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Chapter 10. Possession in Tantra: Constructed Bodies and EmpowermentSamāveśa as Tantric Realization; Discipline and Enlightenment; Divinizing the Body; Possession in Buddhist Tantras; Tantric Possession and Images of a Multiple Self; Chapter 11. Tantra and the Diaspora of Childhood Possession; The Śaiva and Buddhist Tantras and the South Indian Texts; Svasthāveśa and the Prasenā; Epigraphical Evidence for the Practice of Svasthāveśa; The Ritual of Svasthāveśa; Possession Across the Himalayas; Aweishe: The Indic Character of Chinese Possession; Svasthāveśa in South India; The Mantramahodadhi. Chapter 8. Vampires, Prostitutes, and Poets: Narrativity and the Aesthetics of PossessionCulture, Fiction, and Possession; Possession in Sanskrit Fiction; Can There Be an Aesthetic of Possession?; Chapter 9. Devotion as Possession; Devotional Possession in the Gītā and Ānandavardhana; Vallabhācārya's Concept of Āveśa; Śrī Caitanya and the Gaubīya Concepts of Āveśa, Avatāra, and Multiple Bodies; Āveśa and Bhāva; Āveśa, Bhāva, and Alternative Vedāntas; Part IV. Worldly and Otherworldly Ruptures: Possession as a Healing Modality. In the Beginning, God Possessed Heaven and EarthTransfer of Essence; The Gandharva, the Apsaras, and the Vedic Body; Chapter 6. Friendly Acquisitions, Hostile Takeovers: The Panorama of Possession in the Sanskrit Epics; The Mahābhārata, Where Everything Can Be Found; Notes on Possession in the Rāmāyana; Chapter 7. Enlightenment and the Classical Culture of Possession; Possession as Yoga Practice; Possession and the Subtle Body in the Yogavāsiùha; Śaãkara's Possession of a Dead King; Possession and the Body in the Brahmasūtras; Possession in Indian and Tibetan Buddhism; Conclusions. List of illustrations; preface; acknowledgments; introduction; Part I. Orthodoxies, Madness, and Method; Chapter 1. Academic and Brahmanical Orthodoxies; Sanskritic Culture and the Culture of Possession; The Sanskritic Vocabulary of Possession; Problematics of Interpretation; Part II. Ethnography, Modernity, and the Languages of Possession; Chapter 2. New and Inherited Paradigms: Methodologies for the Study of Possession; Classical Study and Ethnography; Definitions and Typologies; The Devil's Work; Possession as a Form of Social Control; Possession and Shamanism. Possession as Ontological RealityŚakti, the Localization of Divinity, and the Possessed; Performative and Biographical Context; Conclusions; Chapter 3. Possession, Trance Channeling, and Modernity; Chapter 4. Notes on Regional Languages and Models of Possession; Lexicography, Languages, and Themes; Exorcists, Oracles, and Healers; Reflections on "Folk" and "Classical" in South Asia; Part III. Classical Literature; Chapter 5. The Vedas and Upaniùads; Embodiment and Disembodiment Among the ñùis; Possession in the Early Vedic Literature; Shape-Shifting and Possession. The Self Possessed is a multifaceted, diachronic study reconsidering the very nature of religion in South Asia, the culmination of years of intensive research. Frederick M. Smith proposes that positive oracular or ecstatic possession is the most common form of spiritual expression in India, and that it has been linguistically distinguished from negative, disease-producing possession for thousands of years. In South Asia possession has always been broader and more diverse than in the West, where it has been almost entirely characterized as ""demonic."" At best, spirit poss
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