Hoodoo

Hoodoo, also known as Lowcountry Voodoo in the Gullah South Carolina Lowcountry, is a traditional African-American spirituality that developed from a number of West African spiritual traditions and beliefs. Hoodoo is a mixture of various African religious practices created by enslaved Africans in the New World. These religious practices were held in secret away from white slave owners. Following the Great Migration, hoodoo practice spread throughout the United States.

Regional synonyms for hoodoo include conjuration, witchcraft, or rootwork.

History
Hoodoo is the practice of spirituality carried to the United States by West Africans as the result of the transatlantic slave trade. It is a blend of practices from the people of the Congo, Benin/Togo, Nigeria and others. The extent to which hoodoo could be practiced varied by region and the temperament of the slave owners. Enslaved Africans of the Southeast, known as the Gullah, as well as those in Louisiana, were people who enjoyed an isolation and relative freedom that allowed for retention of the practices of their West African ancestors. Root work or hoodoo, in the Mississippi Delta where the concentration of enslaved Africans was dense, was practiced but under a large cover of secrecy. Hoodoo spread throughout the United States as African Americans left the delta during the Great Migration.

1771 Stafford, Virginia
In 1771 Peter Hansborough of Stafford, Virginia, suspected his slave who was named Sharper, of procuring poison from "a [Root] Doctor or Conjurer as they are Call'd." Hansborough obtained an arrest warrant from the county justices and Sharper was apprehended and placed in country jail. "Upon examination it appeared to the justices that said Sharper had attempted to procure poison from the doctor to destroy white people." Sharper died due to severe frost bite.

Differences from voodoo religions
Hoodoo shows evident links to the practices and beliefs of Fon and Ewe Vodun spiritual folkways. The folkway of Vodun is a more standardized and widely dispersed spiritual practice than hoodoo. Vodun's modern form is practiced across West Africa in the nations of Benin, Togo, and Burkina Faso, among others. In the Americas, the worship of the Vodoun loa is syncretized with Roman Catholic saints. The Vodou of Haiti, Voodoo of Louisiana, and Vudú of Puerto Rico, Cuba, and the Dominican Republic are related more to Vodun than to hoodoo.