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Volume 9 Number 1 (Spring 2001)
Articles
BEATRICE KÜMIN (Zürich): Climbing Trees: The Transmission
of Knowledge in Buryat Shamanism
This essay is concerned with how shamanic knowledge
is passed on. The question is particularly relevant
for the areas of Siberia and Mongolia, which are the
home of the Buryats and where, in recent decades, shamanism
seemed to be in real danger of disappearing. Today,
however, shamanic traditions are actively pursued again
and may be able to survive political currents. In this
article I attempt to elaborate, by reference to a Buryat
initiation ritual, the different though interdependent
ways in which shamanic knowledge is handed down and
kept alive.
MIKE MONEY (Liverpool): Deceit and Duality: Jacob's
Shamanic Vision
The Jacob story given in Genesis is usually read within
the orthodox Judaeo-Christian tradition. However, it
contains themes and elements strongly suggestive of
a shamanic origin. This paper considers the essential
elements of the shamanic tradition and scrutinises the
story from this perspective. Such an interpretation
gives many elements within the traditional account greater
meaning, and some hitherto unconsidered details are
revealed as highly significant. Reconstructed as a shamanic
narrative, the account of Jacob's visions, his relationships
with Isaac and Laban, the matter of the mandrakes, and
the encounter with the angel may all be located in a
revised framework of understanding. This framework is
not reductionist but offers new insights into the significance
of the story; placing it within a framework of shamanic
practice and healing. Such a reconceptualisation supports
the suggestion that there may be a shamanic tradition
within Judaism and permits the location of the Jacob
narrative within the conventional corpus of shamanic
experience.
MARILYN WALKER (Sackvile, N.B., Canada): The Language
of Shamans and the Metaphysics of Language: Emerging
Paradigms in Shamanic Studies
The language shamans use in ritual, including the language
of songs and chants, has been studied by western science
primarily as text, in which sound has been spatialized
into writing. And language has been viewed primarily
as a function of physical changes in the evolution of
human consciousness. Emerging paradigms suggest we look
at shamanic language as communication on the physical,
symbolic and subtle planes for new perspectives on the
origin of language and its role in shamanism. Drawing
on cymatics, metaphysics and new work in imagining rather
than theorizing language, this paper addresses the spiritual
function of language, a topic that has received little
attention in the ethnographic and historic literature
in either socio-linguistics or shamanic studies.
Field Reports
EMMA ZEVIK (Boston, MA): Lao BeiZhi Never Had a Gaigua
Review Article
GÁBOR KÓSA (Budapest): Some Recent Chinese Works on
Shamanism
Book Reviews
MERETE DEMANT JACOBSEN. Shamanism. Traditional and Contemporary
Approaches to the Mastery of Spirits and Healing (by
Ulla Johansen)
ALICE BECK KEHOE. Shamans and Religion: An Anthropological
Exploration in Critical Thinking (by Ake Hultkrantz)
DIANA RIBOLI. Tunsuriban. Shamanism in the Chepang of
Southern and Central Nepal (by Gregory G. Maskarinec)
News and Notes
MIHÁLY HOPPÁL (Budapest): A Report on the Founding of
the Research Center for Shamanic Culture in Beijing
Volume 9 Number 2 (Autumn 2001)
Articles
ÁRPÁD BERTA (Szeged): Álmos and táltos
This article discusses the etymology of the Hungarian
personal name Álmos and the Hungarian common noun táltos
‘person with magical powers; one able to make contact
with the supernatural; shaman; magician; fortune teller'.
ÁGNES BIRTALAN (Budapest): The Tibetan Weather-Magic
Ritual of a Mongolian Shaman
This fieldwork-based paper describes a unique Mongolian
shamanic ritual of non-Mongolian-in all probability
Tibetan-origin. The author, who is participating in
permanent field research among the Mongolian populations
of Western and Northern Mongolia, had the opportunity
to observe a weather-magic ritual performed in and around
the tent of Kürlää, a Western Mongolian shaman, in August
1995. One type of weather-magic ritual, performed to
bring on rain, storms, etc., is well known among the
nomads of Inner Asia and also among Mongolian peoples
from the European Kalmyks, through the Siberian Buriats,
to the settled Mongolian population of Inner Mongolian
China. Analysis of the bad weather-averting rituals
of the Buddhist populations of Tibet, China and India
and the Western Mongolian ritual reported here enables
us to investigate a complex system of multicultural
contacts between Mongolian and other cultures and the
religious thought of different peoples. The paper describes
the ritual and presents comparative tables of the two
main types of Tibetan and Mongolian weather-magic rituals.
OLGA KAZAKEVITCH (Moscow): Two Recently Recorded Selkup
Shamanic Songs
Two shaman songs were collected from a Selkup woman
in the village of Ratta in the Krasnoselkup district,
Russian Federation, in 1996. The first is a novice shaman's
song addressed to his or her shaman ancestor, referred
to as "grandfather", and the second song is
an excerpt from a shamanic rite during which the shaman
ascends to the world of the dead. The Selkup texts are
provided, together with translations and commentaries.
JARKKO NIEMI (Tampere): A Musical Analysis of Selkup
Shamanic Songs
This article examines some structural features of Selkup
shamanic songs at the level of the relation between
the verse-form text of the song and the melody. Although
preliminary, the conclusions drawn here may yield new
perspectives on the general problem of versification
in Samoyed languages and especially in that of the Selkup,
whose musical culture is one of the least known among
the native music cultures of Western Siberia.
GÁBOR KÓSA (Budapest): "Open Wide, Oh, Heaven's
Door!": Shamanism in China Before the Tang Dynasty.
Part Two
After reviewing the major scholarly theories on ancient
Chinese shamanism in the first part of this study, here
I explore various aspects of the Chinese religious complex
to demonstrate that underlying major religious notions
there was a general, pre-existing religious substratum.
This substratum contains several elements for which
parallels can be found in phenomena known from shamanic
cultures. Therefore, the functions and attributes of
the wu-the major representative of this substratum-are
investigated to prove that the earliest written records
of any kind of shamanic activity were written in Chinese.
Book Reviews
MARIE-LISE BEFFA and LAURENCE DELABY. Festins d'âmes
et robes d'esprits. Les objets chamaniques sibériens
du Musée de l'Homme (by Mihály Hoppál)
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