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Helsinki University Press

When Cryptotype Meets the Imaginary: ‘Adultery’ in a Sri Lankan Village

  • Victor C. de Munck (author)
Chapter of: Modern Folk Devils: Contemporary Constructions of Evil
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TitleWhen Cryptotype Meets the Imaginary: ‘Adultery’ in a Sri Lankan Village
ContributorVictor C. de Munck (author)
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.33134/HUP-13-13
Licensehttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
PublisherHelsinki University Press
Published on2021-12-13
Long abstract

This chapter presents an empirical case of a young Sri Lankan woman who is ostracized from her local community for being an adulteress, despite no one in the community having any real proof of this being the case. The article engages with the preceding chapters of this volume in order to find comparative connections to both understand this case and to situate it in the contexts of the symbolic roles folk devils may play in a society.

Keywords
  • Folk devils
  • cryptotype
  • adultery
  • ostracism
  • Sri Lanka
Contributors

Victor C. de Munck

(author)
Asian and Transcultural Studies at Vilnius University

Victor de Munck is a cultural and cognitive anthropologist. He is a professor at Vilnius University, in the Asian and Transcultural Studies Institute.   He has recently published articles in Current anthropology and JRAI on theories of culture and on Sufism and cognition, respectively.  He has a book titled "Romantic Love in America" (2019, Lexington).  His current research (supported by the Lithuanian Research Council) is on new forms of intimacy as they affect conceptions of self and decisions regarding, marriage and having children.  He has published eleven monographs (some co-authored) and over 50 refereed articles. Most of his field research has been conducted in Sri Lanka, but more recently he has been working in Eastern Europe where he is fascinated with the Albanian-Macedonian socio-cultural interface as well as how cultural models theory can describe and explain changes in love relations in Lithuania.

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