Modern shamanism in Vietnam

william turley wturley at siu.edu

Thu Mar 29 13:21:58 PDT 2007

Can anyone supply me with a citation or two on modern shamanism in

Vietnam? Thanks.

Bill Turley

Oscar Salemink OJHM.Salemink at fsw.vu.nl

Thu Mar 29 14:35:55 PDT 2007

Dear Bill,

If you are satisfied with spirit mediumship as well, you might want to take a look at Karen Fjelstad and Nguyen Thi Hien (eds), Possessed by the Spirits: Mediumship in contemporary Vietnamese communities. Ithaca NY: Cornell SEAP.

Oscar Salemink

Chung Nguyen Chung.Nguyen at umb.edu

Thu Mar 29 22:24:19 PDT 2007

I don't know whether the following phenomenon is of any interest to Bill, but it has moved "shamanism", or some semblance of it, to the area of scientific study and, let me say this with some "trepidation" here, apparently with some elements of scientific proof, with enormous impact in Vietnam at the moment. I refer to the phenomenon of "cac nha` ngoa.i ca?m" (psychic locators), currently under the investigation of two agencies in VN - Trung Tam Nghien Cuu Tiem Nang Con Nguoi (Center for the Study of Human Potentiality) and Bo Mon Can Tam Ly (Study of Parapsychology (?)).

This initially refers to the search for Vietnamese MIA's bones all over Vietnam, later expanding to the bones of any lost family members, the retrieval of information from 7-centuries old stupas, etc. - all successfully with the assistance of these "psychic locators."

This phenomenon has achieved a sort of high credibility after the reports written by General Tran Do and Deputy Prime Minister Tran Phuong. Being thorough Marxist, they began the search with great skepticism, but were both converted after the success of the search.

According to these two agencies, the success rate is 70%.

Below is a piece on the work of one of these psychic locators - Phan Thi Bich Hang. At the end are several audio reports from the annual conference organized by these two agencies in 2006. Mr. Tran Phuong Deputy Prime

recounted his own experiences earlier.

http://phattuvn.org/index.php?nv=News&at=article&sid=1658 <http://phattuvn.org/index.php?nv=News&at=article&sid=1658>

[Unfortunately, it's all in Vietnamese.]

If someone tells me about this, I would find it hard to believe. But based upon the data present here, I think it'd be hard to dismiss it out of hand. I wonder if any VSGer would like to comment on this.

Nguyen Ba Chung

pascal bourdeaux pascalbourdeaux at yahoo.fr

Thu Mar 29 21:26:07 PDT 2007

Dear Bill,

you should contact Christian Culas who published a book last year on ''Le messianisme Hmong'', ed. du CNRS.

Pascal Bourdeaux

Maxner, Steve steve.maxner at ttu.edu

Fri Mar 30 07:00:03 PDT 2007

Bill:

The following document in the Virtual Vietnam Archive contains a number of citations for Shamanism in Vietnam.

Item Number: 2410102025

Visit http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/virtualarchive/redirects/vva.htm and enter that item number as a keyword.

Interestingly, it cites The Proceedings of the International Conference on Shamanism held in San Rafael, California, in May 1984. Curiosity got the better of me and I found the listing below my signature in World Cat (there is more in World Cat that I did not include).

Also, you can find additional information on "shaman" and "shamanism" in our Virtual Archive by using those as keywords for individual searches (91 and 11 documents, respectively).

I hope this helps.

Steve

Stephen Maxner, Ph.D.

Deputy Director

The Vietnam Center

Database: WorldCat

Query: ti: proceedings and ti: international and ti: conference and ti:

shamanism

1 Proceedings of the ... International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and Alternate Modes of Healing.

Meeting Name: International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and Alternate Modes of Healing. Publication:

Berkeley, CA. :

Independent Scholars of Asia, 1984- Document:

English : Serial

Publication : Annual Libraries Worldwide: 2

2 Proceedings of the International Conference on Shamanism :

at the St. Sabina Center, San Rafael, California, May

11-13, 1984 /

Author: Heinze, Ruth-Inge. Meeting Name:

International Conference on Shamanism (1984 : San Rafael,

Calif.)Publication: [Berkeley, Calif.] : Independent

Scholars of Asia,

1984 Document: English : Book Libraries Worldwide:

9

3 [Proceedings of the Second International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism at the St. Sabina Center, San Rafael,

California, August

31-September 2, 1985 /

Author: Heinze, Ruth-Inge.; Millay, Jean. Meeting

Name: International Conference on the Study of Shamanism

(2nd : 1985 :

San Rafael, Calif.) Publication: Mill Valley, Calif. :

Sound

Photosynthesis, 1985 Document: English : Sound

Recording :

Non-music : Lectures, speeches : Cassette tape

4 Proceedings of the Second International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism :

at the St. Sabina Center, San Rafael, California, August

31-September 2, 1985 /

Author: Heinze, Ruth-Inge. Meeting Name:

International Conference on the Study of Shamanism (2nd :

1985 : San

Rafael, Calif.)Publication: [Berkeley, Calif.] :

Independent Scholars

of Asia, 1985 Document: English : Book Libraries

Worldwide: 17

5 [Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and Alternate Modes of Healing held at the St.

Sabina Center,

San Rafael, California, September 5-7, 1987 /

Author: Heinze, Ruth-Inge.; Lyon, William S.

Meeting Name: International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and

Alternate Modes of Healing (4th : 1987 : San Rafael,

Calif.)

Publication: Mill Valley, Calif. : Sound Photosynthesis,

1987

Document: English : Sound Recording : Non-music :

Lectures,

speeches : Cassette tape

6 [Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and Alternate Modes of Healing held at the St.

Sabina Center,

San Rafael, California, September 5-7, 1987 /

Author: Heinze, Ruth-Inge.; O'Connell, Carol., and

others Meeting Name: International Conference on the

Study of Shamanism

and Alternate Modes of Healing (4th : 1987 : San Rafael,

Calif.)

Publication: Mill Valley, Calif. : Sound Photosynthesis,

1987

Document: English : Sound Recording : Non-music :

Lectures,

speeches : Cassette tape

7 [Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and Alternate Modes of Healing held at the St.

Sabina Center,

San Rafael, California, September 5-7, 1987 /

Author: Heinze, Ruth-Inge.; Johnson, Willard.

Meeting Name: International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and

Alternate Modes of Healing (4th : 1987 : San Rafael,

Calif.)

Publication: Mill Valley, Calif. : Sound Photosynthesis,

1987

Document: English : Sound Recording : Non-music :

Lectures,

speeches : Cassette tape

8 [Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and Alternate Modes of Healing held at the St.

Sabina Center,

San Rafael, California, September 5-7, 1987 /

Author: Heinze, Ruth-Inge.; Cardeсa, Etzel.

Meeting Name: International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and

Alternate Modes of Healing (4th : 1987 : San Rafael,

Calif.)

Publication: Mill Valley, Calif. : Sound Photosynthesis,

1987

Document: English : Sound Recording : Non-music :

Lectures,

speeches : Cassette tape

9 Proceedings of the Third International Conference on the Study of

Shamanism and Alternate Modes of Healing :

held at the St. Sabina Center, San Rafael, California,

August 30 to September 1, 1986 /

Author: Heinze, Ruth-Inge. Meeting Name:

International Conference on the Study of Shamanism and

Alternate Modes

of Healing (3rd : 1986 : San Rafael, Calif.)Publication:

Berkeley :

Independent Scholars of Asia, 1987 Document: English

: Book

Libraries Worldwide: 8

10 Study of shamanism and alternate modes of healing :

4th International conference : Papers.

Publication: Independant Scholars of Asia, 1988

Document: English : Book

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