What is the difference between Hoodoo and Voodoo?
Hoodoo and Voodoo are both practiced in Louisiana and have many things in common. However, there are differences between the two. Voodoo is a religion and Hoodoo is an African American system of folk magickal practice that has typically been handed down from generation to generation. Many Hoodoo practitioners in Louisiana are Roman Catholic and also practice some form Spiritualism or Spiritism. They do not typically invoke the loas (African deities) as in Voodoo, and instead use Catholic Saints that represent the loas. This Catholic shroud is the result of a historical atmosphere wherein the only legal religion permitted in the state of Louisiana from the 1600s to 1812 was Roman Catholicism. There is no conflict between those who practice Voodoo and those who practice Hoodoo in Louisiana and they are perfectly complementary. Hoodoo practitioners work with both hands – for good and evil. The “root doctors”, as they are called in Louisiana, and the “bokors” as they are called in Haiti, a
