Shamanism, Colonialism, and the Wild Man by Michael Taussig

Below is a brief summary of some main points from Michael Taussig’s book named “Shamanism, Colonialism, and the Wild Man.” All of the quotes from the book are accompanied by page numbers so that you, if needed, could find more detailed information in the book itself. If you choose to cite this in your school work, make sure to paraphrase or use quotation marks because this (like everything else in my blog) is my original content unless stated otherwise.

In the first part of the book Michael Taussig speaks of colonialism and “the magical realism of debt" - a fictional reality created by the whites during the rubber boom in Putumayo to enslave Indian workers; a fictional reality that led to the extermination of thousands of natives who were caught in the fragmented world of "savagery and business, cannibalism and capitalism," magic, torture, and subjugation (73). In the second part of the book he explores the realm of sorcery and its connections to colonialism and post-colonialism. The phrase "fictional reality" is frequent in his book, and it emphasizes the idea that realities (like historical narratives) are constructed by people - not preexistent.

This is a very important point. Very often we take the realities we live in for granted, forgetting that we ourselves create and recreate them every moment and every day. Our realities are not simply given to us – we are active makers of them, no matter what social positions we occupy. In my opinion, Taussig’s “fictional reality” doesn’t mean that the colonial world people lived in was “unreal.” I think the author means that the world was filled with myths and tales which often differed from factual reality, but eventually became real because they were reinforced by retelling and people’s beliefs. For example, the “primitive” weren’t really primitive, but European newcomers viewed them as such, so the label “primitive” helped create this new threatening and magical reality filled with wild and ungodly “others”.

Multiple fictional realities were created during colonial times. Some of them were those of the savage - a hostile, treacherous cannibal, or a gentle, humble, child-like creature. One of the assumptions drawn by Casement constituted a myth that Indians suffered a "mysterious displacement of their true selves" (87). Hardenburg tried to establish a single reality of the true Indian, but his attempts failed (85). During the rubber boom Westerners were ruled by the irrational fear of the jungle (and all its contents) and by the feeling of superiority over the native inhabitants. Out of fear, pride, and impunity of the newcomers rose fictional realities and the culture of terror, which the author calls "a mediator of colonial hegemony; the space of death where Indian, African, and white gave birth to the New World" (5).

The Church played a big role in creating the magical reality. Claiming that Indians had memories of the pact with the devil and of his teachings, and trying to erase these memories, the Church was "creating and strengthening them as a new social force, thereby ensuring the transmission of myth into reality and memory into the future" (143). That myth, once real, lived in the image of the shaman, a "pagan savage." According to Taussig, the colonizer himself becomes dependent on the pagan and its power in search for "salvation from the civilization that torments him as much as the savage on whom he has projected his antiself" (211). Here, after years of slavery and torture, the roles change - the shaman exploits the colonist (331).

Creation of the historical narrative is present along with the creation of magical reality. In the story of Nina Maria, for example, the author shows us how the official history was overpowered by multiple versions of the story. Some of the interviewed claimed that the Virgin was brought by the Spanish, and others believed that it was found by the Indians. Both attributed supernatural powers to the Virgin, saying that she helped her people overcome the enemy by creating illusions (193-197). The ultimate truth, if it existed, would be lost in the subtle battle of power and submission, in people's multiple descriptions of one past.

The array of stories, sides, and views touches all aspects of the world in which whites and Indians live side by side. Taussig mentions the existence of many divisions and oppositions in the fictional reality. There are the Church and the pagans; there are shamans who use yage and witches who learn their magic from satanic books; mediums and shamans of the lowlands and highlands who are distrusting and using each other; social classes that live in a constant struggle; the dark-skinned and the whites. There are also mediators (the highland shamans) who are in between Christianity and paganism, mediating both the spiritual and the social opposites (the masters and the peons) (254).
Taussig says that without imagined realities the conquest itself would be impossible. Stories of cannibalism, magical cures, wicked sorcerers, and savage primitives “functioned to create through magical realism a culture of terror that dominated both whites and Indians” (121).

Taussig, Michael (1987) Shamanism, Colonialism, and the Wild Man. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London.