Review by Booklist Review
Before Singh became an assistant professor of anthropology and a regular contributor to publications like the New Yorker, he found himself journeying to Indonesia and Colombia to learn and understand the origins of Shamanism. Shamanism itself can sometimes be seen as a scam, or "woo," and not something that produces real healing, as opposed to scientifically based medicine. Those who practice it use altered states, or transcendence, to provide help and healing for others. Singh immerses himself in the culture of shamanism, including initiation ceremonies and drug use, and learns how these practices healed people who truly needed help. In some cases, it seems as though the issue was one of mental rather than physical health, and once someone believed what ailed them was no more, they proceeded to recover. The question then remains: Are shamans truly "fixing" people, resolving their troubles, or is it all a massive placebo effect? As readers follow along on Singh's discoveries, they will see that the physical impacts of psychological trauma and mental health issues cannot be ignored, and perhaps there is a place for many types of healing.
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Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
New Yorker contributor Singh (Zoostalgia) brilliantly traces the evolution of shamanism across history. Exploring the practice's psychological roots, he contends that shamanism answers a deep human need to manage uncertainty through its theatrical rituals, invocation of the supernatural, and elevation of shamans to superhuman status. Countering the notion that shamanism is a vestige of ancient societies, he tracks its development from the Paleolithic era to the first and second centuries, when early members of the Christian church regularly "enter ecstatic states and perform healing rituals," through the 20th century, as it seeped into "seemingly enlightened spaces" by way of charismatic experts like money managers, who use "their models, degrees, personalities, and superhuman work schedules" to persuade clients that they can "control the uncontrollable." Singh makes especially insightful points about how shamanism has engaged in a somewhat contradictory dance with religion, first influencing it and then threatening to siphon away adherents who crave a rawer spiritual experience. He frames the current spike of interest in trance, spirit possession, psychedelics, and other nontraditional forms of spirituality as a continuation of this search for "spiritual relief" in a society where institutionalized religion has lost appeal. Combining meticulous research and an excellent grasp of psychological and sociocultural theories, Singh paints a panoramic portrait of a little-understood subject. (May)
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Review by Library Journal Review
Singh (anthropology, Univ. of California, Davis) undertakes the time-honored tradition of participant-observer in seeking to demystify shamanism. Accordingly, he considers shamanism neither primeval wisdom nor mere superstition but rather a loose conglomeration of local practices operating mostly outside moribund religious institutions. Its power comes from its deep psychological resonance. In surprisingly universal ways, shamans bridge the divide between the seen and unseen, the known and the unknown, to bring the mystical and the spiritual to commonplace realms of disease, disaster, and anxious unknowing. Those seeking to enter its mysterious ranks must undergo a rigorous apprenticeship to develop the sort of untamed yet recognizable spiritual insights for which shamans are known; an individual shaman's credibility rests on their ability to convincingly intuit, impact, and transform age-old human problems. It is for this reason this work is subtitled "The Timeless Religion," as Singh can hardly imagine a time without such practitioners. VERDICT A convincing journey into powerful realms of religious knowing.--Sandra Collins
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
A wide-ranging study of a putatively premodern way of knowledge. Anthropologist Singh writes extensively of fieldwork among the Mentawai people of Indonesia, whose shamans undertake healing rituals, knowing "the plants for treating fungal infections and the songs for calling souls to feverish bodies." Once the object of much anthropological study, shamanism was co-opted by the problematic mythographer Mircea Eliade and the New Age guru Michael Harner. Both got it wrong, by Singh's lights, the latter by turning it into "a bite-size bundle amenable for Western consumption." This denatured, homogenized view of shamanism--in some views mumbo-jumbo, in other views "primeval wisdom," and mostly very different from the practices of the Tungusic people whose language is embedded in the name--turns it into formulas (hallucinogens here, spirit journeys there) that are ideal for flimflammery. Yet, in a broader view--and here a solid background in anthropology will help the reader--it's also fallen victim to a certain essentialism: This practice is industrial, this is agricultural, this is scientific. Nonsense, Singh suggests, stretching the boundaries of his field: When evangelists pray over Donald Trump, they're practicing (perhaps black) magic, and hedge-fund wizards speculate no more scientifically than a so-called witch doctor seeking a cure for spirit possession, in that "they fill very similar niches." If traditional shamanism is in decline around the world because of what Max Weber called disenchantment, there are still plenty of people willing to engage in its "moral ambiguity." As for hallucinogens, Singh dismisses the notion that magic mushrooms are the preferred shamanic key to the otherworld (beer is much more prevalent, tobacco even more so). He also questions anthropology's vaunted relativism: "A power of anthropology…is in turning the strange familiar and the familiar strange, yet this reversal requires a comparative approach." A provocative treatise, of much interest to students of culture, religious belief, and social science. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
