Abstract
This article investigates the belief narratives about shamanic illness experienced by the spirit mediums in contemporary northeast China where various mental and physical disorders are believed to be the manifestation of the call of animal spirits. Taking sociocultural background, narrative patterns and structures, and the narrators’ epistemological models into account, this article explores how prospective shamans perceive the call of spirits as a two-sided illness with bio-medical symptoms and supernatural etiology. This perception is shaped through the process of vernacular theorizing and spread and consolidated via belief narratives.
Recommended Citation
Li, Haozhen
(2026)
"The Call of Spirits and Mental Disorders: Belief Narratives of Prospective Shamans in Contemporary Northeast China,"
Narrative Culture: Vol. 13:
Iss.
1, Article 4.
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/narrative/vol13/iss1/4