Deveveux] MOHAVE ETHNOPSYCHIATRY AND SUICIDE 179 



and as a ghost doctor as well, Fathauer concluded that these various 

 powers were either inherently interrelated, so that one and the same 

 individual necessarily exercised all of these functions and held the 

 various statuses pertaining to them cumulatively, or else that the 

 foreign disease itself was closely related to the ghost illness.^^ 



It is proposed to show that the accumulation of these various powers 

 by a single shaman is, as Fathauer's first hypothesis indicates, due 

 to the inherent relationship obtaining between these various powers, 

 and that such a patterned co-occurrence of interrelated powers in one 

 and the same shaman is actually an important characteristic of Mohave 

 shamanism. This, in turn, implies that Fathauer's second hypothesis 

 is simply a corollary of his first hypothesis. 



The basic point is the fact that shamans who treat hiwey lak usually 

 have the power to treat also either the other "venereal" disease called 

 hikurpk (e. g., Harav He:ya) or else those real obstetrical complica- 

 tions (e. g., Ahma Huma :re) that more or less resemble the difficulties 

 experienced by women whose hiwey lak takes the form of a ghost 

 pregnancy (pseudocyesis) (pt. 4, pp. 150-175). Otherwise stated, it is 

 in the nature of Mohave medical practice to combine related 

 specialties.^* 



Thus, the real problem is not whether scalpers specialize also in 

 the treatment of the foreign illness, of the ghost illness, and of illness 

 (insanity) caused by a violation of funeral taboos, but why these 

 various specialties form a pattern, and how they are interrelated. 



In this connection, Fathauer (1951) suggests that there is a natural 

 affinity between aliens and ghosts, since both these pathogenic agents 

 are, in a sense, not real Mohaves. It was shown elsewhere (pt. 4, 

 pp. 128-150) that, even though the Mohave are convinced that the ghost 

 of a dead Mohave remains a Mohave even in the land of ghosts, there 

 is a definite psychological tendency to equate, affectively at least, 

 aliens and the ghosts of one's relatives, not only in connection with 

 illness, but also otherwise.®'' 



The fact that these various powers are interrelated does not neces- 

 sarily mean that all scalpers acquire all of these powers. Even less 

 does it mean that these various powers are necessarily acquired simul- 

 taneously. Thus, even though Hivsu: Tupo:ma was a practicing 



°' Fathauer's third supposition, that, due to the breakdown of their culture, the modern 

 Mohave tend to confuse these various functions is, as will be seen, vmconvincing. 



»* The fact that the hiwey lak specialist may specialize either in the treatment of hiku : pk, 

 or else in the treatment of obstetrical complications has its parallel in occidental medicine, 

 in that a syphilologist may, in addition, specialize also in the treatment of the other 

 venereal diseases (granuloma inguinale, gonorrhea), or else in dermatology. 



°^ Thus, alien males, who are supposedly oversexed and endowed with huge phalli, are 

 actually projections of the small child's grossly fantastic image of the father, whose 

 "mysterious" (sexual) activities during the night make him In the child's eyes a nocturnal 

 ogre on the prowl (Devereux, 1950 a). 



