The article describes the practices of people using complementary medicine and alternative methods of healing in a Ukrainian village of Murafa and the city of Vinnytsa, both situated in historical Eastern Podolia. I analyse the figure of healer and also attempt to scrutinise local complementary medicine market. In my analisys I use the concept of bricolage and combining practices based on discourses of science, folk, traditions, and spirituality. I also examine the ways in which healers use practices usually related to institutions such as the church or state in order to make sense of their work. The example of state and its institutions serves as an illustration of an object deconstructed in common consciousness, but still generating subliminal attachement to its manifestations; similary I try to look at the question of complementary medicine and healers acting in this field. I conclude my reflections analysing the embodied experience of change that seems to be essential in a successful process of healing.
Source: Szymańska J. (2017). Faith, hope, authority: Healing practices in Eastern Podolia region. Ethnography. Practices, Theories, Experiences. 2: 17-45
Source web-site: http://www.ejournals.eu/Etnografia/2016/2-2016/art/8774/
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