An important new way of viewing the prehistoric art of the Americas, The Jaguar Within demonstrates that understanding a work of art’s connection with shamanic trance can lead to an appreciation of it as an extremely creative solution to the inherent challenge of giving material form to nonmaterial realities and states of being. Shamanism—the practice of entering a trance state to experience visions of a reality beyond the ordinary and to gain esoteric knowledge—has been an important part of life for indigenous societies throughout the Americas from prehistoric times until the present. Much has been written about shamanism in both scholarly and popular literature, but few authors have linked it to another significant visual realm—art. In this pioneering study, Rebecca R. Stone considers how deep familiarity with, and profound respect for, the extra-ordinary visionary experiences of shamanism profoundly affected the artistic output of indigenous cultures in Central and South America before the European invasions of the sixteenth century. Using ethnographic accounts of shamanic trance experiences, Stone defines a core set of trance vision characteristics, including enhanced senses; ego dissolution; bodily distortions; flying, spinning, and undulating sensations; synaesthesia; and physical transformation from the human self into animal and other states of being. Stone then traces these visionary characteristics in ancient artworks from Costa Rica and Peru. She makes a convincing case that these works, especially those of the Moche, depict shamans in a trance state or else convey the perceptual experience of visions by creating deliberately chaotic and distorted conglomerations of partial, inverted, and incoherent images.

One of Italy's greatest and most popular writers offers three witty, fantastical stories, each dominated by one of three senses--taste, hearing, or smell.

‘Shaman’, meaning ‘intermediary between spirit and the natural world’, has become a much overused word in the West. It’s not a job title one can give oneself, and in indigenous societies, a shaman is usually born to this role. Ya’Acov Darling Khan is one of the few westerners who have been acknowledged as shamans by indigenous elders or teachers.After being hit by lightning, Ya’Acov took a 30-year journey into the heart of shamanism to seek his own healing, and to learn how he could serve others with the wisdom he acquired through his experiences. He has studied with indigenous teachers from the Arctic Circle to the USA and South America, and has taken part in ceremonies in such diverse locations as Welsh caves to the depths of the Amazon rainforest. Nowadays, Ya’Acov continues to study and regularly journeys to the Ecuadorean Amazon to work alongside the Achuar and Sápara people.For thousands of years, shamans helped the people in their communities remain in balance with themselves, each other, the natural world and the spirit world. This beautifully written book is not only a powerfully honest, humorous and inspiring memoir, but a guidebook for those from many cultures and walks of life wishing to return to their indigenous roots, and be part of midwifing a more benign human presence here on Earth as part of a new dream.

Mexican conservationists have sometimes observed that it is difficult to find a country less interested in the conservation of its natural resources than is Mexico. Yet, despite a long history dedicated to the pursuit of development regardless of its environmental consequences, Mexico has an equally long, though much less developed and appreciated, tradition of environmental conservation. Lane Simonian here offers the first panoramic history of conservation in Mexico from pre-contact times to the current Mexican environmental movement. He explores the origins of conservation and environmental concerns in Mexico, the philosophies and endeavors of Mexican conservationists, and the enactment of important conservation laws and programs. This heretofore untold story, drawn from interviews with leading Mexican conservationists as well as archival research, will be important reading throughout the international community of activists, researchers, and concerned citizens interested in the intertwined issues of conservation and development.

In 1983, zoologist Alan Rabinowitz ventured into the rain forest of Belize, determined to study the little-known jaguar in its natural habitat and to establish the world's first jaguar preserve. Within two years, he had succeeded. In Jaguar he provides the only first-hand account of a scientist's experience with jaguars in the wild. Originally published in 1986, this edition includes a new preface and epilogue by the author that bring the story up to date with recent events in the region and around the world.

Mysteries of the Jaguar Shamans of the Northwest Amazon tells the life story of Mandu da Silva, the last living jaguar shaman among the Baniwa people in the northwest Amazon. In this original and engaging work, Robin M. Wright, who has known and worked with da Silva for more than thirty years, weaves the story of da Silva’s life together with the Baniwas’ society, history, mythology, cosmology, and jaguar shaman traditions. The jaguar shamans are key players in what Wright calls “a nexus of religious power and knowledge” in which healers, sorcerers, priestly chanters, and dance-leaders exercise complementary functions that link living specialists with the deities and great spirits of the cosmos. By exploring in depth the apprenticeship of the shaman, Wright shows how jaguar shamans acquire the knowledge and power of the deities in several stages of instruction and practice. This volume is the first mapping of the sacred geography (“mythscape”) of the Northern Arawak–speaking people of the northwest Amazon, demonstrating direct connections between petroglyphs and other inscriptions and Baniwa sacred narratives as a whole. In eloquent and inviting analytic prose, Wright links biographic and ethnographic elements in elevating anthropological writing to a new standard of theoretically aware storytelling and analytic power.

Compelling reading for anyone seeking the courage to make more conscious choices and live fully awake, The Necktie and The Jaguar is a memoir with thought-provoking questions that encourage self-exploration. Author Carl Greer—businessman, philanthropist, and retired Jungian analyst and clinical psychologist—offers an illuminating roadmap to individuation and personal transformation. Greer found security in conforming to the cultural expectations of a postwar, midwestern, middle-class upbringing after a childhood tragedy taught him to constrict his emotions. Becoming president of an independent oil and gas company, he drove his team to success and built his wealth only to find in midlife that his spiritual self was crying out for expression. Undergoing Jungian analysis and becoming an analyst himself offered some soul nourishment. So did studying and practicing martial arts, whose principles helped him navigate challenges in the world of work. Still, it wasn’t until Greer took a deep dive into shamanic training and practice that he was able to embody the qualities and emotions he had long denied and turn his attention to philanthropy. Writing about his spiritual practices and reflecting on his vulnerabilities, Greer tells of honoring his longings for purpose and meaning, journeying to transpersonal realms, reinventing his life, and devoting himself to service to others while living with deep respect for Pachamama, Mother Earth. His memoir is an inspirational testament to the power of self-discovery. As Carl Greer learned, you don’t have to feel trapped in a story someone else has written for you.