Paper short abstract:

In biomedicine the physical effects of meaningful performances are often downplayed as 'only' a placebo effect, and therefore not 'real'. The example of Candomblé shows how a non-biomedical healing culture makes use of the performative aspects of healing in a more elaborate way.

Paper long abstract:

Although the influence of the placebo effect, or 'meaning response' (Moerman 2002), is well known in biomedicine, it is usually not seen as a healing resource but is instead rejected as deception or fake. In biomedical knowledge production, placebo effects are regarded as confounders that need to be eliminated in order to study the "real" efficacy of a drug. Meaning responses are part of any medical encounter and impact physical and psychological processes. However, biomedicine fails to employ them in an honest and skillful way.

Traditional healing methods are often depreciated as relying "merely" on the placebo effect. I turn this argument around by regarding ritual performances as creative ways to enact and support healing processes. An example of such ritual performances is Candomblé, an Afro-Brazilian religion in which 'deep knowledge' is being produced through bodily experience including dancing, and elaborate rites of initiation. In Candomblé, dualisms like mind-body, subject-object, and construction-reality are being rendered useless. Humans create their deities by worshipping them and thereby cultivate axé, the vital force. In turn, they receive axé from their gods during trance possession and ritual performance.

The enactment of worship and healing in Candomblé can be seen as a model for creating meaning responses. The transformative performances include dance, ritual baths, dressing and eating like the gods, and ultimately embodying the deities through trance possession. Recognizing such practices as a healing art may help to understand the importance of imaginative, bodily performances in different medical contexts, instead of rejecting them as fraud.