Alternative Medicine Phenomenon Combines Spirituality And Medicne: The Profound Effect Of Alternative Therapies
More Americans are incorporating alternative therapies and medicines into their lives than ever before. "We're in a major change moment," says Barbara Tedlock, Ph. D., a noted anthropologist and author of the new book The Woman in the Shaman’s Body: Reclaiming the Feminine in Religion and Medicine. "Beliefs and spirituality are coming back into medicine."
(PRWEB) July 20, 2005 -- More Americans are incorporating alternative
therapies and medicines into their lives than ever before. In fact, according to
the National Institutes of Health, 36% of adults in the U.S. are using some form
of alternative medicine. When megavitamin therapy and prayer specifically for
health reasons are included, that number rises to 62%.
"We’re in a major
change moment," says Barbara Tedlock, Ph. D., a noted anthropologist and author
of the new book The Woman in the Shaman’s Body: Reclaiming the Feminine in
Religion and Medicine. "Beliefs and spirituality are coming back into
medicine."
"Some doctors are prescribing patients yoga training and
acupuncture," continues Tedlock, a distinguished University of Buffalo
anthropology professor, who’s a fully initiated shaman. "I’m excited that we’re
seeing a major shift of our regular Western paradigm. We’re in a moment where
this whole thing is breaking into the mainstream. Americans are extremely
pragmatic. If something works, we’ll do it. Well, guess what? It’s
working."
While many people are still just beginning to explore and
benefit from alternative healing practices, Tedlock has long known of their
tremendous power. As a child in the late 1950’s, she was stricken with polio.
The entire left side of her body was paralyzed. Doctors put the four-year-old
Tedlock into a tank respirator, better known as an iron lung. She was confined
to the immobilizing metal machine for a year-and-a-half.
It wasn’t until
her grandmother, a shaman, herbalist and midwife, talked her parents into
releasing her from the hospital that she got better. A still ailing Tedlock was
brought home to a difficult regimen of daily swims and sweat baths that were
intended to awaken the muscles. Her grandmother complemented that treatment by
massaging her with ointments made from various healing herbs.
The
alternative treatments sent "bolts of electricity" through Tedlock’s limbs. In
just six months, she had regained enough strength and flexibility to return to
school.
Tedlock says those alternative therapies -- and the amazing
results -- have profoundly influenced her throughout her life. In The Woman in
the Shaman’s Body, Tedlock explores the tremendous contributions women like her
grandmother have historically made to shamanism, the world’s oldest spiritual
and healing tradition.
By melding firsthand experience with exhaustive
scholarly research that's taken her through Asia, Africa and the Americas,
Tedlock provides proof that shamanism was originally the domain of the female.
"There’s very good evidence that women were shamans from the beginning,
says the prolific author of four previous books and scores of academic journal
articles. Unfortunately, the scholarly literature and pop literature only
stressed the male dimension."
The Woman in the Shaman’s Body not only
sheds new light on the female’s role in shamanism, it provides compelling
information about the effectiveness of mystical practices and alternative
healing.
But nothing is more compelling than these statements from
Tedlock: "I’m normal today because of my grandmother," she says. "I walk and
talk today because of alternative medicine."
For a review copy of the
book or to set up an interview with Barbara Tedlock for a story, please contact
Jay Wilke at 727-443-7115, ext. 223.
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Source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2005/7/prweb263065.htm