Santurismo: The Commodification of Santería and the Touristic Value of Afro-Cuban Derived Religions in Cuba

Autori

  • Julie Rausenberger University of Antwerp

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2036-5195/7775

Parole chiave:

Santería, Tourism, Afro-Cuban Religions, Jineterismo, Commodification

Abstract

Santurismo (Santería + Turismo) refers to the popular formula of Afro-Cuban religions and tourism and initially served the Cuban government in the 1960s to promote Santería as a folkloric product of Cuban identity through staged performances in touristic surroundings. Gradually, it became a coping strategy by Cuban people to deal with political and economic hardship during the Special Period in the 1990s which led to the emergence of diplo-santería by so-called jinetero-santeros. While the continuous process of commodification of Cuban Santería is marked by local social, economic and political influences, it also relates to current tendencies in comparable religious and spiritual phenomena at a global level. This research paper is based on an extensive literature review as well as on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Cuba in 2016. It aims at showing in which ways Afro-Cuban religions have worked their way up from a stigmatized and persecuted religious system to a widely valorized religion in the spiritual and touristic sphere. While warning for the consequences of its commodification, it also shows that, over time, Santería has proved to serve as a weapon for resistance and struggle, which is still ongoing in Cuban society today.

Riferimenti bibliografici

Argyriadis, K. (2005). El desarollo del turismo religioso en La Habana y la la acusación de mercantilismo. In: Desacatos 18, p. 29-52.

Argyriadis, K. (2008). Speculators and Santuristas: The Development of Afro-Cuban Cultural Tourism and the Accusation of Religious Commercialism. Tourist Studies, 8, 249-265.

Ayorinde, C. (2004). Afro-Cuban Religiosity, Revolution and National Identity. Gainesville: University of Florida Press.

Behar, R. (2007). An Island Called Home: Returning to Jewish Cuba. New Brunswick, New Jersey, and London: Rutgers University Press.

Betto, F. (1985). Fidel Y La Religion. La Habana: Oficina de Publicaciones del Consejo de Estado.

Bourdieu, P. (1984). Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Bowman, M. (1999). Healing in the Spiritual Marketplace: Consumers, Courses and Credentialism. Social Compass, 46(2), 181-189.

Brandon, G. (1993). Santería: From Africa to the New World: The Dead Sell Memories. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.

Delgado, K. (2009). Spiritual Capital: Foreign Patronage and the Trafficking of Santería. In: A. Hernandez-Reguant (Ed.), Cuba in the Special Period: Culture and Ideology in the 1990s (pp. 51-66). New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Fernandez, D. J. (2005). Cuba Transnational. Gainesville: University Press of Florida.

Gonzalez, B. (2015). A Primitive Paradise: Representations of Afro-Cuban Culture and Religion in Pre-Revolutionary Tourist Propaganda. Unpublished Paper.

Hagedorn, K. J. (2001). Divine Utterances: The Performance of Afro-Cuban Santería. Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press.

Hernandez-Reguant, A. (2009). Cuba in the Special Period: Culture and Ideology in the 1990s. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Holbraad, M. (2004). Religious ‘Speculation’: The Rise of Ifá Cults and Consumption in Post-Soviet Cuba. Journal of Latin American Studies, 36, 643-663.

Larduet Luaces, A. (2014). Hacia una Historia de la Santería Santiaguera y Otras Consideraciones. Santiago de Cuba: Editorial del Caribe.

Mahler, S. J. & Hansing, K. (2005). Myths and Mysticism: How Bringing a Transnational Religious Lens to the Examination of Cuba and the Cuban Diaspora Exposes and Ruptures the Fallacy of Isolation. In Fernandez, D. J. (Ed.), Cuba Transnational (pp. 42-60). Gainesville: University Press of Florida.

Mwakabana, H. A. O. (2002). Crises of Life in African Religion and Christianity. Geneva: The Lutheran World Federation.

Ortiz, F. (1940). Contrapunteo cubano del tabaco y el azúcar. Madrid: Cátedra.

Pantoja Torres, J. (2016). Cartomancia en tiempos del New Age y legado africano en Cuba. Del Caribe, 65, 57-67.

Republic of Cuba (2002). The Constitution of the Republic of Cuba as Amended to 2002. Consulted on November 13, 2016 via http://www.constitutionnet.org/files/Cuba%20Constitution.pdf

Sanchez, S. M. (2000). Afro-Cuban Diasporian Religions. A Comparative Analysis of the Literature and Selected Annoted Bibliography. Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies Occasional Paper Series.

Sandoval, M. C. (1979). Santería as a Mental Health Care System: An Historical Overview. Social Science and Medicine, 13B, 137-151.

Sandoval, M. C. (2006). Worldview, the Orichas, and Santería: Africa to Cuba and Beyond. Gainesville: University of Florida Press.

Scott, J. C. (1985). Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Palmié, S. (2004). Fascinans or Tremendum? Permutations of the State, the Body, and the Divine in Late-Twentieth Century Havana. New West Indian Guide, 78, 229-68.

Palmié, S. (2013). The Cooking of History. How Not to Study Afro-Cuban Religion. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

Ramírez Calzadilla, J. (2006). Religión y cambio social: el campo religioso cubano en la década del 90. La Habana: Editorial de Ciencias Sociales.

Ramos, M. W. (2010). Diplo Santería and Pseudo-Orishas. Historical Background of Diplo-Santería. Consulted on November 7, 2016 via http://eleda.org/blog/2010/12/27/diplo-santeria-and-pseudo-orishas/

Redden, G. (2016). Revisiting the spiritual supermarket: does the commodification of spirituality necessarily devalue it? Culture and Religion, 17(2), 231-249.

Routon, K. (2010). Hidden Powers of the State in the Cuban Imagination. Gainesville: University of Florida Press.

Turner, V. (1974). Dramas, Fields, and Metaphors: Symbolic Action in Human Society. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Van Gennep, A. (1909). Les Rites de Passages. Paris: Emile Nourry.

Villepastour, A. (2009). Two Heads of the Same Drum? Musical Narratives within a Transatlantic Religion. Journal of Transatlantic Studies, 7, 343-362.

Ward, G. (2003). The Commodification of Religion or the Consummation of Capitalism. The Hedgehog Review, 50-65.

Wirtz, K. (2004). Santería in Cuban National Consciousness: A Religious Case of the Doble Moral. Journal of Latin American Anthropology, 9, 409-438.

Downloads

Pubblicato

2018-05-23

Come citare

Rausenberger, J. (2018). Santurismo: The Commodification of Santería and the Touristic Value of Afro-Cuban Derived Religions in Cuba. Almatourism - Journal of Tourism, Culture and Territorial Development, 9(8), 150–171. https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2036-5195/7775