Belief, power, and identity in Pennsylvania Dutch brauche, or powwowing

The Pennsylvania Dutch magico-religious practice known as "powwowing," or brauche in the Pennsylvania Dutch dialect, has been practiced in southeastern and south-central Pennsylvania for over 200 years. Its principal use is physical and spiritual healing and it remains a health care choice for certain residents of that area, particularly when dealing with minor ailments, skin diseases, and culturally-defined illness (such as "livergrown" and "the take-off"). An analysis of twentieth century cases derived from interviews with brauchers (practitioners of brauche) and their clients yields a cure rate of approximately 90 percent for brauche healing. An exploratory study of data from these cases suggests that belief in brauche healing is based on experience as a brauche patient; prior belief and cultural factors are not significantly associated with a belief in the efficacy of brauche. This result is consistent with David Hufford's "experiential theory," which holds that some supernatural belief is based on empirical evidence derived from observation, rather than dependent upon prior cultural templates. Brauche healing rituals may be classed within three genres, identified on the basis of complexity and scope of ailments deemed treatable, with the most complex rituals deemed capable of treating the broadest range of ailments. Professional and non-professional brauchers may be distinguished by various criteria, such as range of clients, special treatment areas, and size of practice, although brauchers are not supposed to request payment for their services. Brauche healing rituals serve as an occasion for identity work, as defined by Wallace, in which healer and client generally use "claimed identities" to move "real identity" closer to "ideal identity" and farther from "feared identity." Life stories of brauchers and patients reflect this identity work which takes place in the context of a shared cultural model. A Pennsylvania Dutch cultural model of healing which shows the relation of worldview to lower order beliefs may be abstracted from scaled survey responses. This model includes sub-models of brauche and is able to accommodate and adapt to new input from experience.