African Spirits Speak: A White Woman's Journey into the Healing Tradition of the Sangoma

African Spirits Speak: A White Woman's Journey into the Healing Tradition of the Sangoma

by Nicky Arden
African Spirits Speak: A White Woman's Journey into the Healing Tradition of the Sangoma

African Spirits Speak: A White Woman's Journey into the Healing Tradition of the Sangoma

by Nicky Arden

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Overview

The moving story of an expatriate coming to terms with her country's history, and her joyous spiritual and emotional rebirth as an African healer.

• One of the first accounts of the mysterious sangomas, the healers of South Africa's black population.

• A mystical journey that will appeal to those wishing to reunite with their roots and a more spiritual life.

Set against the stirring backdrop of a crumbling apartheid regime, African Spirits Speak is the lyrical account of white South African Nicky Arden's journey into the world of the sangomas, the diviners, doctors, psychologists, and priests of South Africa's black population.

While in her early twenties Nicky fled South Africa with her husband as the stranglehold of apartheid tightened on her native land. For twenty-two years they lived in California as expatriates--never once returning to their homeland--until a deep depression, followed by a spiritual awakening in the California desert, compelled Nicky to return to South Africa. During her visit, while exploring deep in the bush, she unexpectedly met an old black medicine woman--a sangoma. This meeting would change her life. Few white South Africans are even aware of the world of the sangomas, but this prophetic old woman saw in Nicky the spirit of a fellow healer and set the author on a mystical journey that would reunite her soul with its African roots. Thus began her astonishing and complex initiation into a nearly unknown world and her quest to discover the truth about herself and her heritage.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781620553497
Publisher: Inner Traditions/Bear & Company
Publication date: 02/01/1999
Sold by: SIMON & SCHUSTER
Format: eBook
Pages: 272
File size: 725 KB

About the Author

Nicky Arden is the former director of San Diego Youth and Community Services, a social service agency. She and her husband divide their time between San Diego, California, and Johannesburg, South Africa.

Table of Contents

1 In the Beginning
2 The Time of Tears
3 Where the Only Sound is Silence
4 Morongo Valley, Meditation. and Mother Earth
5 The Weaving Thread
6 The Emerging Pattern
7 The Work Begins
8 The Second Night
9 Herbs and Politics
10 Spirit Riffles and Porcupine Quills
11 Alina
12 Herbs to Cure, Herbs to Hide, and Spirit Names
13 The Initiation
14 Learning to Divine
15 The Work Goes on and Western Worries
16 Return to the Bush
17 Killings and Drummings
18 Madota Thanks the Spirits
19 Spirit-Speak
20 Clients and Lessons
21 Farewell for Now
22 Back into the Motherhood
23 Return to Africa
24 Passages
25 Visiting Balfour
26 Prayers, Transmigrations, and Strange Happenings
27 Dreadlocked and Oiled
28 A Meeting about Children
29 Whisks, Warps, and Visions
30 A Country Reborn
33 Elections
34 Giving Thanks

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"A fascinating account of [the author's] search for acceptance by a tribal community. . . . Highly recommended for collections on social sciences, women's studies, and spirituality."

"A strong and unusually concrete spiritual memoir."

"African Spirits Speak is a poignant initiatory dive into the self.. . .Nicky Arden brings courage and wisdom back from her journeys to share with us all. The clear bell that she rings is truly a gift."

"A rich earthy, heart-wrenching account, this is a difficult book to put down once the journey has begun; the reader is advised to set aside plenty of time to absorb it. "

Malidoma Some

African Spirits Speak is a poignant initiatory dive into the self. . . .Nicky Arden brings courage and wisdom back from her journeys to share with us all. The clear bell that she rings is truly a gift. -author of The Healing Wisdom of Africa

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