If ethnography across East Asia has tended to stress local differences at the expense of regional continuities, it is not surprising. Fieldwork as a methodology directs attention to very profound local differences which can exist in the midst of apparent similarity. In this respect it is interesting to consider two recent books about *shamanism in East Asia, by M.Wolf (1992) and L.Kendall (1988), which share very similar concerns. Each is an account of one woman’s life history and of her participation in local religion, but also a consideration of *gender, ethnographic methods, and of the way in which ‘tales’ of certain incidents are constructed. Kendall relates the story of ‘Yongsu’s mother’, a successful Korean shaman, while Wolf relates the story of Mrs Tan, a Taiwanese woman who seemed on the verge of becoming a shaman. Many of the folk religious practices in the communities of the two women seem rather similar, including the worship of Buddhist gods, the concerns which are addressed to shamans, the ways in which shamans establish credibility, the significance of gods and ancestors in accounts of misfortune, etc. Several direct Chinese influences are woven into Kendall’s account from Korea: the impact of Confucian ideals, the use of classical Chinese in household divination manuals, and the consumption of Chinese herbal tonics against illness.
But for all the similarities between the backgrounds to the accounts, there is one fundamental difference.
Most Korean mansin (shamans) are women, and even the men who perform this role dress as women to do so. By contrast, although it is possible for Taiwanese women to become tang-ki (shamans), it is generally considered inappropriate, and the role is usually reserved for men. This means that while Kendall is writing about Tonga’s mother becoming a shaman, and the impact of this upon her life, Wolf is instead writing about Mrs Tan not becoming a shaman, and speculating on the reasons for her failure to do so. Although from a regional perspective we might say that the cultural context of these two life-stories is similar, in practice, the impact of local religious beliefs on the fate of the two women could not have been more different. Because anthropologists generally develop their understandings through close interaction with local informants, local understandings are likely to overshadow attempts at regional generalization. It is these local understandings which impinge most directly upon the people with whom anthropologists live and work.
Far from wanting to consider East Asia as an ethnographically continuous entity, anthropologists have increasingly become interested not only in local variations of the dominant cultures, but also in the position of smaller cultural groups within the region. Shepherd is one writer who has found a position somewhat between the regional and the local, in his ‘anthropological history’ of Taiwan (1993). He relates the history of the interaction between various colonial regimes, the Chinese state, Han Chinese settlers, and the Malayo-Polynesian aborigines of Taiwan. In so doing, he takes account not only of the specific cultural traditions of the island, but also of the political implications, within the Chinese sphere of influence, of cultural difference.
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