The Evolution of Chinese Shamanism: A Case Study from Northwest China
Religions December 4, 2018 Peer reviewed DOI: 10.3390/rel9120397 via DOAJ
Summary
Among the Tu ethnic group in Qinghai Province, Northwest China, shamanic religious practices have shifted: private healing rituals have become less frequent, while collective rainfall rituals led by shamans have grown more important. The changes are driven by a mix of techno-economic, sociopolitical, and ideational factors external to the religious system. The analysis adapts Historical Materialism and Cultural Materialism to contemporary Chinese realities, emphasizing that economic transformations, along with socio-political and ideological forces, shape religious change.
Study at a glance
| Design | theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Population | Tu ethnic group of Qinghai Province, Northwest China |
| Key finding | Changes in Tu shamanism—a decrease in private healing rituals and an increase in collective rainfall rituals—are caused by a cluster of techno-economic, sociopolitical, and ideational factors exogenous to the religious system. |
Abstract
This paper presents information on the shamanic religious system practiced among the Tu ethnic group of Qinghai Province in Northwest China. After presenting ethnographic information on the spirit beliefs, rituals, and shamanic specialists of the Tu, the paper will use a systemic definition of religion to (1) identify changes that have occurred in the focus of Tu shamanism and the role of the shaman, and (2) identify a cluster of causal factors—techno-economic, sociopolitical, and ideational—exogenous to the religious system itself that appear to have played a role in generating these changes. The paper will focus on two specific changes: (1) a decrease in the frequency of private shamanic healing rituals, and (2) a corresponding increase in the importance of shamanic leadership in collective rainfall rituals that affect the entire community. The explanatory paradigm utilized is a modified adaptation to contemporary Chinese reality of the Historical Materialist paradigm pioneered by Marx and Engels and the Cultural Materialist paradigm developed by Marvin Harris. While continuing to emphasize the causal power of technological and economic factors, the Chinese experience, both at the macro level of transformations of the Chinese economy and at the micro level of Tu shamanism, forces analytic attention on the causal impact of socio-political and ideological variables.