Acknowledgments ix
Introduction: Gesture and Power 1
I. Performative Encounters, Political Bodies
1. Neither Native nor Stranger: Places, Encounters, Phophecies 37
II. Spirits, Bodies, and Performance in Belgian Congo
2. "A War between Soldiers and Prophets": Embodied Resistance in Colonial
Belgian Congo, 1921 71
3. Threatening Gestures, Immoral Bodies: Kingunza after Kimbangu 107
III. Civil Religion and Performed Politics in Postcolonial Congo
4. Dancing with the Invisible: Everyday Performances under Mobutu Sese
Seko 137
5. Dancing Disorder in Mobutu's Zaire: Animation Politique and Gendered
Nationalisms 165
IV. Re-creating the Past, Performing the Future
6. Bundu dia Kongo and Embodied Revolutions: Performing Kongo Pride,
Transforming Modern Society 187
Conclusion: Privileging Gesture and Bodies in Studies of Religion and
Power 227
Glossary 233
Notes 235
References 253
Index 275
