A study of contemporary Chinese healing practices as observed in the San Francisco Bay area and compared with relevant research literature

The purpose of this study was to explore how Chinese legends and folklore are reflected in Chinese healing practices in the San Francisco Bay area, particularly shamanic rituals, acupuncture, and herbal medicine.;The practitioners were two Chinese shamans, a Chinese acupuncturist, and a Chinese practitioner of herbal medicine. Settings were the practitioners' offices in the San Francisco Bay area. As the participant, I contacted the practitioners through networking with their colleagues and former clients. During my appointments with them, as a client, I made mental notes of rituals and healing processes, and then formulated analyses of my observations. Over the three years involved in this series of appointments, I made field notes describing how traditional paraphernalia, talismans, tools, and techniques were employed by these Chinese healers.;Both the archival data and the participant observation data indicated that shamanism, acupuncture, and herbal medicine continue to use key elements in traditional Chinese healing practices. Legend, folklore, and supernatural beliefs still provide the framework for these practices. Shamanic concepts such as the powers of nature, spirits, deified heroes, and worship are used during rituals. Music, chanting, and dances are essential to the shaman's practices because they are means of entering into an altered state of consciousness wherein the shaman can communicate with the spirit world.;This study also confirmed that Chinese medical practitioners still make use of special implements and materials, such as needles and herbs, to treat diseases and illnesses. These are described in the Nei Ching--The Yellow Emperor's Classic of Internal Medicine---a text that is still used as the foundation for Chinese healing practices.;One of the outcomes of my research was the formulation of a Chinese Model of Healing based on Siegler and Osmond's (1974) generic 12-facet model of medicine. Traditional Chinese healing practices were found to satisfy all the components of the Siegler-Osmond model.