Summary: | Malagasy healers-diviners, followers of the ancestors cult, can rarely make a living from their magico-religious activity, so most are also peasants or sellers of medicinal plants at the market, among other examples. The lay exorcists of the Malagasy Protestant Revival movement (fifohazana, appeared in 1894 in the Betsileo region) are not members of the clergy and are therefore not paid for this practice. They can also work as nurses, lawyers, or peasants. This article examines, from ethnographic data collected in Fianarantsoa, in the Betsileo region, in the central highlands of Madagascar, the positions of two physics and chemistry teachers who are also healer-diviner of the ancestors cult, for one, and Protestant exorcist for the other. These two local figures are known and recognized throughout the city as both religious specialists and teachers. They control, play with their multiple skills, alternate and / or combine valorize social positions.
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