HOS 55: Nepalese Shaman Oral Texts released

[Michael Witzel]

 I am pleased to announce the recent relase, on Dec. 24, 1998, of volume
55 of the HARVARD ORIENTAL SERIES (edited by Michael Witzel since 1993)


                        NEPALESE SHAMAN ORAL TEXTS

                        <edited and translated by>

                        Gregory  G. Maskarinec

                Cambridge, Mass. and London, England 1998

ISBN 0-674-60795-3

pp. xii, (Nepalese text) N 1-391, (Engl. transl.) 1-391; pp. 392-695
(commentary, indexes) = total pp. xii, 1085.

price: $ 90


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DESCRIPTION OF CONTENTS

Nepalese Shaman Oral Texts is a bilingual (Nepali and English) critical
edition of three complete, representative repertoires of shaman texts
collected over the past twenty years in Jajarkot District, Western Nepal.

Throughout that area, shamans continue to fulfill important therapeutic
roles, diagnosing problems, treating afflictions, and restoring order and
balance to the lives of their clients and their communities.  Each of
these efforts incorporates extensive, meticulously memorized oral texts,
materials that not only clarify symptoms and causes but also detail the
proper ways to conduct rituals.  These texts preserve the knowledge
necessary to act as a shaman, and confirm a social world that demands
continued intervention by shamans.

This volume, the first of its kind, includes both publicly chanted
recitals and privately whispered spells of the area's three leading
shamans, annotated with extensive notes. Containing over 250 texts totally
nearly 11,000 lines of material, this work endeavors to provide a
comprehensive documentation of a non-Western healing system through the
material that sustains and preserves that tradition, demonstrating that
shaman texts remain thoroughly meaningful.


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For information write to Editor, Harvard Oriental Series,
Department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies,
2 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge  MA 02138, USA
617-495 3295; email: witzel at fas.harvard.edu

 and cf.:  www.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/mwpage.htm     sub: HOS.

 The book can be ordered directly from Harvard Univ. Press.; see:
 http://128.103.251.49/default.html
 or email to :  cal at hup.harvard.edu


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Michael Witzel                       witzel at fas.harvard.edu
                                     www.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/mwpage.htm

phone: 1- 617 - 495 3295 (voice & messages), 496 8570, fax 617 - 496 8571
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my direct line (also for messages) :  617- 496 2990