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Colonial Possessions: A Fanonian Reading of The Exorcist and its Sequels
- Social Research: An International Quarterly
- Johns Hopkins University Press
- Volume 81, Number 4, Winter 2014
- pp. 883-896
- 10.1353/sor.2014.0049
- Article
- Additional Information
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The Exorcist posits that its eponymous character first battled a demon in Africa. The rest of the films in the series then, echoing a strong trope in American horror, site in Africa the locus of evil. By juxtaposing these narratives with Frantz Fanon’s writings about possession in The Wretched of the Earth, one might see how colonial violence and indigenous possession belief reflect a culture in tension over the violence done to bodies and the freeing power of exorcism.