riboli, Pamela Stewart and Andrew Strathern, The Shamaness in Asia: Gender, Religion and the State (2020) with Sophie Roche and Shamanism and Violence. Power, repression and Suffering in Indigenous Religious Conflicts (2013) with Diana Riboli.
