ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses shamanism as the political, historical, and ideological context that is catalytic to the major image that is attributed to shamans, giving rise to the light' or dark' aspects of that image. It is a transcendent figure, emerging from a broad background of magico-religious ideas because of his or her powers to travel to the spirit worlds and to be an instrument of revelation and transformation as a result of this hodological ability. Extreme cases of dark shamans are found in the ethnographic literature of Amazonia. The chapter explains shamanic practices, which devoted largely to healing in the Temiar of Malaysia. Healing practices of shamans focus on the head soul, which is thought to become detached in trancing and in illness, or by sudden disturbances such as startling, so that people try not to upset others by angry words.
