This book covers a range of the medical, holistic and religious aspects of healing and of death. The contributors broaden the field of medical anthropology by demonstrating that healing involves the senses in treatment whose efficacy depends in part on dramatic performances. Curing is not just about making people well - it also forms a crucial means of reproducing relations of power. A performance directed toward a particular individual might also heal a traumatized social group, expanding the definition of cure from its narrower sense of restoring a victim to health to the larger goal of...

In this widely-praised study, Carol Laderman provides a vivid picture of the daily life of rural Malays as she focuses on their dietary practices and the ritual and medical aspects of childbirth procedures. Apprenticed to a village midwife and a local shaman, she was able to observe a traditional culture adapting to modern practices.

Charged with restoring harmony and relieving pain, the Malay shaman places his patients in trance and encourages them to express their talents, drives, personality traits--the "Inner Winds" of Malay medical lore--in a kind of performance. These healing ceremonies, formerly viewed by Western anthropologists as exotic curiosities, actually reveal complex multicultural origins and a unique indigenous medical tradition whose psychological content is remarkably relevant to contemporary Western concerns.

Accepted as apprentice to a Malay shaman, Carol Laderman learned and recorded every aspect...