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Book Author: Larry G. Peters

Dr. Larry Peters is a world-renowned scholar and initiated shaman in the Tamang tradition. He was recipient of the Regent’s Fellowship at the University of California Los Angeles, and an NIMH post-doctoral fellow at UCLA’s Neuropsychiatric Institute. Dr. Peters holds advanced degrees in both Anthropology and Psychology. He has conducted ethnographic fieldwork in Nepal, China, Mongolia, and Siberia and is a Nepal Research Associate of the Foundation for Shamanic Studies. Dr. Peters has published extensively on shamanism, conducts workshops on Tamang and Tibetan Shamanism in the United States, Europe, and Asia, and leads experiential Initiation Journeys to Nepal. In 1999, his highly acclaimed book, Tamang Shamans: An Ethnopsychiatric Study of Ecstasy and Healing in Nepal appeared in the Nirala Series. His second book, Trance, Initiation and Psychotherapy in Nepalese Shamanism: Essays on Tamang and Tibetan Shamanism was published in 2004 in the same series. His pioneering research, Yeti: Spirit of Himalayan Forest Shaman came a year after. Dr. Peters is a retired professor of Anthropology and Psychology at the California Graduate Institute in Los Angeles, California. Dr. Peters is a licensed psychotherapist in the State of California, the author of five books and many dozen articles, including Ode to Dreams, a poetry compilation.

  • Tamang Shamans: An Ethnopsychiatric Study Of Ecstasy And Healing In Nepal by Larry Peters

    Tamang Shamans: An Ethnopsychiatric Study Of Ecstasy And Healing In Nepal by Larry Peters

    Tamang Shamans

    An Ethnopsychiatric Study of Ecstasy and Healing in Nepal

    Dr. Larry Peters is an internationally acclaimed scholar and an initiated shaman. Tamang Shamans is a “unique contribution” to the psychology and anthropology of shamanism. To be more precise, it is an ethnopsychiatric analysis of the practices and trance-steps of the Tamang shamans of Nepal.

    With his ingenious research, Dr. Peters here opens new frontiers of ancient wisdom by demonstrating the shaman’s role in Tamang segment of Nepalese society as analogous to the psychotherapist’s role in the contemporary western world. The book opens with an examination of Tamang shamanism in a cross-cultural perspective and in the process explores the ethnographic setting of the Tamang culture in context of Nepalese society.

    In the course of his research, Dr. Peters employs traditional participant-observer method as well as an experiential approach in which he undertook a Tamang shaman apprenticeship. The practices of curing and being cured are explored in detail. The Tamang shamans of Nepal function as community psychotherapists, treating a wide range of symptoms by redressing social conflicts and as “training analysis” in relation to their disciples. The master shaman’s procedures in both instances are compared to concepts and techniques prevalent in the contemporary psychiatry in order to account for their psychotherapeutic effectiveness.

  • The Yeti : Spirit of Himalayan Forest Shamans

    The Yeti : Spirit of Himalayan Forest Shamans

    Dr. Larry G. Peters is a world-renowned scholar and initiated Shaman in the Tibetan tradition. The book takes a fresh look at the yeti, the elusive snowman of the Himalayas. Peters here aspires to establish the yeti as the spirit of the Himalayan Forest Shamans. In his view, Evolution-minded researchers’ hunt for ‘missing-link’ led to a scientific dead-end and the yeti who became associated with research fell into disrepute as a superstitious wed to spurious theory. Consequently, the yeti academically became “an abominable snowman”.

    Yeti is a living, current, popular mythology and a folkloric treasure whose origin the present book seeks to explore. Tracing its history to the pre-Buddhist, fierce spirit of Nature-mountain goddess and forest wild men of Bonpo shamanism in Tibet, Dr. Peters uncovers the hidden chapters of human history, evaluating the cross-cultural implications of religious practices, myths rituals, legends and scriptures.

    The Yeti, to sum up, it a sparkling piece of original research written with an objective to rehabilitate interest in the study of yeti as a spiritual teacher and initiator of shamans.

  • Trance, Initiation and Psychotherapy in Nepalese Shamanism (Essays on Tamang and Tibetan Shamanism)

    Trance, Initiation and Psychotherapy in Nepalese Shamanism (Essays on Tamang and Tibetan Shamanism)

    Dr. Larry G. Peters is an internationally acclaimed scholar and an initiated shaman.

    Result of lifetime’s researches in the Himalayas, Trance is a meticulous study exploring the hidden terrains of Tamang and Tibetan Shamanism. An exquisite fusion of creative writing and anthropological research, the book evaluates the relevance of shamanic practices in a modern-day Nepal. Divided into four major sections, the book opens with a study of phenomenology of Shamanism as a spiritual discipline.

    Shamanism, Dr. Peters claims, is humankind’s first mystical tradition. It is a cross- cultural phenomenon. Shamans were the first to explore the inner space in a disciplined way. Shamanism, he adds, overlaps with, and is at the origin of other younger spiritual traditions, like yoga, Vipasana and Tantra, which had continued the development of the disciplines of spiritual transformation. “The shaman’s mystical path,” in Dr. Peters’ words, “is an archetype, a universal pattern. It is not a prehistoric or a dead artifact but a living fossil possessing the same vital psychological foundations as later mystical traditions.

    Against this ideological backdrop, Dr. Peters ventures to study the cultural archetype of what it is to be a shaman in a Nepalese society and finds out that Tamang shamanic initiatory process comprises a psychotherapeutic system. The chapter that follows documents rare letters he sent home to his friends. These letters tell us of remarkable shamans that he met during his anthropological fieldwork in Nepal. The chapter next effortlessly sketches the visions of Nepalese mindscape during Dr. Peters’ journey to Kalinchowk shrine with Aama Bambo, a Tamang shaman.

    Focusing on the transformative nature of mystical experiences in Tamang shamanism, the author then moves ahead to discuss the Tibetan healing rituals of Dorje Yudronma, a fierce manifestation of feminine cosmic force. Despite reservations on Lhamo’s intensely aggressive style of healing, Dr. Peters seems to be in awe of her magical abilities and her paranormal knowledge. Dr. Peters interprets Lhamo’s violent exorcisms as psychotherapeutic procedures aimed at breaking down the patient’s ego defenses and introducing psychological crisis. A full-length chapter is devoted to Karga Puja ritual, a dramatic event, successful in treating indigenous categories of mental illness.

    The book ends with a survey of shamanism and medicine in developing Nepal. Shamanism, Dr. Peters suggests, is not antithetical to modern medicine; “In fact with proper training the shamans can even come to spread medical aid inasmuch as they already recognize their limitations in the treating of certain illness and take an active part in getting their clients to seek such treatment.”