"This engagingly written book is a must-read for anthropologists working and teaching in the fields of religion, anthropological theory, medical anthropology, and alternative medicine. It will also appeal to a wide audience outside of academe because it provides ethnographic descriptions of little known but fascinating ritual healing practices." -Robert Anderson, M.D., Ph.D., Professor and Department Head, Sociology and Anthropology, Mills College "Spirits with Scalpels is a likeable and intelligent book, one that strikes an unusual balance between intimate ethnographic description and enthusiastic general anthropology, between historical background and state-of-the art theory. As scary as the last quote was, it is actually highly readable, and at its small size (about 200 pages) and low cost, it would make a worthwhile addition to courses in anthropology of religion, medical anthropology, and psychological anthropology. Scholars of those subjects will find it appealing, and students should be entertained by the dramatic accounts of spiritual healing and the tolerant blending of science and religion. I plan to refer to it in my own religion and psychological anthropology classes. See the full review: http://wings.buffalo.edu/ARD/cgi/showme.cgi?keycode=3454"--Jack David Eller, Anthropology Review Database "...[T]his book is a captivating read that provides some good ethnographic stories, an interesting overview of the sociology of religious movements in Brazil and some broad speculations about a model of spiritual healing. It is up to the reader to decide which part is most enlightening and/or useful for him/her."... -Ronald Fischer, Transcultural Psychiatry "Greenfield's ethnographic descriptions are captivating. Spirits with Scalpels will make an excellent textbook for courses in medical anthropology/sociology and for students in the medical field who are interested in issues at the intersection of culture and health. I will definitely use it for my classes, because through his analysis of spirit healing and cultural biology Greenfield clearly addresses anthropology's fundamental concepts, methods, and approaches." -Alexander RAdlach, Creighton University " Spirits with Scalpels is the culmination of a lifetime of pioneering research integrating fascinating insights about mind-body healing on all levels. He tells us the inside stories documenting healers in many of Brazil's diverse religious traditions. He updates it with the leading edge of the most recent laboratory research on the molecular-genomic foundations of mind and matter. This volume is a classic of field research that would no longer be possible to carry out today. " - Ernest L. Rossi, PhD, author of A Discourse with our Genes and The Psychobiology of Gene Expression " From the very first page, Spirits with Scalpels is very hard to put down. The reader is led on an adventure greater than any that NASA has promised. Author Sidney M. Greenfield, a widely trained and careful anthropologist, takes you step by step into the precisely documented, witnessed and filmed worlds of Spiritist surgery and other religious therapies in Brazil. If you do not want your mind expanded and new possibilities added to your belief system, do not read this book. The converse is also true. " - Lawrence LeShan, PhD, author of The Dilemma of Psychology and The Medium, the Mystic, and the Physicist: Toward a General Theory of the Paranormal "...Spirits with Scalpels is an outstanding book by an outstanding scholar... The book contains vivid accounts of the work done by a number of healer-me- diums and examines their interaction with patients. Each practitioner is placed in the context of his or her religious tradition. The result is fascinating anthropology and compelling reading."...Rafael L. Lopez Valdes Ph.D., Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology
