Trance states, whether defined as mediumistic or spiritual, sit on the edge of different fields of study and domains of practice. As they are variable, they escape fixed categorizations and so they often lend themselves to clashing interpretations, often resulting in representational or pathological reductionism. Yet, healing practices based upon trance, meditation, visualization, or imagination are increasingly present in our societies entering the spheres of therapeutic pluralism as complementary or alternative therapies. In this conference, we explore ethnographic notions of trance along with healing practices considering the contexts of therapeutic pluralism and the more or less successful experiences of healing cooperation, as much as its hindrances. In a joint effort between anthropologists, scholars of religion, psychologists, practitioners in the field of spiritual healing, we ask:
How can we unpack phenomenologically the experiences of trance to uncover its therapeutic aspects? Can these therapeutic aspects be considered transversally across the domains of spirituality and biomedicine? How should we consider imagination and embodied knowledge in the therapeutic process?
In terms of efficacy, at what levels may trance be considered therapeutic activating endogenous mechanism?
How do different actors in the field of healing envision pathways to cooperation? To what extent could ‘cooperation’ be a useful paradigm to address different modalities of encounter? Could it conceal or rather unveil potential epistemological clashes and hierarchies of knowledge?
What kinds of symptoms, conditions, or unease, lead people to experiment with these healing practices? How are these therapeutic processes integrated with other therapeutic practices (biomedical, psychological, etc.)?
In contexts of therapeutic pluralism, how is “trust” understood and articulated in and between different healing practices and in relation with the biomedical one? How can we as social scientists produce trustworthy outputs that allow the audience to approach healing practices in a critical and ethical way?
What is at stake politically in terms of the legitimation of power related to the uses of these practices? What kinds of cultural capitals are constructed through these processes of legitimation? How does the construction of this cultural capital shape the emergence of new practices and territories of contested ownership?
