Senior Lecturer, School of Behavioral Sciences, Peres Academic Center, Israel
Contact : asaf.sharabi@gmail.com
Asaf Sharabi obtained his doctorate in social anthropology in 2010 from Bar Ilan University’s Sociology and Anthropology Department. In his doctoral thesis he explored the encounter between religion and contemporary modernity, focusing on the question of how the religious revival can be interpreted, in light of predictions about the weakening of religion in modern times. This question was examined in the context of the Teshuva movement in Israel.
In 2013, he undertook an ethnographic study in the Western Himalayas, a study in which he is intermittently engaged to this day. His fieldwork is located on the border between two Indian states – Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand. His research focuses on the religious experience and changing theological perceptions relating to the image of local gods, and in particular on the various ways in which religious streams are formed (and consolidated) in the face of other social and cultural phenomena, such as modern perceptions of religiosity or the rationalization of reality.
Main Research Interests
Cultural Anthropology ; Anthropology and Sociology of Religion ; Anthropology of Modernity ; Medical and Psychological Anthropology ; Ritual Healing ; Social Performance ; Identity and Agency ; Himalayan Society ; Israeli Society
Main publications
Articles in Peer-Reviewed Journals
2021 – Sharabi, Asaf. The Politics of Madness and Spirit Possession in Northern India. Medical Anthropology, Cross-Cultural Studies in Health and Illness, Volume 40, Issue 2, 182–195
2020 – Sharabi, Asaf. Omniscient Gods and Precision and Intent in Rituals : The Case of Orthodox Judaism. Journal of Contemporary Religion, 35 (2) : 307–322.
2019 – Sharabi, Asaf. Is it God Speaking ? Agency of Deities in the Western Himalaya Anthropological Forum. A Journal of Social Anthropology and Comparative Sociology, Volume 29, Issue 4, 356–373
2018 – Sharabi, Asaf and Hagar Shalev. 2018. Charismatic Mediumship and Traditional Priesthood : Power Relations in a Religious Field. Religion 48 (2) : 198–214.
2018 – Shalev, Hagar and Asaf Sharabi. 2018. Sanskritization of the Upper Castes : The Case of Mahāsū Followers. Anthropos, 113 (1), 258–267.
2017 – Guzmen-Carmeli, Shlomo and Asaf Sharabi. Textual Healing : Tailor-Made Kabbalistic Therapeutics in Jerusalem. Anthropology and Medicine.
2016 – Sharabi, Asaf and Hagar Shalev. From Ruler to Healer : Changes in Religious Experience in the Western Himalayas. Himalaya 36 (2) : 22–35.
2015 – Sharabi, Asaf. Religion and Modernity : Religious Revival Movement in Israel. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 44 (2) : 223–248.
2014 – Sharabi, Asaf. Deep Healing : Ritual Healing in the Teshuvah Movement. Anthropology and Medicine 21 (3) : 277–289.
2014 – Guzmen-Carmeli, Shlomo and Asaf Sharabi. The Holy Contract : the social contract of the Toldos Aharon Hasidic dynasty. Social Compass 61 (3) : 290–390.
2013 – Sharabi, Asaf. ’Boundary Work’ in Religious Revival Movements : The Case of the ’Teshuva Movement’ in Israel. Ethnography 14 (2) : 233–254.
2013 – Sharabi, Asaf and Shlomo Guzmen-Carmeli. The Teshuva Bargain : Ritual Healing Performances at Rabbi Amnon Yitzchak’s rallies. Journal of Ritual Studies 27 (2) : 97–110.
2012 – Sharabi, Asaf. ’Teshuvah Baskets’ in the Israeli Teshuvah Market. Culture and Religion, 13 (3) : 273–293.
Book Chapters
Sharabi, Asaf. Forthcoming. Mediums and Deep Healing : Ritual Healing in the Western Himalayas. In PC Joshi and Chakraverti Mahajan (Ed.), Recent Trends in Indian Medical Anthropology. Delhi : Concept Publishing Company