book chapter
Navaho treatment of sickness: diagnosticians
American anthropologist, n.s. • 33 • Published In 1931 • Pages: 390-402
By: Morgan, William.
Abstract
This is a detailed account of Navajo diagnosis and treatment of disease by diagnosticians. It covers hand-tremblers, stargazers, and listeners: their theories of diseases, their methods of prediction, their rituals, sacred objects and therapeutic efforts at curing. The author also touches on other functions of diagnosticians: advice about unusual incidents, provisions for warding off dangers, help in the recovery of lost possessions, and oneiromancy. In discussing the latter, he stresses the importance of dreams as factors in everyday life of the Navajos. The author is an anthropologist who gathered the material personally on the Reservation. Capital letters in the text denote Navajo informants. Small letters denote Euro-American informants. Since Morgan is primarily interested in a study of individuals, he has inserted informants in order to prevent his statements from sounding like tribal generalizations.
- HRAF PubDate
- 2004
- Region
- North America
- Sub Region
- Southwest and Basin
- Document Type
- book chapter
- Evaluation
- Creator Type
- Ethnologist
- Document Rating
- 5: Excellent Primary Data
- Analyst
- Katchen S. Coley ; 1951
- Field Date
- no date
- Coverage Date
- not specified
- Coverage Place
- Navajo Reservation, Arizona, New Mexico, United States
- Notes
- William Morgan
- This document consists of excerpts
- LCCN
- 1715424
- LCSH
- Navajo Indians