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Concept
Hoodoo (spirituality)
Summary
Hoodoo is a set of spiritual practices, traditions, and beliefs that were created by enslaved Africans in the Southern United States from various traditional African spiritualities, Christianity and elements of indigenous botanical knowledge. Practitioners of Hoodoo are called rootworkers, conjure doctors, conjure man or conjure woman, root doctors, Hoodoo doctors, and swampers. Regional synonyms for Hoodoo include conjure or rootwork. As a syncretic spiritual system, it also incorporates Islam brought over by enslaved West African Muslims and Spiritualism. Scholars define Hoodoo as a folk religion. Folk religions are syncretic traditions between two or more cultural religions, in this case African indigenous spirituality and Abrahamic religion.
Many Hoodoo traditions draw from the beliefs of the Bakongo people of Central Africa. Over the first century of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, an estimated 52% of all kidnapped Africans (over 900,000 people) came from Central African countries that existed within modern day Cameroon, Congo, Angola, Central African Republic and Gabon. By the end of the colonial period, enslaved Africans were taken from Angola (40 percent), Senegambia (19.5 percent), the Windward Coast (16.3 percent), and the Gold Coast (13.3 percent), as well as the Bight of Benin and Bight of Biafra in smaller percentages.
Following the Great Migration of African-Americans, Hoodoo spread throughout the United States.
The first documentation of the word Hoodoo in the English language appeared in 1870. Its origins are obscure but some believe it originated as an alteration of the word Voodoo – a word that has its origin in the Gbe languages such as Ewe language, Adja language and Fon languages of Ghana Togo and Benin – referring to divinity.
Another possible etymological origin of the word Hoodoo comes from the word Hudu, meaning "spirit work," which comes from the Ewe language spoken in the West African countries of Ghana,Togo and Benin. Hudu is also one of the dialects of the Ewe language of the Ewe people in West Africa.
Official source
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