简介：
Sarah Milledge Nelson’s bold thesis is that the development of states in East Asia—China, Japan, Korea—was an outgrowth of the leadership in smaller communities guided by shamans. Using a mixture of historical documents, mythology, archaeological data, and ethnographic studies of contemporary shamans, she builds a case for shamans being the driving force behind the blossoming of complex societies. More interesting, shamans in East Asia are generally women, who used their access to the spirit world to take leadership roles. This work challenges traditional interpretations growth of Asian states, which is overlaid with later Confucian notions of gender roles. Written at a level accessible for undergraduates, this concise work will be fascinating reading for those interested in East Asian archaeology, politics, and society; in gender roles, and in shamanism.
书评：
"In this book Sarah Milledge Nelson suggests that shamanism was a significant building block for state formation in East Asia, and that women, who often had the shamanistic access to the spirit world, played an important role in this process. She shows how this would have been the case, by systematically going through archaeological, historical and ethnographic records of various regions of East Asia and surrounding areas, from Palaeolithic through early historic times, unravelling and rewinding various strands of mythological, ideological, documentary, and simply anthropological. Very convincingly, [Nelson] demonstrates the fun and value of an alternative approach to East Asian archaeology."
—Fumiko Ikawa-Smith, McGill University
目录：
Preface
1. Orientation
2. Legends, Landscapes, and Skyscrapes
3. What is a Shaman?
4. Power, Leadership, and Gender
5. Shamanism in the East Asian Neolithic
6. Shamanism in Early Chinese States
7. Shamanism in Korea, Japan, and Taiwan
8. Rewinding the Strands
References
Index
About the Author
作者简介：
Sarah Milledge Nelson is John Evans Professor of Archaeology at the University of Denver. She is a specialist in cultural development, the origins of agriculture, and gender in the ancient world. Recent books include The Archaeology of Korea (1993), The Archaeology of Northeast China (ed.)(1995), Handbook of Gender and Archaeology (2005), and two editions of the textbook Gender in Archaeology (1997/2004), which won the Choice Outstanding Academic Book Award.
ISBN:9781598741322
书名:Shamanism and the Origins of States: Spirit, Power, and Gender in East Asia
副书名:Spirit, Power, and Gender in East Asia
作者:Nelson, Sarah Milledge
装帧:Hardback
出版社:Left Coast Press Inc
页数:304
出版日期:7/15/2008
更多：
http://www.lcoastpress.com/book.php?id=136