An argument is made for the unthreading of two separate, if commonly intertwined, elements of spirit possession prac tices. The term "trance-possession" is frequently employed to designate either of these concepts, implying that trance and possession are essentially synonymous in nature. Yet the psychophysiologically altered states of consciousness known as trance constitute something...
NEXT ARTICLEAbstracts & Reviews : The Evolving Self: A Psychology for the Third Millenium by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. 1993. New York: Harper Collins. Cloth: $33.50, ISBN 0-06-0166770-0, xviii+358 pages. In Over Our Heads: The Mental Demands of Modern Life. by Robert Kegan. 1994. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Cloth: $29.95, ISBN 0-674-44587-2, vii+396 pages, figures and tables
This section opens with a tentative classification made by P. M. YAP of atypical culture-bound reactive syndromes and of atypical and typical syndromes of "reactive psychosis." The second paper, by G. DEVEREUX, deals with hypnosis and suggestion in primitive societies and suggests some differences between primitive and industrialized societies in that respect. This is followed by a brief...
O. RIOS and M. DOBKIN, a Peruvian psychiatrist and an American anthro pologist ( a) review the literature on ayahuasca, a South American plant con taining Harmine, ( b) summarize earlier studies regarding its pharmacological and psychological effects, and ( c) describe its use in folk healing in Peru.