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The Shaman's Needle: Development, Shamanic Agency, and Intermedicality in Aguaruna Lands, Peru
Author(s) -
Greene Shane
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
american ethnologist
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.875
H-Index - 78
eISSN - 1548-1425
pISSN - 0094-0496
DOI - 10.1525/ae.1998.25.4.634
Subject(s) - shamanism , ethnography , indigenous , sociology , explication , agency (philosophy) , ethnomedicine , anthropology , narrative , epistemology , social science , history , traditional medicine , medicine , philosophy , linguistics , ecology , archaeology , medicinal plants , biology
In this article I juxtapose and integrate three distinct but interrelated lines of analysis: (1) a critique of “development” with respect to its (misconceptions of ethnomedicines as epistemologically and practically (that is, culturally) static; (2) an explication of how shamanic curing epitomizes such perceived stasis; and (3) an ethnographic analysis of a specific shamanic session (originally presented by Brown [1988]) conducted by an Aguaruna shaman whose discourse and practice, when contextual ized and fully explored, undermine (misconceptions of stasis. The article employs a notion of intermedicality to examine medical development, demonstrating the important social agency executed on the part of native practitioners. I discuss implications for theorizing indigenous culture and the importance of an ethnographic approach , [development, shamanism, ethnomedicine, culture change, medical anthropology, Amazonia]