The Language of Mediums and Psychics : The Social Organization of Everyday Miracles

Every week in Europe and the USA thousands of people consult psychic practitioners: men and women who claim to communicate with the dead; or to have paranormal means of cognition; or the ability to discern past and future events from the arrangement of tarot cards, and so on. What is common in all these encounters is language. Psychic practitioners use language to demonstrate their powers, whether they are reporting the words of their spirit contacts or interpreting the spread of tarot cards. Their clients accept or reject this information also through talk. Thus everyday ways of speaking are crucial to the performance of psychic powers in such sittings. This book presents the first sustained study of the verbal interaction between the various kinds of psychic practitioners and their clients. Using conversation analysis Robin Wooffitt examines the structure of the interaction, focusing on the ways in which psychic practitioners establish the genuineness of their claimed paranormal powers. The book adopts a neutral standpoint in terms of the status of the claims of psychic practitioners, raising important issues about the use of the social sciences to understand not only the activities of psychic practitioners, but other kinds of paranormal phenomena. This highly original study will appeal to students and scholars of discourse studies, and to sociologists interested in conversation analysis. It has been written in a style accessible to non-specialists and will also appeal to social scientists interested in the ways in which we might study psychic phenomena and the paranormal. 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Communication is crucial to the performance of psychic powers in a range of settings. Psychic practitioners use language to demonstrate their powers, whether they are reporting the words of their spirit contacts or interpreting the spread of Tarot cards. Their clients also accept or reject this information through talk. This book presents the first sustained study of the verbal interaction between the various kinds of psychic practitioners and their clients." "Using conversation analysis, Robin Wooffitt examines the structure of the interaction, focusing on the ways in which psychic practitioners and their clients establish the authenticity of the claimed paranormal powers. Adopting a neutral standpoint towards the status of the claims of psychic practitioners, the book raises important issues about the role of social science in understanding the activities of psychic practitioners and other kinds of parapsychological phenomena. This highly original study will appeal to students and scholars of discourse studies, and to sociologists interested in conversation analysis. It is written in a style accessible to non-specialists, and will also interest parapsychologists and social scientists studying psychic phenomena and the paranormal."--Jacket. Presents the study of the verbal interaction between the various kinds of psychic practitioners and their clients. Using conversation analysis, this book examines the structure of the interaction, focusing on the ways in which psychic practitioners establish the genuineness of their claimed paranormal powers. Robin Woofitt studies the language used in consultations between mediums and psychic practitioners such as Tarot readers, astrologers and clairvoyants, and their sitters and audiences. It focuses specifically on the use of language in successful demonstrations of ostensibly paranormal forms of cognition