Hands Feel It
Healing and Spirit Presence Among a Northern Alaskan People

Edith Turner (Author)

9780875805733

Paperback / softback, published 1 July 1996

288 pages
21.6 x 14 x 2.1 cm, 0.454 kg

In a treeless land far north of the Arctic Circle, the I\u00f1upiat live immensely practical lives, yet they have a profound belief in the spirit world. For them, everything-whether living being or inanimate object-has a spirit. This outlook reflects their sense of the connectedness of all life.

The Hands Feel It is the account of one person's experience among the I\u00f1upiat. Anthropologist Edith Turner records occurrences of healing, spirit manifestation, and premonition in her narrative of a year in the life of an Eskimo community. Her diary captures for the reader sea ice, tundra, gravel beaches, and a determined and cheerful population. Sights, sounds, and even smells that Turner encounters provide context for a study in tune with the spiritual.

Accounts that ethnographers have often termed "myth" and "legend" Turner sees from a different point of view-not as mere stories but as real events the I\u00f1upiat sincerely report to her. The value of Turner's work originates in her own connection to spirituality and in the growing receptiveness of the I\u00f1upiat to her.

Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Families and Persons Mentioned in the Text
Introduction
1 Arrival
2 A Dream of the Loss of Childhood
3 The Healer
4 Embattled Politics: The Ancient Master Returns
5 The Taste of Sea Mammal Awakens I\u00f1upiat History
6 The Seal and Its Organs: A Prophetic Seeing
7 Winter: Western Celebration Converted
8 Winter Solstice
9 The Messenger Feast: The Work of the Eagle
10 A Man Lost in the Tundra: The Finding
11 The Grandmother Speaks a Word
12 The Laughing Mask
13 Preparations for Whaling
14 The Bowhead Whale: Balaena Mysticetus
15 The Whale's Head: Presence and Absence
16 Rich Parka and Festival Food
17 The Whaling Festival: Qagruq, the Beaching
18 The Shaman's Four-Day Syndrome
19 Reconnecting After Absence
Conclusion: The Threads of Connectedness
Notes
Bibliography
Index