Review of 'The Concept of Shamanism: uses and abuses' (part 1)

(edited by Henri-Paul Francfort and Roberte N. Hamayon in collaboration with Paul G. Bahn, 2001, Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó)

So I'm currently reading two different books on shamanism. They take different approaches- Piers Vitebsky's Shamanism is an image-heavy book which feels like it probably works better as an intro book for someone without a social science background (in that it's interesting and well-written and very very pretty, but not as thoroughly referenced as I'd like). The Concept of Shamanism, on the other hand, is an essay collection with a very analytical approach. So far I'm enjoying the latter one more.

If you take a Popperian view of science (which I do), the vast majority of ethnographies are non-scientific studies. Ethnographic data is usually presented in a way that makes it impossible for anyone else to try to test or replicate it. There are many reasons for this. Obviously there's a major issue in that ethnographers tend to work alone and focus very much on local variation (so if someone else feels your ethnography doesn't sound plausible, then even if they have considerable knowledge of the culture in question it's often possible to just say "well, my understanding is very specific to the individuals I spoke to and the time period when I was there. If the study had been done in a slightly different place, at a different time, or with a different researcher, then differences in interpretation would be inevitable."

This sort of attitude would seem to make the idea of reliable replication of results pretty problematic (although it is sometimes possible to go back and re-interview the specific people who acted as informants for an earlier anthropologist, and see if their statements still seem to support the original researcher's conclusions. Derek Freeman's research with Margaret Mead's informants would be an obvious example, although I'm not massively familiar with his work and I'm aware that some people feel he ends up resorting to ad hominems against Mead- I'll have to go read it properly sometime).

However, I think that even if we accept the methodological limitations of research on human belief systems, there are ways in which it's possible to pursue scientific research by phrasing your theories in terms of testable predictions. Not many people actually seem interested in doing this- which is fair enough, and if researchers are interested in a pursuing a humanities approach rather than a scientific one then it makes total sense. What REALLY annoys me, though, is when someone advances a theory which seems to involve testable hypotheses, but then when you actually engage with their research it often turns out that their hypotheses aren't really testable. Or worse, they're testable as initially phrased, but any apparently contradictory evidence is met by attempts by researchers to redefine terms or otherwise move the goalposts in order to save the theory from falsification. That just seems to render the entire debate completely pointless.

Caveat: I'm not totally up to date on the theory that's under question in this book. I read Clottes and Lewis-Williams' The Shamans of Prehistory (1998) about three years ago, but I certainly wouldn't claim to be an expert on that book and I haven't read more recent stuff like Lewis-Williams and David Pearce's Inside the Neolithic Mind (2005). So I'm basically going on the reviews presented by the various essay authors in The Concept of Shamanism (who were published in 2001, so theoretically Lewis-Williams & co. could have penned a devastating rebuttal by now for all I know). So that aside: here's a summary of what I understand to be the core theory that's being proposed:

• 'Shamanism' is a word which applies to customs practiced in a very broad range of cultures throughout human history. 'Shamanism' here seems to mean localised belief systems inspired by certain kinds of altered states of consciousness (ASCs) experienced on a regular basis by individual ritual practitioners.
• These ASCs are often induced by drugs, but they can also be caused by other things such as sensory deprivation.
• There are certain types of vision/hallucination which frequently arise from shamanic ASCs, regardless of the cultural context. This is because all humans share the same sort of brain structure and visual system, and these can internally generate certain kinds of images (e.g. entoptic phenomena).
• Shamanic ASCs often inspire certain types of artwork (thus leading to certain patterns of images which can be found in art from a broad range of cultures).
• Therefore, if we find art which fits these patterns, we can infer that the culture which produced it practiced shamanism.
• European Paleolithic cave art and San rock art show these patterns. Therefore the (long-dead) people who created these works were shamans.
  

The contributors to this volume are archaeologists and anthropologists who are sceptical of this theory.

The anthology kicks off with 'Shamanism: symbolic system, human capability and Western ideology' by Roberte Nicole Hamayon (p.1-27). Hamayon instantly earns my love by starting off with a quote from Unended Quest (I am a Popper fangirl). The quote in question goes:

"Never let yourself be goaded into taking seriously problems about words and their meanings. What must be taken seriously are questions of facts and assertions about facts: theories and hypotheses, the problems they solve and the problems they raise." (cited p.1).

This is an especially important point in discussions on 'shamanism', where there's rarely a clear consensus over exactly what the word means, and so you tend to wind up with a series of overlapping but non-equivalent definitions plus a substantial number of researchers who don't really care whether the word has a precise definition as long as it can be used in a sort of broad, common-sense, "but at least everyone knows roughly what I mean by this" sort of way (see p.5, 8).

Hamayon is concerned that popular interest in shamanism (from Western subcultures like the New Age and Pagan movements, or people interested in experimenting with drugs) is in danger of distorting research on shamanism in other cultures (by providing an incentive for people to attach the shamanism-label to a very wide range of practices, and then only emphasise the elements of those practices which accord with the vague mental image which non-specialists have of 'shamanism').

A couple of key quotes here:

"At the risk of oversimplifying the debate, we may put it in the straightforward manner it was initially put no matter how obsolete this may appear today: Is shamanism basically and ultimately the expression of a type of religion or worldview or of a type of personality or inner innate disposition? If the former, is it characteristic of certain types of societies and cultures or an elementary constituent of religious systems in general? If the latter, is it specific to a certain type of individuals or inherent in human beings?" (p.4)

"On the basis of this [Korean shamanism] and other similar examples, it has come to be largely admitted that shamanism is inherently oral, not as a reflection of illiteracy and backwardness but as a condition for its specific practice. According to tradition, shamanic efficacy comes from being in 'direct contact' with spirits and acting under their inspiration. It is precisely for this reason that shamanic practice is claimed to be an object of personalised performance exclusively, basically incompatible with the very idea of doctrine and, more broadly, with the idea of fixed ways of expression." (although written songs have been used to train beginner Korean shamans, established Korean shamans argue these songs lack efficacy and so an experienced shaman should only sing songs they have learned directly from their spirits). (p.10)

Hamayon thinks 'shamanism' appeals to some modern Westerners for the following reasons:

• it sounds 'exotic' and 'primitive', and therefore represents a rebellion against Western culture
• people feel it's connected with 'nature' and therefore environmentalism
• it sounds relatively vague and non-culturally specific. Therefore a commitment to 'shamanism' does not not necessarily imply a commitment to any particular culture or way of life (which is good from a memetic transmission perspective, because a definition of 'shamanism' which implied that to be a 'shaman' one must be a hunter-gatherer, for example, would make it much harder for Westerners to participate).
• shamanism is conceptualised as a phenomenon which encompasses a wide range of cultural variation but has some universal features (such as a specific type of ASC which humans from any culture can learn to induce). This implies that if you want to become a shaman, it's not strictly necessary to learn about specific types of non-Western cultures, or be initiated into an existing non-Western tradition. You can theoretically tap into the universal features of the shamanic experience from the comfort of your own home and culture.
• sometimes these universal features of shamanism are speculated as being connected to universal features of the human brain. This relatively vague reference to neurology helps reassure some people that 'shamanism's efficacy has scientific backing.
• 'shamans' are conceived as individuals, working outside of any institutional structure, who are capable of 'mastering' spirits. This means that, compared to some other religious options on offer to Westerners, 'shamanism' seems to make fewer demands which might conflict with individual's existing desires or moral beliefs (p.12-13)

Hamayon then goes on to argue that members of the Western counter-culture are using the concept of 'shamanism' as a tool to reshape Western culture into a form which they find more compatible with their own interests. In some areas, they have been remarkably successful in doing so- for example, concern for the environment and for individual health and well-being are values which began mainly as features of the counter-culture, but have since become widely accepted by mainstream Western society. Hamayon states quotes Bernard Dupuy: "mysticism is the form taken by a religion when new tendencies refuse to break out of the shell of the old religious system to create a new one but instead remain confined within its limits." (cited p.13).

Hamayon believes that the type of shamanism practiced in the West is more individualistic than non-Western 'shamanisms', more internalised within individuals (due to Western conceptualisations of 'ASC' and 'trance' rather than an emphasis on ritual performance), and less focused on spirits (especially spirits with specific roles, such as embodiments of discrete aspects of the natural environment, or of individual ancestors) (p.14). I agree that the Western shamanic movement seems a lot more individualistic than non-Western shamanisms- I can't really comment on the other two points, since I don't know enough about Western shamanism to say what would count as 'typical'.

This leads to my one major area of concern with Hamayon's very intriguing essay: she doesn't make it very clear how much direct experience she's had with the Western shamanism movement. Has she done any textual research, interviews, or participant observation? If not, then does she have a good reason why we should take her arguments on trust? Her description of Western shamanism feels relatively plausible to me, but I'm definitely not an expert and so I'm not convinced that 'plausible to me' is good enough.

For example, she cites Weber's comment that ecstatic states, spirit possession, and ASCs caused by drugs or dancing play the same role for 'peasants' that 'mysticism' plays for intellectuals (see p.14). Setting aside the fact that my level of respect for many of Weber's generalisations is not terribly high, I'm not convinced that this statement really applies to much of the Western shamanism movement. It sounds like it might be a reasonable argument in relation to most of Western history (although I'm not a historian so I don't really know), but it seems to me that most of the people who are drawn to the Western shamanic movement are attracted by the idea that it involves ASCs and/or drugs and/or dancing and physical ritual- this is something which serves to distinguish it from most of the other options on offer. I also don't understand what Weber's supposed to be implying by the word 'mysticism' in this context- earlier we had a quote from Dupuy which seemed to be saying that 'mysticism' is basically just any attempt to radically reform a religious tradition from the inside, rather than starting a whole new tradition in order to achieve the sort of religious framework that you want. Where does that imply 'intellectualism' or a lack of emphasis on ASCs and dancing? Possibly Weber has a narrower definition of 'mysticism' that addresses these questions, but if so it would have been helpful for Hamayon to mention it.

All in all, though, it's an interesting essay- definitely food for thought.