From: "emily wilson" <ecameronw-AT-hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: PUPT: a hello and a help me please...
Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 09:14:51 -1000


Hello Emily and others,
I've been a lurker on this list for a while and have yet to post anything, 
but I was reminded of your query as a professor Jane Marie Law from Cornell 
was speaking last night, in an introduction to a Bunraku performance at 
UMass.  She spoke about the connections between Bunraku theater and Japanese 
Shamanism.  The first part of the Bunraku performance was a piece of the 
"Sanbaso", in which the puppet represents a Shinto priest whose ritual dance 
brings good fortune to the house where it is performed.  Prof. Law suggested 
that the puppet is able to survive spirit posession, where a human body 
would be destroyed by the experience.  She also mentioned other uses of 
puppets and figurines as "body substitutes" to attract misfortune/ill 
health/evil spirits away from vulnerable human beings and onto the dolls 
instead. I thought it was fascinating, and so I just looked up her book, 
_Puppets of Nostalgia: The Life, Death, and Rebirth of the Japanese Awaji 
Ningyo Tradition_ published by Princeton University Press in '97.  I have it 
in my hand now.  I haven't read any of it yet, so I can't exactly recommend 
it, but it seems like a good lead.  I'd love to hear more about your 
research and findings in the future.
Good Luck,
Emily Wilson

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