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Variation and variables in religious glossolalia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

William J. Samarin
William J. Samarin
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Toronto
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Abstract

Psychopathological explanations oversimplify religious glossolalia. An analysis of the use of glossolalia reveals that the speaker manipulates linguistic variables with considerable delicacy in response to role, purpose of the speech act, and setting of the speech act. Examined from a cultural point of view, glossolalia is another ‘language’ in the Pentecostalists' linguistic repertoire. (Glossolalia, Pentecostalism, speech pathologies, paralinguistics, language of religion.)

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Type
Articles
Information
Language in Society , Volume 1 , Issue 1 , April 1972, pp. 121 - 130
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1972

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