The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, set 1

A Hmong tvix neeb, or shaman performing a ceremony to recapture a lost soul and return it to its body.

“Medicine was religion. Religion was society. Society was medicine. Even economics were mixed up in there somewhere… and so was music… In fact, the Hmong view of health care seemed to me to be precisely the opposite of the prevailing American one, in which the practice of medicine has fissioned into smaller and smaller sub-specialties, with less and less truck between bailiwicks. The Hmong carried holism to its ultima Thule… I concluded that the Hmong preoccupation with medial issues was nothing less than a preoccupation with life.”

Excerpt from The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong child, her American doctors and the collision of two cultures by Anne Fadiman, page 60-61.

This excerpt, found at the beginning of Fadiman’s book, in a way sets the stage for the rest of the book for me. The context for the author’s thought came about as she was trying to organize the piles of notes she had collected about the Hmong while writing her book. She wanted to fit her notes into specific folders such as medicine, mental health, animism, shamanism, etc and finally came to the realization that the multiple aspects she discovered about her subjects could not be compartmentalized. There were many themes prevalent, but I was drawn to the idea that the animistic culture of the Hmong connected medicine to religion to everything else in their life. They believed in the sacredness of the soul and they could not understand treating the body without treating the soul at the same time.

The Hmong view of medicine as religion appeared in the physical sense in the form of their tvix neeb, or their shaman. The shaman was their doctor, their priest, their psychologist. The Hmong placed in one person that which we as Americans have compartmentalized into many different roles. The shaman was the healer of the body, mind and soul. Without the soul, the body could not survive, so to focus on fixing the body was pointless if the soul was lost. That concept was lost on the American doctors who tried to save the life of Lia Lee, a tragic little girl with severe epilepsy. The American doctors and the Hmong parents could not understand each other because of language and cultural barriers that neither side were able to cross.

Due to a class that I took, Sociology of Religion, the connection of religion with medicine grabbed my attention and made me contemplate the role of medical doctors in our Western society. We view MDs in a strictly secular sense; they focus on fixing the body based on years of scientific study, separate from religious influence. While religion in various forms still thrives in the US, it is not expected that doctors address the spiritual needs of their patients. But what about civil religion? A concept where we revere science and certain American ideals, apart from religion, as if they were religious. Civil religious symbols include the American flag, Statue of Liberty, the Fourth of July, the Pledge of Allegiance, Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. Thinking about the roles of our doctors in that perspective, I believe that they take on the roles of a shaman but in a civil religion.

If we compare the picture of the medical doctor to the right with that of the Hmong shaman above we can see some similarities. The MD is wearing the white gown or jacket of the profession and a stethoscope, a tool of healing, around his neck. He is dressed to perform the ritual of healing, as is the shaman. The MD is the 'shaman' in civil society, the priest and healer of secular health (which is physical rather than spiritual). He commands a high level of respect from us, as the tvix neeb does from the Hmong. He had a calling and went through rigorous training to become an MD, as did the Hmong shaman. When we are in pain or are sick, we seek a doctor for help. Many Americans have a skepticism towards doctors for one reason or another that does not seem to be shared by Hmong towards their shaman, but deep down, we have trust and hope in doctors that they will be able to repair us when we most need them. Our doctors occupy one of the highest positions in our society, as do the shaman in the Hmong society, and we look to what they say with reverence. We are supposed to eat what the doctors tell us to eat, take the medicines we are told to take, and change our habits if we are told to do so. We seek their advice because they hold answers to mysteries that lie beyond the scope of information that most of us have. The MD is the one who connects the 'holy' beliefs of a civil religion, science, to healing.

Because I am a huge fan, I want to include the connection of medicine to religion in civil society by another example: Doctor Who. Doctor Who is a television show about a fictional hero who has graced the TV networks in Great Britain for over 40 years. He is the last of the race of the Time Lords, the highest beings in existence, and travels through time and space with human companions as an adventurer and protector of Earth. He seems to know all and has great resources and scientific knowledge at his command. And he is simply known as the Doctor. He is a Time Lord called the Doctor. A lord of time has religious connotations to it and the last of them who is greatly revered all across the fictional universe is the Doctor. To me that connects the idea of religion and medicine in a non religion specific society.

Hmong shaman image from:
http://www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/welcome/features/20060809_
cancer_hmong/photos/Cancer_Hmong_Shaman.jpg

Medical doctor image from:
http://www.escapefromcubiclenation.com/photos/
uncategorized/doctor.jpg

Doctor Who image from:
http://www.infoaddict.com/fileadmin/Images/Television
/dr_who.jpg