The Devil and Commodity Fetishism in South America

by Taussig, Michael T.

• ISBN13: 9780807871331
• ISBN10: 0807871338
• Edition: Anniv.
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-04-15
• Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Pr

Summary

In this classic book, Michael Taussig explores the social significance of the devil in the folklore of contemporary plantation workers and miners in South America. Grounding his analysis in Marxist theory, Taussig finds that the fetishization of evil, in the image of the devil, mediates the conflict between precapitalist and capitalist modes of objectifying the human condition. He links traditional narratives of the devil-pact, in which the soul is bartered for illusory or transitory power, with the way in which production in capitalist economies causes workers to become alienated from the commodities they produce. A new chapter for this anniversary edition features a discussion of Walter Benjamin and Georges Bataille that extends Taussigrs"s ideas about the devil-pact metaphor.

Author Biography

Michael T. Taussig is professor of anthropology at Columbia University. He is author of ten books, including What Color Is the Sacred? and Walter Benjamin's Grave.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Thirtieth Anniversary Edition	p. xi
Preface	p. xv
Fetishism: The Master Trope
Fetishism and Dialectical Deconstruction	p. 3
The Devil and Commodity Fetishism	p. 13
The Plantations of the Cauca Valley, Colombia
Slave Religion and the Rise of the Free Peasantry	p. 41
Owners and Fences	p. 70
The Devil and the Cosmogenesis of Capitalism	p. 93
Pollution, Contradiction, and Salvation	p. 112
The Baptism of Money and the Secret of Capital	p. 126
The Bolivian Tin Mines
The Devil in the Mines	p. 143
The Worship of Nature	p. 155
The Problem of Evil	p. 169
The Iconography of Nature and Conquest	p. 182
The Transformation of Mining and Mining Mythology	p. 199
Peasant Rites of Production	p. 214
Mining Magic: The Mediation of Commodity Fetishism	p. 223
Conclusion	p. 229
The Sun Gives without Receiving: A Reinterpretation of the Devil Stones	p. 235
Bibliography	p. 267
Index	p. 289
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