Michael James Harner (April 27, 1929 – February 3, 2018) was an anthropologist, educator and author. His 1980 book, ''The Way of the Shaman: a Guide to Power and Healing,''
[Harner, Michael (1980) ''The Way of the Shaman''. San Francisco: Harper & Row. Third edition, 1990. ] has been foundational in the development and popularization of Core Shamanism as a path of personal development for adherents of
neoshamanism.
[Noel, Daniel C. (1997) ''Soul Of Shamanism: Western Fantasies, Imaginal Realities.'' Continuum. ] He also founded the Foundation for Shamanic Studies.
Career
Harner was born in Washington, D.C. in 1929.
He initially worked in the field of archaeology, including studying the Lower Colorado River area.
[E.g., Kroeber, A.L., and Michael J. Harner. (1955) "Mohave Pottery", ''Anthropological Records'', Berkeley: University of California.] As a graduate student in 1956-57 he undertook field research on the culture of the
Jívaro (Shuar) people of the Ecuadorian Amazon
and began to pursue a career as an
ethnologist. His doctoral dissertation, "Machetes, Shotguns, and Society: An Inquiry into the Social Impact of Technological Change among the Jivaro Indians" (U California-Berkeley 1963), became the basis for his book, ''The Jívaro: People of the Sacred Waterfalls''.
[Harner, Michael J. (1972) ''The Jívaro: People of the Sacred Waterfalls.'' New York: Natural History Press. Second edition 1984, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.]
In 1960-61 he experimented with the Amazonian plant medicine
ayahuasca with the
Conibo
The Shipibo-Conibo are an indigenous people along the Ucayali River in the Amazon rainforest in Peru. Formerly two groups, the Shipibo and the Conibo, they eventually became one distinct tribe through intermarriage and communal ritual and are cur ...
people of the Peruvian Amazon,
which he wrote about in the articles "The Sound of Rushing Water" (1968)
[Harner, Michael J. (1968) "The Sound of Rushing Water." ''Natural History'' 77(6).] and "The Role of Hallucinogenic Plants in European Witchcraft" (1973).
[Harner, Michael J., ed. and contributor (1973) ''Hallucinogens and Shamanism''. New York and London: Oxford University Press. ] Harner returned to the Jívaro in 1964, 1969, and 1973 where he learned the use of the
entheogen ''maikua'' (''Datura brugmansia'').
In 1966, having taught at UC-Berkeley and served as associate director of the Lowie Museum of Anthropology, Harner became a visiting professor at
Yale and
Columbia University and in 1970 joined the graduate faculty of
The New School for Social Research in New York City. He co-chaired the Anthropology Section of the
New York Academy of Sciences.
[Haviland, William A., Harald E. L. Prins, Bunny McBride and Dana Walrath (2013). Anthropologists of Note: Michael J. Harner. ''Cultural Anthropology: The Human Challenge'' (14th ed., p. 307). Belmont: Wadsworth. .]
In 1983, Harner founded the Center for Shamanic Studies, which is today known as the Foundation for Shamanic Studies.
In 1987 Harner left academia to devote himself full-time to the Foundation for Shamanic Studies. Walsh and Grob note in their book, ''Higher Wisdom: Eminent Elders Explore the Continuing Impact of Psychedelics'', "Michael Harner is widely acknowledged as the world's foremost authority on shamanism and has had an enormous influence on both the academic and lay worlds.... What
Yogananda did for
Hinduism and
D. T. Suzuki did for
Zen, Michael Harner has done for shamanism, namely bring the tradition and its richness to Western awareness."
[Walsh, Roger, and Charles S. Grob, eds. (2005) ''Higher Wisdom: Eminent Elders Explore the Continuing Impact of Psychedelics'', pp. 159, 160. State University of New York Press. Albany.]
He died on February 3, 2018 at the age of 88.
Development of Core Shamanism
After traveling to the Amazon where he ingested the hallucinogen
ayahuasca, Harner began experimenting with monotonous drumming. In the early 1970s he started giving training workshops to small groups in Connecticut. In 1979 he founded the Center for Shamanic Studies in
Norwalk, Connecticut
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, map_caption = Location in Fairfield County, Connecticut, Fairfield County and ...
. In 1980, Harner published ''The Way of the Shaman: a Guide to Power and Healing.''
[ Students in the United States and Europe began to take his classes in what he was now calling "]core shamanism
Neoshamanism refers to new forms of shamanism. It usually means shamanism practiced by Western people as a type of New Age spirituality, without a connection to traditional shamanic societies. It is sometimes also used for modern shamanic rituals a ...
" (as differenced from traditional, Evenk shamanism
Shamanism is a religious practice that involves a practitioner (shaman) interacting with what they believe to be a Spirit world (Spiritualism), spirit world through Altered state of consciousness, altered states of consciousness, such as tranc ...
, or other indigenous and historical practices that have been referred to as "shamanism" in anthropological texts).
Anthropologist Joan Townsend has distinguished Harner's core shamanism from neoshamanism.[Townsend, Joan B. (2004) "Individualist Religious Movements: Core and Neo-shamanism" ''Anthropology of Consciousness'' vol. 15(1), pp. 1-9. ] However, most authors in the field, especially Harner's critics, consider Harner's core shamanism to be the primary influence on, and foundation of, the Neoshamanic movement.[Hobson, G. "The Rise of the White Shaman as a New Version of Cultural Imperialism." in: Hobson, Gary, ed. ''The Remembered Earth''. Albuquerque, NM: Red Earth Press; 1978: 100-108.][Aldred, Lisa, " Plastic Shamans and Astroturf Sun Dances: New Age Commercialization of Native American Spirituality" in: ''The American Indian Quarterly'' issn.24.3 (2000) pp.329-352. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.][White Shamans and Plastic Medicine Men]
" Terry Macy and Daniel Hart, ''Native Voices'', Indigenous Documentary Film at the University of Washington
Harner later integrated his Center for Shamanic Studies into the nonprofit Foundation for Shamanic Studies. The Foundation received financial support primarily from the Core Shamanism courses and workshops he taught, supplemented by private donations. From the early 1980s onward, he invited a few of his students to join an international faculty to reach an ever-wider market. In 1987, Harner resigned his professorship to devote himself full-time to the work of the foundation.[Harner, Michael (2005) "The History and Work of the Foundation for Shamanic Studies", ''Shamanism'' 18: 1&2, p. 5.] He largely ceased publishing, except for occasional articles in the publication "Shamanism."[Harner, Michael, and Sandra Harner (2000) "Core Practices in the Shamanic Treatment of Illness". ''Shamanism'' 13 (1&2), pp. 19-30.][Harner, Michael (2010) "A Core Shamanic Theory of Dreams." ''Shamanism'' 23, pp. 2-4.]
See also
* Hank Wesselman
Bibliography
*Harner, Michael, ''Cave and Cosmos: Shamanic Encounters with Another Reality'' (North Atlantic Books 2013)
*Harner, Michael (ed,), ''Hallucinogens and Shamanism'' (Oxford University Press 1973)
*Harner, Michael, ''The Jívaro: People of the Sacred Waterfalls'' (University of California Press 1972)
*Harner, Michael, ''The Way of the Shaman'' (HarperOne 1990) Orig. 1980
*Harner, Michael, and Meyer, Alfred, ''Cannibal''. New York: Morrow, 1979. (a novel on Aztecs)
*Harner, Michael
"The Enigma of Aztec Sacrifice."
pp. 46–51. ''Natural History'', Vol.86 (no.4), April 1977.
*Haviland, William A., Harald E. L. Prins, Bunny McBride and Dana Walrath, "Anthropologist of Note: Michael J. Harner" ''Cultural Anthropology: The Human Challenge'' (14th ed.) (Wadsworth 2013)
References
External links
Michael Harner's Foundation for Shamanic Studies
{{DEFAULTSORT:Harner, Michael
1929 births
2018 deaths
American anthropologists
Neoshamanism
Exorcism
Spiritual warfare
American animists
American archaeologists
People from Washington, D.C.