Read more
Ms. Donna Haskins is an African American woman who wrestles with structural inequity in the streets of Boston by inhabiting an alternate dimension she refers to as the "spirit realm." Both ethnographic and personal, Onaje X. O. Woodbine's portrait of her spiritual life sheds new light on the lived religion of the dispossessed.
List of contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Part I: Daughter of Darkness
1. “The Devil Had His Way with Me”
2. “I Really Didn’t Want to Give Up My Kid”
3. “Am I Ever Going to Be Normal?”
4. “Every Time You Leave, You Take a Piece of Me with You”
Part II: Metamorphosis
5. Incubus
6. Seeds of Evil
7. Chrysalis
Part III: Child of Light
8. Between Worlds
9. Treasures from Heaven
10. The Devil Is a Liar
What If You Read Your Book to Your Subject(s)? or, On Methodology
Notes
Bibliography
Index
About the author
Onaje X. O. Woodbine is assistant professor of philosophy and religion at American University. He is the author of Black Gods of the Asphalt: Religion, Hip-Hop, and Street Basketball (Columbia, 2016) and coproducer of a forthcoming documentary film on sacred space in New York City playground basketball, Hallowed Ground & Cracked Concrete.
Summary
Ms. Donna Haskins is an African American woman who wrestles with structural inequity in the streets of Boston by inhabiting an alternate dimension she refers to as the “spirit realm.” In this other place, she is prepared by the Holy Spirit to challenge the restrictions placed upon Black female bodies in the United States. Growing into her spiritual gifts of astral flight and time travel, Donna meets the spirits of enslaved Africans, conducts spiritual warfare against sexual predators, and tends to the souls of murdered Black children whose ghosts haunt the inner city.
Take Back What the Devil Stole centers Donna’s encounters with the supernatural to offer a powerful narrative of how one woman seeks to reclaim her power from a lifetime of social violence. Both ethnographic and personal, Onaje X. O. Woodbine’s portrait of her spiritual life sheds new light on the complexities of Black women’s religious participation and the lived religion of the dispossessed. Woodbine explores Donna’s religious creativity and her sense of multireligious belonging as she blends together Catholic, Afro-Caribbean, and Black Baptist traditions. Through the gripping story of one local prophet, this book offers a deeply original account of the religious experiences of Black women in contemporary America: their bodies, their haunted landscapes, and their spiritual worlds.
