This book discusses the cultural importance of spirits, what spirits want, and how humans interact with them, using examples from around the world and through time. Examples range from the vengeful spirits of the Zulu that cast lightning bolts from clear skies to punish wrongdoers, to the benevolent Puebloan Kachina that encourage prosperity, safety, and rain in the arid American Southwest. The case studies illustrate how humans seek to cooperate (or counteract) spirits to heal the physical and spiritual ailments of their people, to divine the truth, or to gain resources. Building from their cross-cultural analyses, the authors further discuss how our physiology and psychology impact our interaction with the spirits. Readers will come away with an appreciation of the beauty and power of the spirits that continue to shape the lives of people around the world.
Author(s): Christine S. VanPool, Todd L. VanPool
Publisher: Springer
Year: 2023
Language: English
Pages: 259
City: Cham
Preface
Acknowledgments
Contents
List of Figures
List of Tables
Chapter 1: Things that Go Bump in the Night (and Day)
References
Chapter 2: Anthropology and the Science of the Supernatural: Souls, Ancestors, Ghosts, and Spirits
2.1 What Is Anthropology?
2.2 Tylor and the Anthropology of Spirits
2.3 Boas, Malinowski, and the Critique of Tylor
2.4 The Golden Bough and the Anthropology of Magic
2.5 Psychedelics, Insanity, and the Shaman in Mid-Twentieth Century Anthropology
2.6 Spirit Possession During Late-Twentieth Century Anthropology
2.7 Brain Neurology during Late-Twentieth Century and Early Twenty-First Century Anthropology
2.8 The `Social Ghost´ of Early Twenty-First Century Anthropology
2.9 Our Path Forward: The Construction of a Scientific Framework for the Anthropology of Spirits
References
Chapter 3: An Observational Classification of Spirits
3.1 Defining (Various Kinds of) Spirits
3.2 The Ethnosemantics of Spirits
3.3 Those Who Work with the Spirits: Shaman, Priest, or Something Else
3.4 Ethnosemantics Case Study 1: Deifying the ``Ten Girls´´ in Vietnam
3.5 Ethnosemantics Case Study 2: Religious Specialists in the Kathmandu Valley, Nepal
3.6 A Footnote on Embracing Ambiguity in Heuristic Definitions
References
Chapter 4: Spirits in the World
4.1 The Shamanic Universe
4.2 Climbing the World Tree using the Axis Mundi
4.3 The Spirits of Nature
4.3.1 Whirlwinds
4.3.2 Water, Lightning, Thunder, and Rain
4.3.3 Caves
4.3.4 Plant Spirits
4.4 The Spirit of Things
4.4.1 Noisemakers
4.4.2 Bundles
4.4.3 The Spirit of the House
4.4.4 Miscellaneous Objects
4.5 Building Ethnosemantics
References
Chapter 5: Spirits and Their Helpers
5.1 The Deep, Deep Origins of Shamanism
5.2 Spirits Transform the Shaman
5.3 Spirits Initiate the Shaman
5.4 Spirits and the Working Shaman
5.4.1 Spirits as Healers
5.4.2 Spirits and Divination
5.5 Vision Quests
5.6 Spirits and Priests
5.7 The Ethnosemantics of Spirit Specialists
References
Chapter 6: Defense Against the Dark
6.1 A Starting Caveat
6.2 Magic-Based Spirit Protection
6.2.1 Protecting the Self
6.2.2 Protecting the Home
6.3 Protecting Against Malicious Spirits
6.3.1 The Special Case of Demons
6.4 The Unwanted Possession
6.4.1 Types of Possession
6.4.2 Ending Unwanted Possession
Possession by the Dead
Possession by Demons
6.4.3 A Final Comparison of Voluntary and Involuntary Possession
6.5 Discussion
References
Chapter 7: Neurology, Physiology, and the Mind/Spirit Interface
7.1 The Spiritual Brain
7.2 The Religious Gut
7.3 ASC with and Without Entheogens
7.4 The Brain Beyond ASC
7.4.1 The Miracle of the Dancing Sun
7.4.2 Mass Hysteria
7.5 The Brain of the Dead
7.6 Discussion
References
Chapter 8: Modeling the Ethnosemantics of Spirits
8.1 Cross-Cultural Regularities
8.1.1 There and Back Again
References
