Sensitiivid tänapäeva eesti rahvausundis: nende kujutamine kogumikus "Eesti nõiad"

Abstract

Psychics in the Vernacular Religion of Contemporary Estonia: Their Portrayal in the Volume Eesti nõiad (“Estonian Witches“). The popularity of “New age“ movement in Estonia has been constantly growing. People enjoy TV-shows and articles in the internet that talk about psychics and their extraordinary abilities. People turn to healers to get help, when ordinary medicine has not given any help or has been insufficient. This study takes a closer look on how the psychics and healers are displayed in an article collection Eesti nõiad (“Estonian witches“, 2004), how they take part in the vernacular religion of Estonia and how they affect it. The main attention is on how the belief in supernatural and in the psychics’ abilities is enhanced by the psychics themselves and also by the media. The first part of the study presents an overview of vernacular religion and medicine in Estonia through historic perspective; the definition of “new age“ and a view on how media affects the vernacular religion. The second part of the study introduces the results of the discursive analysis of the article collection Eesti nõiad and discusses the possible influence of this volume on verancular beliefs. Subchapters are as follows: dominant themes, beliefs and ways of treatment, the role of “self“, legends in the articles, the meaning of nõid (“witch“), the role of authors in producing textual representations of beliefs.