Acknowledgements
An earlier version of Chapter 2 was published as “La politica di mito e rito nel funerale di Giulia: Cesare debutta nella sua carriera,” in La Cultura in Cesare, Diego Poli, ed. (Rome: Il Calamo, 1993), pp. 387–396.
An earlier version of Chapter 3 was published as “Revisiting ‘Magical Fright,’” American Ethnologist 28 (2001): 778–802.
An earlier version of Chapter 4 was published as “Mythic Narrative and Cultural Diversity in American Society,” in Wendy Doniger & Laurie Patton, eds., The Study of Myth after Eliade (Charlotttesville: University Press of Virginia, 1996), pp. 163–176.
An earlier version of Chapter 5 was published as “Mortuary Ritual and the Economy of Prestige: The Malagan for Bukbuk,” Cultural Critique 8 (1989): 197–225.
An earlier discussion of the example treated in Chapter 6 was published as “Diventare umano/a,” in Carla Pasquinelli, ed., Quaderni, Vol. 6: Forme dell’ identità culturale (Naples: Liguori, 1994): 45–52.