Meaning of wendigo psychosis | Babel Free

Definitions

A psychological condition specific to some Native American groups, in which a person in fever-induced delusions believes that they are possessed by a cannibalistic wendigo spirit, or in which members of the groups hysterically believe a person to be so possessed.

uncountable

Examples

“"Windigo psychosis" has been the most celebrated culture trait of the Northern Algonkian peoples for almost half a century. […] The conclusion reached is that, although aspects of the windigo belief complex may have been "components in some individuals' psychological dysfunction" (Preston 1980: 128), there probably never were any windigo psychotics in the sense that cannibalism or murder was committed to satisfy an obsessional craving for human flesh. It is argued, rather that windigo psychosis as an etic/behavioral form of anthropophagy is an artifact of research conducted with an emic/mental bias.”

CEFR level