Shamanism and Armed Conflict – a Case Study of the Interface between Religion and War in Aboriginal South America

Authors

  • Jan-Åke ALVARSSON Uppsala University (Sweden)

Keywords:

shamanism, armed conflict, Amerindians, Gran Chaco, shamanic leadership, divination

Abstract

The main task of the Amerindian shaman has always been the restoration of cosmological harmony, whether it has been on an individual level, like in healing, or on a collective level, like when a village has been affected by an epidemic or any other type of plague. This article wants to bring an aspect to the fore that often has been ignored, the performance of the shaman in cases of armed conflicts. The ethnographic case used here is from the ‗Weenhayek, a group of foragers in the Gran Chaco. Among these, a shaman played an important role in the setting up of a strategy and deciding time and space for the warriors to attack. To understand this combination of two phenomena, that have often been divided into two compartments by scholars, shamanism and war, we suggest a holistic view of Amerindian society, of shamanism, war and society in general.

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Published

2010-12-13