You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
This fine monograph, though written primarily for anthropologists, contains a wealth of information for the psychoanalyst; and it can well serve as a convenient, if not simple, introduction—by way of mythology—to the enormous literature on the Navaho.
Following Boas's classic studies of the degree to which a culture is reflected in, and functionally re-enforced by, its mythology, Spencer has examined the large body of Navaho chantway myths in order to
ascertain their relation to Navaho values. The chantways, which may be described as socialized dreams and fantasies, bulk large in the therapeutic ritual which is performed over a patient; and they play a significant role in a culture which is characterized, not only by a fear of witchcraft, institutionalized hypochondria, and pervasive uneasiness, but also by a high incidence of infectious disease, economic distress, and other reality problems which seem to intensify the pre-existing anxieties.
The chantways epitomize those magical techniques, largely but not exclusively verbal, which are employed by Navaho 'therapists' to relieve guilt and anxiety. The multiplicity of chantway plots and themes does not disguise their underlying uniformity, namely, Oedipal strivings and guilt—just as the late Géza Róheim noted in several published prolegomena to his ambitious (and as yet unavailable) study of the Navaho. Although Spencer touches on Róheim's work only parenthetically, and came to it after her own research had already taken final shape, she indicates that her findings are congruent with his. Her book is not phrased in psychoanalytic terms, but it is highly recommended.