Embodied Sumange' in Luwu

1 May 1983

journal article
Published by Duke University Press in Journal of Asian Studies

Vol. 42 (3) , 545-570
https://doi.org/10.2307/2055517

Abstract

A creative, potent, formless energy is assumed to animate the universe in parts of island Southeast Asia. In Luwu, a former kingdom of South Sulawesi (Celebes), Indonesia, this energy is called sumange'. This paper describes how sumange' is treated within the human body, which it is said to animate, and the logic of ritual substance that it implies. Because it can be lost through shock and routine depletion, humans make efforts to care for it, retain it, and increase it. Because it is potent, concentrations of it in people and places are dangerous. Its differential distribution orders the social and natural universe.

Keywords

This publication has 2 references indexed in Scilit:

Purity and Danger
Published by Taylor & Francis ,2003
56. A Magical Ceremony for the Cure of a Sick Person Among the Malays of Upper Perak
Man, 1903