In many parts of the contemporary world, spirit beliefs and practices have taken on a pivotal role in addressing the discontinuities and uncertainties of modern life. The myriad ways in which devotees engage the spirit world show the tremendous creative potential of these practices and their innate adaptability to changing times and circumstances. Through in-depth anthropological case studies from Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, and Vietnam, the contributors to this book investigate the role and impact of different social, political, and economic dynamics in the reconfiguration of local spirit worlds in modern Southeast Asia. Their findings contribute to the re-enchantment debate by revealing that the “spirited modernities” that have emerged in the process not only embody a distinct feature of the contemporary moment, but also invite a critical rethinking of the concept of modernity itself.

An absorbing study of Cambodian religion and beliefs covering everything from the role of monks in everyday life to beliefs in ghosts, gods and shamans. Belief in the supernatural covers every aspect of a Cambodian's birth, life and death; life is a process of merit-making in order to maximize the conditions of their rebirth. Philip Coggan's lively text describes the Buddha's life, the establishment of Buddhism in Cambodia and the duties of monks within the monasteries. The spirit world is mapped and the interaction between gods, spirits and humans is described through the various stages of life. Cambodia's recent history is discussed in relation to its connection with the spirit world. The text is enlivened by the author's interviews with Cambodians, such as the girl who sees spirits all the time, or the woman who can put people in touch with the ghosts of dead relatives. Altogether, this factual account of the status of the supernatural and the practice of religion in Cambodia makes a fascinating read.

The Spirit Ambulance is a journey into decision-making at the end of life in Thailand, where families attempt to craft good deaths for their elders in the face of clashing ethical frameworks, from a rapidly developing universal medical system, to national and global human-rights politics, to contemporary movements in Buddhist metaphysics. Scott Stonington’s gripping ethnography documents how Thai families attempt to pay back a “debt of life” to their elders through intensive medical care, followed by a medically assisted rush from the hospital to home to ensure a spiritually advantageous last breath. The result is a powerful exploration of the nature of death and the complexities arising from the globalization of biomedical expertise and ethics around the world.

Transcendents offers an in depth look at gender fluid spiritual practices in Burma and Thailand.

"A house in the center of Bangkok becomes the point of confluence where lives are shaped by upheaval, memory, and the lure of home. Witness to two centuries' flux in one of the world's most restless cities, a house plays host to longings and losses past, present, and future. A nineteenth-century missionary doctor pines for the comforts of New England even as he finds the vibrant foreign chaos of Siam increasingly difficult to resist. A post-war society woman marries, mothers, and holds court, little suspecting the course of her future. A jazz pianist is summoned in the 1970s to conjure music that will pacify resident spirits, even as he's haunted by ghosts of his former life. Not long after, a young woman gives swimming lessons in the luxury condos that have eclipsed the old house, trying to outpace the long shadow of her political past. And in the post-submergence Bangkok of the future, a band of savvy teenagers guides tourists and former residents past waterlogged, ruined landmarks, selling them tissues to wipe their tears for places they themselves do not remember. Time collapses as these stories collide and converge, linked by blood, memory, yearning, chance, and the forces voraciously making and remaking the amphibian, ever-morphing city itself"--Provided by publisher.

Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction, this brilliantly reported and beautifully crafted book explores the clash between a medical center in California and a Laotian refugee family over their care of a child.

Dr Tambiah describes the religious practices and beliefs of the people of a remote village in north-east Thailand, relating them to the wider context of the civilization in which they are embedded, and examining the relationship of the religious practices of the villagers to the classical Buddhist tradition. Because they have based their studies on the Sanskrit and Pali literature, Western observers have tended to dismiss much of the popular manifestation of Buddhism as debased. Dr Tambiah demonstrates that this judgement is misleading, and emphasizes that the contemporary village religion that he describes manifests continuities as well as transformations with respect to the classical literary tradition. The village religion is described primarily through ritual.

This book is a tale about a girl who was born into an unexpected reality. We laugh at the unexplained and tend to mock what we don't understand. This girl was born into a world that didn't want her.. She found love with her Grandmother in the northeastern farms of Thailand. At the age of six she encountered a near death experience that forever changed her life. During the course of her first seventeen years she experienced coming back from the other side: She witnessed a public suicide, and an old man being publically beaten to drive out a spirit that people believed made him ill: She was visited by spirits that would give even the strongest person nightmares. The book is very entertaining when you see how this child copes with everyday life experiences as well as the supernatural experiences. At the age of thirteen she was able to catch a thief. At an older age she was able to deal with spirits that wanted nothing more than to do harm, I mean physical harm. This book is about a little girl with more inner strength than most of us can possibly comprehend. She tapped into her inner self and found the courage to accept and to rationalize their very existence. This book is about a little girl named by a nurse because no one was around to give her a name. Her name is Nongnooch Mercer.

"Seven Peppercorns" covers the vast scope of traditional Thai medicine practices including: Thai element theory, physical therapies, medical Buddhism, herbal medicine for massage, divinatory practices, and spirit medicine; all held within the context of a Thai bodyworker’s instructional manual. This is not another step-by-step Thai massage photographic sequence book, but rather an in-depth training in the theory behind the steps, with instruction in a wide range of esoteric Thai physical therapies designed to bring practical understanding of Thai bodywork as it is practiced by traditional doctors in Thailand. "Seven Peppercorns" is divided into twelve main segments; each segment containing several chapters. The organizational flow takes the reader from introduction, overview and history, through an understanding of Thai anatomy, including element, point, and sen line theory, to instruction in Thai diagnosis, actual physical manipulations and practical application of the shamanistic and Buddhist components of traditional Thai medicine as it applies to bodywork; all in an easy-to-follow well organized format. Included in this guide are Thai self care practices and exercises as well as treatment guidelines for specific disorders. "Seven Peppercorns" serves as both an instruction manual and a reference book fully annotated with appendixes, notes, glossary, bibliography and index. The straightforward academic informational writing is gentled with moments of conversational author-to-reader comments (often humorous), and peppered with short personal narrative stories that bring the reader into the sensory tapestry of Thailand. It is intended as a stand alone manual, or as a text book for Thai massage instructors to use in classes.