Focusing on particular characters, situations, or emotions - usually with little or no explicit plot - lyric song poses interpretive challenges to the listening audience. Without an overt plot, how does one understand what a song is about? Are there rules or norms for how to interpret them? Do these[...]

Shamans are an integral part of communal religious traditions, professionals who make use of personal supernatural experiences, especially trance, as a resource for the wider community's physical and spiritual well-being. This Introduction surveys research on the topic of shamanism around the world,[...]

Religious ideas and actors have shaped Asian cultural practices for millennia and have played a decisive role in charting the course of its history. In this engaging and informative book, Thomas David DuBois sets out to explain how religion has influenced the political, social, and economic transfor[...]