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Witchcraft


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             In S. F. Nadel's article titled Witchcraft in Four African Societies: An Essay in Comparison (1952), he talks of how the Nupe have a concrete belief in witchcraft that include the perception of "witchcraft as unequivocally evil, as destroying life, mainly through mysterious wasting diseases, and as implying the power of witches to eat' the life-soul' of their victims- (p.18). Although their belief is solid and tangible, this belief of witches takes place on a "fantasy realm-, which is non-tangible. These witches can not be seen when they attack, as "their bodies remain asleep at home, thus deceiving any ordinary attempts at proving, or disproving, these mystic activities-, and the Nupe describe this way of traveling about as the witch leaving her "shadow-soul-. (Nadel, 1952 p.19). The Nupe witch is always a woman, and as Nadel (1952) observes, the only way men are ever associated with witchcraft is in the fight against it as, "[c]ertain individuals [men] are said to possess a power similar to witchcraft, which enables them to see and deal with witches. This power is essentially good; so that the men possessed of it can control and combat the women witches- (p.19). Note the word "control-. Women witches need the "control- of the men to fully activate their powers, "for only when the female and the male powers are joined does female witchcraft become fully effective [and the men] use their power not to assist, but to restrain the female witches, by withholding the required aid- (Nadel, 1952 p.19). Therefore, men have a certain power over the women even in their "fantasy realm-. Nadel (1952) notes that if there is a case of witchcraft where there is a death or something unimaginable, it is said, "a few evil individuals among the men (whom no one can name) have betrayed their own sex and become the helpers of a woman witch [and] men are never blamed or accused of witchcraft- (p.


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