January 28: Katrina C. Kosyk lectures on Ancient Costa Rican Musical Instruments and Shamanistic Practices

An Examination of Ancient Costa Rican Musical Instruments and Shamanistic Practices

Katrina C. Kosyk

CSRS Graduate Student Fellow, Anthropology Dept.

Pre-Columbian Greater Nicoyan peoples during the Tempisque and Bagaces periods (500 B.C. until A.D. 800) practiced a variety of shamanistic rituals incorporating an assortment of musical instruments. The uses of sound within a range of shamanistic practices such as music induced trances, animal spirit possession, and animistic cult organization, and were essential components in communication with the afterlife. During this lecture we will explore the ways pre-Columbian musical instruments were produced and utilized in Costa Rica and Pacific Nicaragua. Analyzing multiple museum collections, we will investigate musical gestures associated with one of the most dynamic and influential members of Greater Nicoyan indigenous society; the shaman.

Katrina C. Kosyk is a music archaeologist specializing in ancient ceramic aerophones from Costa Rica. She holds a BSc honours in Archaeology and a BA in history from the University of Calgary. She is currently working on her MA thesis in the department of Anthropology at the University of Victoria.

Thursday, January 28, 4:30 – 5:30 pm

UVic, Human & Social Dev. Building, Room A240

This lecture is free and open to the public.

Web: www.csrs.uvic.ca Tel: 250-721-6325 Email: csrs@uvic.ca