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Author Rivers, W. H. R. (William Halse Rivers), 1864-1922.

Title Medicine, magic, and religion : the Fitzpatrick lectures delivered before the Royal College of Physicians of London in 1915 and 1916 / W.H.R. Rivers ; preface by G. Elliot Smith
Published London : Routledge, 1999

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Description 1 online resource (viii, 136 pages)
Series International library of psychology ; 035
International library of psychology. Anthropology and psychology ; 4
International library of psychology ; 035.
International library of psychology. Anthropology and psychology ; 4.
Contents Book cover; half-title; title; copyright; preface; chapter i medicine, magic, and religion; methods of inquiry; definition of the social processes; concept of disease by various peoples; beliefs as to causation of disease; disease or injury ascribed to magic; disease ascribed to object or influence projected into victim's body; disease attributed to abstraction of part of body or soul; magical action on separated part of victim's body or touched object; treatment: magical or religious nature of rites; concrete nature of beliefs underlying the rites; chapter ii
Processes of diagnosis and prognosisdisease attributed to infraction of taboo; the religious element; religious character acquired by magical process; independent occurrence of disease; variety in leechcraft; differentiation of leech from priest; epidemic disease; relations of economical and juridical nature; the part played by suggestion; rationality of the leechcraft; chapter iii; evolution of social customs and institutions; independent evolution; transmission as a factor in human culture; relations of medicine, magic, and religion in various countries; australia; polynesia; indonesia
Indiachina and japan; africa; america; similarity in views on causation and treatment of disease; consideration of rival views; two widely differing beliefs in causation of disease; remedies of the "domestic" order; origin of above practices; chapter iv; methods of solving the problems; the importance attached to numbers; the criterion of common distribution; some difficulties met with; formulation of guiding principle; factors affecting success or failure of transplanted elements of culture; modification of practices after introduction
Examples suggested as modifications of transmitted practicesblood-letting; massage; sweat-baths; circumcision and sub-incision; some points raised in relation to distribution of customs; scantiness of available evidence; history and evolution; complex nature of the process; the influence of cultural mixture on progress; the effect on medicine of mixture of cultures; the relations between medicine and religion; chapter v mind and medicine; index
Summary One of the most fascinating men of his generation, W.H.R. Rivers was a British doctor and psychiatrist as well as a leading ethnologist. Immortalized as the hero of Pat Barker's award-winning Regeneration trilogy, Rivers was the clinician who, in the First World War, cared for the poet Siegfried Sassoon and other infantry officers injured on the western front. His researches into the borders of psychiatry, medicine and religion made him a prominent member of the British intelligentsia of the time, a friend of H.G. Wells, George Bernard Shaw and Bertrand Russell. Part of his appeal lay in an ex
Notes Reprint of the 1924 ed. published by K. Paul, Trench, Trubner, London, Harcourt, Brace, New York, in series: International library of psychology, philosophy, and scientific method and the Fitzpatrick lectures, 1915-1916
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes Print version record
Subject Traditional medicine.
Medicine -- Religious aspects.
Religion.
Magic.
Religion and Medicine
Religion
religion (discipline)
Magic
Medicine -- Religious aspects
Religion
Traditional medicine
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9780203980989
0203980980