The transition from traditional Nanay shamanism to neoshamanism

Tatiana Bulgakova

At the turn of the century, traditional Nanay shamanism seemed to die out, but instead after a short gap it arose again with a new appearance, having acquired some new methods, but preserved in its essence.

(photo courtesy Tatiana Bulgakova)

Until the mid-1990s in Khabarovsk region in Russia, there were still several actively practicing traditional shaman-elders, who were notably isolated from their cultural surroundings (some of them did not even speak Russian). Since early 1980s those shamans made several attempts to initiate some new candidates as shamans, but all of them were unsuccessful: all the candidates died right away after their initiation. These years there were also many Nanays who, according to the shamans’ explanation, were taken ill with shamanic-like disease, but as they refused the shamanic call, they also died. For about three decades, not one new Nanay shaman became active, so the entire generation produced no shamans, and only in 2005-2006 did several new shamans appear almost simultaneously.  The new shamans’ practice differed from the traditional ones to such an extent that we can affirm that traditional shamanism has turned into neoshamanism.

The most remarkable trait of Nanay neoshamanism is its renunciation of some traditional cultural and social patterns. The neoshamans were not able to continue the religious traditions in its completeness any more because of their loss of Nanay language and the minimal cultural knowledge necessary for performing the rituals.  At the same time, all of them were sure that they had inherited shamanic spirits from their Nanay ancestors. 

To compensate for the lost traditional knowledge, neoshamans used any accessible information on different religious and occult doctrines, picked up mostly through mass media. For example, the Russian extrasensory individual Konovalov, the Georgian healer Davitashvili, and the Bulgarian healer Vanga became quite popular among the new Nanay shamans.  The mass media information on unidentified flying objects (UFOs) impressed one of the candidates for shamanship to such degree that she asserts that a UFO delivered to her an ultimatum that she must start shamanizing.

(photo courtesy Tatiana Bulgakova)

One of the factors affected by this overrunning of ethnic and confessional boundaries is the loss of local shamans who would be able to initiate the new ones. Looking for those who could initiate them (or who were the proper person to ‘steal power’ from them), the neophytes applied to the foreign neoshamans, extrasensory healers, chiromancers (palm readers) and Buddhists. To meet them the neophytes traveled to other regions (e.g., to Buryatia) and even to another country (China). 

Unlike the traditional Nanay shamans, the neoshamans prefer not to limit themselves to only one source of shamanic power, but to gain several of them. As a result, one of our informants, a woman-neoshaman, who was initiated by a Buddhist, called herself in different situations variably a shaman, a healer, a “cosmic power specialist”, an extrasensory individual and or a chiromancer. 

The local Nanay intelligentsia and the administration, both of whom are engaged in revival of Nanay traditional culture, force some Nanays to become initiated as shamans. They time it for certain cultural occasions such as festivals, meetings and conferences. Thus, in anticipation of a visiting Buryat shaman, the administration of the Nanay district put together a list of those people (mostly children) who, they assumed, would be able to become shamans, and brought them to the town for the official initiation.