Healing process in Ceremony and in Ghãtu (original) (raw)
Related papers
Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony: Tayo's Healing Quest
International Journal of Language and Literary Studies, 2022
Leslie Marmon Silko is one of the most prodigious Native American writers of the 1970s. She is distinguished for her engagement with folklore traditions, religious inspirations, and quest narratives. In her novel Ceremony (1977), Silko introduces a man on a journey that is full of hardships and frustrations. Accordingly, the present paper explores Tayo's journey, through which he quests to heal his psychological distress and physical illness caused by the atrocities of World War II. The paper also investigates the different kinds of journeys the protagonist, as a war veteran, takes up and the various motives behind them. Finally, the paper tries to answer questions such as "What is the significance of the people the protagonist meets during his healing quest? Is he healed physically and psychologically at the end of the novel? How? Why? How do all healing processes contribute to affirming his identity and restoring his humanity?"
MISSIONS FOR AWAKENING: HEALING CEREMONY AND STORYTELLING
Studiul de faţă se concentrează în jurul protagonistului Tayo al romanului american Ceremony, personaj principal, care, aparţinând culturii Pueblo, va trece printr-un proces al recuperării spirituale sub forma unui ceremonial de restabi-lire a relaţiei cu natura şi spiritul acesteia. Aşa cum se va demonstra în acest studiu, scriitoarea americană Leslie Mar-mon Silko în romanul său depăşeşte însă sfera limitată a existenţei umane intrând în cadrul mai amplu al problematicii culturale, unde ceremonialul prin care trece Tayo oferă conştientizarea necesităţii naraţiunii prin legătura cu natura în cadrul culturii căreia îi aparţine, autoarea punând astfel accentul pe importanţa valorilor culturale ale băştinaşilor ameri-cani, pierdute şi, în acelaşi timp, recuperate prin prisma narării propriei istorii culturale. Introduction Silko's Ceremony is about Tayo, a half-breed Laguna veteran of World War II, who leaves hospital and returns to his aunt and her family. Before he joins the war, he has been treated as an outsider and a half-breed. Having lost his uncle and cousin in the war, Tayo loses balance and unity between his personality and his native land. Tayo's illness worsens including chronic nausea and vomiting, hallucinations, and weeping. Finally Tayo starts on an intense journey of inner healing and reconnection with his painful but rich past. As a part of the healing ceremony that begins before his birth according to his native traditions and his spiritual illness caused by the war, Tayo must close the gap between the " isolate human beings and lonely landscape. " This gap is brought about through old witchery that has led not only to Tayo's illness but also to a drought-plagued land. Witchery has set a loveless, fearful, mechanistic force loose in the world: war. It signifies an ideal for bravery and glory. However, the attempt to find peace through war is the central paradox placed in the novel. Therefore, a ceremony is required, for Tayo, to escape from the effects of witchery that bring violence. Silko introduces the importance of storytelling with the healing aspect of ceremony. The aim of this article is to show how Tayo's ceremony-spiritual awakening-becomes his own story that gives the message that as a member of Native American society, Tayo learns to possess the power to keep the culture and people alive through stories. It further explores the issues of losing sense of belongingness and death to point out that for Native American people, cultural identity depends on keeping the stories alive. My focus will be on the process of healing during which Tayo finds peace through nature, animals, colors and a supernatural character named T'seh. From a closer perspective, I will examine Tayo's story as ceremony in the native Ameri-can storytelling tradition as a means of leading a lost individual towards the right path he seeks for. Moreover, exploring the interaction between Tayo and nature (represented by the regenerative spirit, Ts'eh) as a ceremony that contributes greatly to Tayo's healing and survival in his culture, the ceremony thus becomes a spiritual understanding of the world. In order to gain psychological wholeness, Tayo needs to struggle in this mystic journey during which he meets and interacts different characters. Some characters created by Silko are all parts of nature, which represent the notion that love is needed to reach a spiritual balance, e.g. T'seh and Night Swan who through their love lead Tayo into finding his interior awakening. Some others are associated with evil and witchcraft, such as Rocky, Emo and Leroy who lead him into witchery.
2019
The article deals with the representation of post-traumatic stress disorder in Leslie Marmon Silko's novel Ceremony (1977), and with the complex psychological and cultural procedures of identity reconstruction its protagonist, half-blood Tayo, must follow in order to find some sort of inner balancing. Tayo's traumatic experience of war seems to schizophrenically split his identity, turning his "real" self into a Lacanian absence (the symptom of the "Real"), a void that denounces the source of the trauma (not the war in itself, which is mainly a metaphorical projection of Tayo's inner conflict, but his being neither Indian nor white) by erasing it from Tayo's consciousness and substituting it with a mythical plot that constructs him as a scapegoat-like figure responsible for the drought afflicting the Reservation. Both the novel and its main character at the end manage to reach some sort of coherence by accepting the unrepresentable Real and turnin...
Global Journal of Human-Social Science Research, 2015
World War II has brought many ethnic groups together through migrations inherent in the said war. This is the case of white Mexicans and Indians who have formed a hybrid American society. Has this creation been desired for better results? This article highlights the profitability of the cultural differences between the two peoples in the novel Ceremony (1977) by Marmon Silko. The emphasis is on the use of a bastard to confirm his identity and the Indian contribution to the national culture of the United States. The failure of American and Vietnamese medicine has led to the promotion of traditional Indian methods and the empowerment of Indian subjects.
An Anthropological Study of Healing Customs in Torkāmān Culture
IN this study we investigated the study of native healing customs among Torkāmān people in Golestan province, northeast of Iran. Traditional medical practice and native therapist have a special importance in believes of these people. Among Torkāmān that have more beliefs in Ŝāmān custom, remedy customs are those beliefs which were before the age of Islam and after Islam have mixed with Islamic manners. Usage of healing methods and techniques for medical treatment of those patients are not in a good and suitable sensitive conditions or those patient who have pain in different parts of their bodies, massagers that have magical characteristic. Ŝāmān custom which is an old custom of Torkāmān people, have a root in religious beliefs in these people. Torkāmān in their customs do some of Ŝāmān customs. Various saying mention, treatment, remedy methods are those kinds. The aim of writing such research is to study the ethical aspect of therapists and patient in view of anthropology. This article tries to investigate different parts of ceremony and the rate of their tendency against these healing customs. Also another part of this research contains the study of patient's manner and feelings in the rage of treatment and their tendency in Ŝāmān's treatment. The non-pathological role of Ŝāmān and also their social centers in this research will investigate. This research also attempts to study the range of patients' tendency against Ŝāmān s. Introduction and Statement of the Problem This essay investigate the healing custom in Torkāmān culture. Iranian Torkāmān are living in Golestan, in the north of Iran and also in north of khorasan province. Torkāmān in Golestan province are resident in four cities.;gonbad kavoos,Bandar Torkāmān, Aq-Qola, Kalaleh and a little in gorgan. This research has been studied about Torkāmāns in this province and kalaleh. In this article, we study about native therapists and their ways and methods of treatment and the range of their tendency and Torkāmān beliefs about therapists and their characteristic and their social position among people. This research wants to investigate the concept of healing in traditional view among Torkāmān people. How much the range of tendency and dependency of patient to the native therapists is effective for their health? Which group of patients seek for treatment by Ŝāmān s(native therapists) and in which school of though those beliefs have rooted. These are the basic issues in this research. Treatment techniques without medicine have a special importance in different parts of Iran. One of the key issue in recognizing Iranian culture is the issue and concept of holy healing. Investigating the aspects of holy healing in the form of Ŝāmān customs is related to these important events of Iranian medical groups. This form of holy healing is visible in treatment custom. Porkhan as a therapist has a super natural power and by using the ways such as ecstasy, to pray, to croon and making relationship with over natural world, tries to control the hidden creature which causes his pain. Treatment is in the greatest grade of psychic patient treatment which is done by therapist(Ŝāmān).(azadegan,1385:120) Another native therapists in Torkāmān society we can point out to "holy family". This therapists group appoint their descendants to "orthodox caliphs". In addition , they have healer characteristic, they also solve the problems and quarrels between Torkāmān groups as a dean. The way of these groups' treatment is different for others native Torkāmān therapists. Resort to divine words, ask help from Quran and writing benediction, touching the forehead and head of patient, in beliefs of people the hands of holy family have a extraordinary power. Reading the mention of God or to do it, is a key point in treatment of patient in Torkāmān culture. this way of treatment is observed in treatment and also in holy family remedy. mention of God by every aim and purpose have a different usage at the end, and this tense of ecstasy in mention custom is as a basic process of treatment. In various customs the holy healing of ecstasy is accounted as an important base of treatment in patient and therapists minds. As an example in treatment ceremony by therapists and in holy healing custom in holy shrine places of Hanifeh Loshan, a city in north of Iran, gilan province, the ecstasy by patient in order to remove secretarial powers.gene,and evils power which captured the patients is as a very important point treatment.(malekrah:2006) The usage and role of mention customs in treating patients is as one of the basic issues in this research which express the role of ecstasy and mention in patients treatment. Mention of god by saying or doing it, play an important role in healing customs. Basic concept of the research: Due to the importance of mention custom in treating psychic patients customs which have a Ŝāmān records. We explain Anther logy point of view in this field.:
AWEJ for Translation & Literary Studies, 2022
This paper examines the decolonizing methods used by Leslie Marmon Silko in her novel Ceremony (1977) to heal the indigenous people from the patriarchal traditions of the white hegemony. This study aims to emphasize the vulnerable responses of the Pueblo people to the memories of the clan and to highlight Silko's methods to sustain the history and lifestyle of the indigenous people. Therefore, Silko's novel can be situated historically and culturally within memory-studies. To analyze the contrasting behaviors of characters, this paper projects the relationship between the collective patriarchal doctrines and that of the individual within the framework of memory studies. Theories of Jan and Aleida Assmann are used here to explore the chronicle struggle of the indigenous people and to maintain the memory and tradition of the clan. Memory studies can best describe this novel since Silko believes there is a systematic shift in dislocating the memories of the place. This cultural displacement, the Pueblo people are specifically facing, happens when the young people lose their memories of the tribe and forget their traditions. The memory-studies then establish an intersection not only between the collective and the individual but also between the white hegemony and the Indigenous culture. The paper concludes that memories of the clan can be regained through specific forms of ceremonies, narratives, or any institutional formation. Therefore, Silko's novel has entertained the possibility of cultural and historical communication-within memory studies-that may succeed in stimulating the attention of the young generation.
From Muscat to Sarhadd: Remarks on gwātī Healing Ritual within the Social Context
2015
This paper focuses on the gwātī healing ritual practiced in the Sarhadd region of Iranian Baluchistan. Though the gwātī ritual is widespread all over Baluchistan (both in Iranian and Pakistani sides) and its central pattern is relatively common in different locations, however the homegrown varieties of the ritual are quite interesting from the anthropological perspective. The data for this article has been collected in the Sarhadd region of Iranian Baluchistan during the ethnographic fieldwork in 2012.
Storytelling and Representation in Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony
2015
Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony (1986) is a literary masterpiece that tells the story of Tayo, a biracial Native American soldier who suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder after his service in World War II. He recovers from a history of alcoholism and violence after participating in a healing ceremony with a storytelling shaman. Informed by Native American mythology, Ceremony is riveting in the gentle revelations of its slowly unfolding plot as well as in the unusual constructions of its literary style. Vividly written with minute observations of both social processes and natural phenomena, Ceremony can be viewed as an ethnographic intervention against a Eurocentric discursive formation that stereotypes Native Americans. Silko's novel provides a detailed, in-depth counter-narrative that contends that Native Americans can challenge the destructive Eurocentric worldview with a return to the healing consciousness of the embodied storytelling of Native traditions. Ultimately, Silko's writing can be seen as a method of inquiry that yields representations whose transformative power renews faith in the healing power of nature. The paper argues that Ceremony's enthnographic genius lies not only in its fictional thick description of Tayo's healing ritual, but in its clever deployment of a representational politics that render the novel into a healing ritual by means of its very form.