Of devotion and disgust: Method,belief and power in anthropological research on religion

Abstract

In this paper I argue that the method of participant observation is as contingent as it is strategic and that ethnographic fieldwork in a religious field cannot be undertaken justifiably by circumventing the question of personal religious belief, as it is indeed the status of the ethnographer’s belief which facilitates learning in and of the field. I will show that in my field, belief in the guru becomes a modality to partake in the power relations among devotees which characterize the public nature of the devotee gatherings and is a commonly accepted way of being acknowledged as a devotee.