Cultural Artifacts and the Oracular Trance States of the Sangoma in South Africa Part 5: Drums and Dance as Trance Inducers he drum is an essential trance-inducing instrument (see fig. 3). For example, one Sangoma, Paulina Mokoeana, described her experience of drumming to induce a trance as intoxicating: "My head is burning and dizzy. When you keep quiet and listening to the drums, sometimes the amadlozi [ancestors] will make you shake and you fall back."35 During the dancing and singing, accompanied by drumming, hyperstimulation of the body and the mind occurs. With exhaustion and hyperventilation, everyday consciousness is shifted,36 and a certain "openness" occurs, thereby allowing the establishment of a shamanistic trance and enabling the ancestors to "enter." It is interesting that the linguistic root of the words isangoma ("diviner" in Zulu) and mungoma ("diviner" in Venda or Tsonga) refers to the "drum."37 Specific rituals induce the trance state during the oracular practice of divination, which usually takes place in front of the indoor shrine, a sacred space. To initiate the divination ritual, snuff is taken and imphepho is burned. Sangomas use a set of bones, shells and other items (such as coins, dice, seeds, twigs)—collectively called the "bones"—in their divination practice. The "bones" are thrown on an impala skin. The trance state is one of focused concentration, during which the ancestors provide omens and visions. The scattering of the "bones" and the ritual of interpretation that follows provide the Sangoma with knowledge about the patient’s state of health, social and psychological problems, and his/her future, as well as the necessary medication to heal ailments and socio-psychological and spiritual imbalances.		Fig. 3. Daniel Baloyi, a Tsonga Sangoma beating drums to induce a trance. The three-drum set is used, when inducing a trance state, to invoke the ancestors who reside in rivers and lakes (bhandawuu).
				35. Lambrecht, "A Psychological Study," p. 385. 36. Arnold M. Ludwig, "Altered States of Consciousness" (1969), in Charles T. Tart, ed., Altered States of Consciousness (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1990), pp. 19–33. 37. Hammond-Tooke, Rituals and Medicines, p. 116.
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