María Sabina’s chants: poetry and words of power

Abstract

This is an approach to the songs of the Oaxacan shaman in order to appreciate her confidence in the power of the word and how this humble woman is empowered by recognizing herself as a wise woman capable of using the power to speak with the Holy Children and heal with the words. María Sabina becomes a symbol of the shamanic wisdom associated with the sacred use of the teonanacatl. The characteristics of a shaman are discussed to distinguish him from the sorcerer and the magician. Her chants reveal an oral tradition associated with the Marian litanies with some important differences. María Sabina’s chants celebrate trust in the language full of possibilities to unite word and action. Her chants arouse the nostalgia of that full certainty in the word.