ESTONIAN ACADEMY
PUBLISHERS
eesti teaduste
akadeemia kirjastus
PUBLISHED
SINCE 1997
 
TRAMES cover
TRAMES. A Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences
ISSN 1736-7514 (Electronic)
ISSN 1406-0922 (Print)
Impact Factor (2022): 0.2
RESORTING TO SHAMANIC AGENCIES: FILLING IN FOR THE FAILURE OF THE OFFICIAL INSTITUTIONS IN A SIBERIAN PERIPHERY (TYVA REPUBLIC, RUSSIA); pp. 133–149
PDF | https://doi.org/10.3176/tr.2017.2.03

Author
Konstantinos Zorbas
Abstract

Drawing on a field study of shamanic remedies against affliction with curses in Tyva Republic (Siberia), this paper offers striking documentation of an ‘agency’ of social control and justice which is officially unseen by the Russian state. The paper identifies several crucial social implications of ‘shamanism’ as an unofficial redress for kinds of occult-mediated conflict which transcend the limits of state jurisdiction. The data on shamanic counter cursing and retaliatory practices provide evidence of the proliferation in Tyva of a pattern of interpersonal violence, associated with lethal appropriations of the ‘occult’ for rational purposes. The argument is advanced that the post-socialist ‘return’ of shamanic religion in the form of a ‘judicial offensive’ against misuses of the ‘occult’ in Tyva signifies a notable departure of ‘shamanism’ from typical meanings of traditional religion which emerge from the state’s law.

References

Atkinson, J. (1992) “Shamanisms today”. Annual Review of Anthropology 21, 307–330.
https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.an.21.100192.001515

Balzer-Mandelstam, M. (1993) “Two urban shamans: unmasking leadership in Fin-de-Soviet Siberia”. In George Marcus, ed. Perilous states: conversations on culture, politics and nation, 131–164. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Balzer-Mandelstam, M. (1996) “Flights of the sacred: symbolism and theory in Siberian shamanism”. American Anthropologist 98, 305–318.
https://doi.org/10.1525/aa.1996.98.2.02a00070

Balzer-Mandelstam, M. (2008) “Beyond belief? Social, political, and shamanic power in Siberia”. Social Analysis 52, 95–110.

Batianova, E. (2000) “Ritual violence among the peoples of northeastern Siberia”. In P. Schweitzer, M. Biesele, and R. Hitchcock, eds. Hunters and gatherers in the modern world: conflict, resistance, and self-determination, 150–163. New York; Oxford: Berghahn Books.

Bohannan, P. (1957) Justice and judgment among the Tiv. Oxford: Oxford University Press and International African Institute.

Douglas, M. (1970) Witchcraft: confessions and accusations. London: Tavistock Publications.

Eliade, M. (1964) Shamanism: archaic techniques of ecstasy. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Evans-Pritchard, E. 1976 (1937) Witchcraft, oracles and magic among the Azande. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Favret-Saada, J. (1980) Deadly words – witchcraft in the Bocage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Geschiere, P. (1997) The modernity of witchcraft: politics and the occult in post-colonial Africa. Charlottesville and London: University of Virginia Press.

Geschiere, P. (2006) “Witchcraft and the limits of the law: Cameroon and South Africa”. In Jean Comaroff and John Comaroff, eds. Law and disorder in the post-colony, 219–246. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Halemba, A. (2003) “Contemporary religious life in the Republic of Altai: the interaction of Buddhism and Shamanism”. Sibirica 3, 165–182.
https://doi.org/10.1080/1361736042000245295

Hoppal, M. (2013) “The rejuvenation of Manchu shamanism”. International Journal for Shamanistic Research (SHAMAN) 21, 163–184.

Jokic, Z. (2008) “The wrath of the forgotten Ongons: shamanic sickness, spirit embodiment, and fragmentary trancescape in contemporary Buryat shamanism”. Sibirica 7, 1, 23–50.
https://doi.org/10.3167/sib.2008.070103

Kenin-Lopsan, M. (1995) “Tuvan shamanic folklore”. In Marjorie Mandelstam-Balzer, ed. Culture incarnate: native anthropology from Russia, 215–254. New York: M. E. Sharpe Publica­tions.

Kenin-Lopsan, M. (2002) Mify tuvinskix šamanov [Myths of Tuvan shamans]. Kyzyl: Novosti Tuvy.

Lévi-Strauss, C. (1963) “The effectiveness of symbols”. In Claude Levi-Strauss, ed. Structural anthropology, 186–205. New York: Basic Books.

Lewis, I. 1971. Ecstatic religion: an anthropological study of spirit possession and shamanism. Middlesex, England: Penguin Books.
https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203241080

Lindquist, G. (2005) “Healers, leaders, and entrepreneurs: shamanic revival in southern Siberia”. Culture & Religion 6, 263–285.
https://doi.org/10.1080/01438300500226430

Lindquist, G. (2008) “Loyalty and command: shamans, lamas, and spirits in a Siberian ritual”. Social Analysis 52, 111–126.
https://doi.org/10.3167/sa.2008.520107

Lindquist, G. (2011) “Ethnic identity and religious competition: Buddhism and Shamanism in southern Siberia”. In Galina Lindquist and Don Handelman, eds. Religion, politics, and globalization, 69–90. London; New York: Berghahn Books.

Morris, B. (2005) Religion and anthropology: a critical introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511814419

Obeyesekere, G. (1975) “Sorcery, premeditated murder, and the canalization of aggression in Sri Lanka”. Ethnology 4, 1–23.
https://doi.org/10.2307/3773204

Pimenova. K. (2013) “The ‘vertical of shamanic power’: the use of political discourse in post-Soviet Tuvan shamanism”. Laboratorium 5, 118–140.

Riboli, D. and D. Torri (2013) Shamanism and violence: power, repression and suffering in indigenous religious conflicts. London: Ashgate Publishing Limited.

Riches, D. (1994) “Shamanism: the key to religion”. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 29, 381–405.
https://doi.org/10.2307/2804479

Vainshtein, S. (1964) Tuvinskoje šamanstvo. [Tuvan shamanism]. Moskva: Nauka.

Vainshtein, S. (1978) “The erens in Tuvan shamanism”. In Vilmos Dioszegi and Mihaly Hoppal, eds. Shamanism in Siberia, 457–468. Budapest: Akademiai Kiado.

Vainshtein, S. (1984) “Shamanism in Tuva at the turn of the 20th century”. In Mihaly Hoppal, ed. Shamanism in Eurasia, 353–373. Budapest: Akademiai Kiado.

Vitebsky, P. (1995) The shaman. Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press.

Vitebsky, P. (2002) “Withdrawing from the land: social and spiritual crisis in the indigenous Russian Arctic”. In Chris Han, ed. Postsocialism: ideals, ideologies, and practices in Eurasia, 180–195. Routledge.

Zorbas, K. (2007) “Agents of evil: curse accusations and shamanic retaliation in post-Soviet Tuva”. Ph.D. dissertation, Scott Polar Research Institute, University of Cambridge.

Zorbas, K. (2013) “Shirokogoroff’s Psychomental complex as a context for analysing shamanic mediations in medicine and law (Tuva, Siberia)”. International Journal for Shamanistic Research (SHAMAN) 21, 81–102.

Zorbas, K. (2015) “The origins and reinvention of shamanic retaliation in a Siberian city (Tuva Republic, Russia)”. Journal of Anthropological Research 71, 401–422.
https://doi.org/10.3998/jar.0521004.0071.304

Back to Issue