Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy by Mircea Eliade; Willard R. TraskReview by: Willard Z. ParkAmerican Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 67, No. 5, Part 1 (Oct., 1965), pp. 1305-1306Published by: Wiley on behalf of the American Anthropological AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/668389 .

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Book Reviews 1305

nected with the important life events, the language spoken, dress, educational and economic level.

All of these data are rather short and disconnected which points to the need for more comprehensive field work on various aspects of the culture of these communities.

The third part, "Social Organization," includes chapters on the "Elements of Caste in Muslim Communities," "Jama'tbandi or Caste Organization," "Marriage and Family," and "Social Change in Recent Years." In the first chapter the author lays down the three basic premises underlying the Hindu caste system and, describing the hierarchical order in Muslim communities, discusses the similarities and differences between the two sys- tems; he also stresses the distinction of caste as it exists among the Hindu and the Muslims.

This point is well supported by other studies in West Pakistan. In "Marriage and Family," similarities between the Hindu and Muslim systems are

shown in the role of marriage being an alliance between the families and in the endog- amous pattern of marrying within one's own community, or caste. However, there is an important difference, for, while cousin marriages are allowed and preferred among Muslims, they do not exist among the Hindus. Besides, with some exceptions, there is a flexibility among certain Muslim communities regarding marriages outside one's own group. Muslim family organization is similar to the Hindu patrilineal and patrilocal system. Also, some customs connected with marriage and widow re-marriage as ob- served by the Muslins show Hindu influence.

In "Social Change in Recent Years," the author discusses the trend toward Islamiza- tion which is manifested in the discontinuance of customs considered as Hindu, in the simplification of celebrations of family events, in the adoption, to a greater extent, of a Muslim style of dress. The passage of the Shariat Act of inheritance in 1937, which clashed with the customary law of succession and presented problems for the land owning class is discussed with all its implications. This period of change has been marked by great social mobility and rise of individuals and whole Muslin communities on the basis of higher education, wealth, and political power. The trend toward west- ernization is shown in the adoption of values and culture traits considered western.

After having read this book, one cannot help but think: Is Islam as rigid a faith as it is often thought of? Islam in India as represented by the various Muslim communi- ties described has shown great flexibility and receptivity to the ideas and practices of an old traditional system which was so foreign to their faith. The very repudiation by these communities of the Shariat Law of inheritance which is a part of their religion and their strong adherence to the customary law of succession which is Hindu proves how deeply they have absorbed the Hindu practices and how well these customs have integrated into their whole social system.

This study provides much data which cannot be given proper treatment in a work of this size. However, one appreciates the importance of the insight which an indige- nous scholar can and has been able to bring into this study.

Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy. MIRCEA ELIADE. Translated from the French by WILLARD R. TRASK. (Bollingen Series LXXVI.) New York: Pantheon Books, 1964. xxiii, 610 pp., index, list of works cited. $6.00.

Reviewed by WILLARD Z. PARK, University of Nevada The present volume attempts "to cover the entire phenomenon of shamanism and

at the same time to situate it in the general history of religion" (p. xi). Eliade

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1306 American Anthropologist [67, 1965]

achieves his first objective. With great skill and learning he summarizes shamanism the world over, under the categories of sources of power, initiatory sickness and dreams, initiation of the shaman, symbolism, cures, and relation to cosmology. The culture historian, the ethnologist, and the student of religion will find here an encyclo- pedic survey including a wealth of material drawn from original ethnographic and historical sources. Eliade's scholarship is weak on only one point, in an area where ethnologists, psychologists, and sociologists, have often shown strength: the evaluation of the sources.

That the author appears to be less successful in situating shamanism "in the gener- al history of religion" may be due to the reviewer's failure to grasp his theoretical or conceptual framework. Eliade's "history of religion" is clearly not the sequence of change and development to be found in documentary history, nor is it the culture his- tory reconstructed by the ethnologist from distributional data. It is a very special con- cept of "history" involving the cultural elements and socialized behavior common to shamanism everywhere; apparently Eliade feels that the function of history is to inte- grate the results of ethnology, psychology, and sociology. The extent of the failure of this ambitious undertaking is largely due to the fact that the ethnological, psychologi- cal, and sociological studies in this vast array are simply not comparable. Despite the book's subtitle, the sociologist and particularly the psychologist probably will not find here the kind of material that would be most useful to an analysis of social and indi- vidual behavior. The weakness lies not with the author's assemblage, but with the lack of data in the original sources that would throw light on the psychological manifesta- tions of shamanism.

According to Eliade, "shamanism . . is not always and necessarily an aberrant and sinister mysticism" (p. 420). However, it does everywhere involve, according to the usually accepted definitions of shamanism, what Eliade calls "archaic techniques of ec- stacy," or more familiarly, possession, trance, or other forms of visionary experience with spirits of various kinds.

The work was first published in 1951, as Le Chamanisme et les techniques archai- ques de l'extase. A cursory comparison indicates that the English translation also incor- porates a substantial amount of additional material. A few awkward expressions, some- what alien to American English, have crept in, but do not detract seriously from read- ability. However, one cannot help but speculate on the effects of first translating into French much of the source material from German, Russian, Spanish, and other lan- guages, and then from French into English.

Professor Eliade needs no commendation among his colleagues in the history of re- ligion. The Bollingen Foundation is to be congratulated for presenting, in a handsome- ly designed and attractive book, such a valuable contribution to the literature on reli- gion and one so unusually oriented toward the anthropological materials.

The World of the Witches. JULIo CARO BAROJA. (Translated from the Spanish by

O. N. V. Glendinning.) Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1964. (Spanish Edition, 1961.) xiv, 313 pp., 7 figures, 18 illustrations, index, notes on references cited.

Reviewed by D. E. WALKER, JR., Washington State University Monica Wilson expressed a desire held by many anthropologists when she said, "I

long to read an analysis of this problem (the interrelationships between European

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