Korean Shamans and the Spirits of Capitalism

Abstract

S Recent studies have taught us that “religion” is not a fixed category but an instrument of popular consciousness. While the studies' subjects have often been victims of colonialism and capitalist exploitation, cultural production through magical means need not be restricted to a society's most oppressed elements. Counter to the expectations of Max Weber, for whom capitalism marched to the drumbeat of “rationalization,” many of the clients who patronize the shaman shrines of Seoul, Republic of Korea, are engaged in high‐risk petty‐capitalist enterprises. Shamans, clients, and spirits address the seemingly arbitrary fluctuations of good and bad fortune that can bring sudden wealth or ruin, and offer wry commentary upon what their world has become.

The 'Ergi' Seidman: Contestations of Gender, Shamanism and Sexuality in Northern Religion Past and Present

“…8 Recent Sámi shamanism is gendered: their shamans were male, often with female assistants. Elsewhere, shamanism often tends to be gendered; for instance, most San shamans are male (Katz, 1981) and Korean shamans are mainly female (Kendall, 1996). We speculate about a possible link between the mostly male gendering of Sámi shamans and the mostly female gendering of seiDworkers of the sagas, if the female seiDworker came to be trained as 'assistant', as Sá mi females were.…”

Markets of piety and pious markets: the Protestant ethic and the spirit of Korean capitalism

“…Idleness was condemned while organization and discipline became marks of salvation. In Korea puritanical discipline reconciled capitalist accumulation with moral virtue and thereby circumvented the Neo-Confucian 'contempt for commerce' (see Eckert et al, 1990: 225;Kendall, 1996: 520).…”

“…Shamanism's concern with wealth, however, is itself a product of the modern Korean economy. From her work with shamans in Seoul, Laurell Kendall (1996) found that shamans commonly complained that it was only now that kut (shamanic rituals) were held in the hope of riches.…”

Whose Steeple is Higher? Religious Competition in Siberia1

“…Whether called shamanism, neoshamanism, urban shamanism, shamanic, White Spirit Teaching, Nature worship, animism, purification or something else entirely, rekindled religiosity links indigenous Siberian peoples with combined spiritual and ethnonational revitalisation trends throughout the world (cf. Balzer, 1997;Niezen, 2000;Humphrey, 1999;Kendall, 1996;Lester, 2002).…”