Reassembling ontologies in tension: syncretism and anti-syncretism in the encounters between Catholicism and kultura in East Timor

Abstract

This paper aims to explore the relationship between the Catholic religion and the kultura in East Timor from a historical and anthropological perspective. We intend to show that the relationship between the two occurs through a tense coexistence and that it is not just the syncretic result of the mixing of elements taken from both. To do so, we will see how both belief regimes appropriate concepts that are alien to their liturgy and re-signify them by representing them from their own worldview principles. We will also see, through an analysis of the discourse of a ritual specialist, how he actively manipulates non-human entities from both belief regimes, reassembling them in a way that benefits him, in order to reinforce his position in the social hierarchy. In this way, we show how the analysis of the enrolment of such entities through discourses becomes fundamental to understanding the mechanisms of power acquisition and distribution in the country.