Taming the Wind of Desire

Psychology, Medicine, and Aesthetics in Malay Shamanistic Performance
1. Auflage 1993
ISBN: 978-0-520-08258-8
Verlag: University of California Press

Buch, Englisch, 386 Seiten, Trade Paperback, Format (B × H): 231 mm x 515 mm, Gewicht: 628 g

Reihe: Comparative Studies of Health Systems and Medical Care

Charged with restoring harmony and relieving pain, the Malay shaman places his patients in trance and encourages them to express their talents, drives, personality traits—the "Inner Winds" of Malay medical lore—in a kind of performance. These healing ceremonies, formerly viewed by Western anthropologists as exotic curiosities, actually reveal complex multicultural origins and a unique indigenous medical tradition whose psychological content is remarkably relevant to contemporary Western concerns.

Accepted as apprentice to a Malay shaman, Carol Laderman learned and recorded every aspect of the healing seance and found it comparable in many ways to the traditional dramas of Southeast Asia and of other cultures such as ancient Greece, Japan, and India. The Malay seance is a total performance, complete with audience, stage, props, plot, music, and dance. The players include the patient along with the shaman and his troupe. At the center of the drama are pivotal relationships—among people, between humans and spirits, and within the self. The best of the Malay shamans are superb poets, dramatists, and performers as well as effective healers of body and soul.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Laderman, Carol

Fachgebiete

• Medizin | Veterinärmedizin Medizin | Public Health | Pharmazie | Zahnmedizin Klinische und Innere Medizin Innere Medizin
• Sozialwissenschaften Psychologie Allgemeine Psychologie Bewusstseinszustände Hypnose, Psychopharmaka-induzierte Bewusstseinszustände
• Geisteswissenschaften Philosophie Moderne Philosophische Disziplinen Philosophische Anthropologie

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Preface 
Acknowledgments 
PART 1. MALAY MEDICINE, MALAY PERSON 
1. An Introduction to Malay Shamanism 
2. Islamic Humoralism on the Malay Peninsula 
3. "Unusual" Illnesses 
4. Angin: the Inner Winds 
5. The Performance of Healing 
PART n. RITUAL DRAMAS OF HEALING 
6. A Stifled Talent 
7. Seance for a Sick Shaman 
8. Breaking Contracts with the Spirit World 
PART III. AFTERWORD 
9. Words and Meaning 
APPENDIX A. A SHAMAN SPEAKS 
APPENDIX B. MUSIC OF THE MAIN PETERI
Glossary 
Bibliography 
Index

Über Autor(innen)

Carol Laderman is Professor and Chair of the Anthropology Department at the City College of the City University of New York and the author of Wives and Midwives: Childbirth and Nutrition in Rural Malaysia (California, 1984).