The Shaman as Healer

Western cultures might view shamanism as superstition; however, the peoples who accept shamanism believe in the existence of the alternate realities that the shamans describe. More than a purely psychological construct for the sake of healing, the "other" world is a source of wisdom and power, a place where a shaman may access the spiritual tools to heal. "Other" worlds exist totally independent of humanity's belief in them, and the shaman's responsibility is to adventure into these realms to gather healing power for the community.

The process by which shamans enter these realms is by entering an altered state of consciousness. This is frequently done through drumming or other percussive sound. When shamans enter an altered state, they find spirits, frequently depicted as animals, whom the shamans befriend for the sake of helping t

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e other world to see souls and transport them. Furthermore, only the shaman has sufficient spiritual power to wrest the patient's soul away from the malevolent spirits that have abducted it. The shaman returns from the trance and describes his voyage to the community. The voyage invariably describes a consistent picture of the underground world of the dead. Each shamanistic narrative "accords with the funerary mythologies of the respective tribes" (Eliade 309). Once the shaman returns, he reveals what he has learned about the illness from the journey and leads the community in a dance. This is followed by instructions for the patient and his or her family. This is only the roughest outline of a typical seance. The actual sequence of events may vary from tribe to tribe. Tales of rescuing lost souls figure heavily in the mythology of the North American peoples, as well. In this sense, the religion and the medicine of Native Americans is closely intertwined. To the Eurocentric mind, the process of entering a trance and conducting conversations with spirits may appear as mental illness. The distinguishing characteristic between the shaman and the madman, however, is volition: "The shaman actively seeks out the spirits in deliberat
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Approximate Word count = 2087
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)

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