I don't expect you to do my research for me, although you and the discussion lists you are on have a lot more stored research than I do. I also disagree that I'm being particularly ethnocentric. One point, the Aztecs and Mayas are not South American. Here is a paper that did a wide-ranging cross-cultural study of the matter. Bottom line- a number of African societies had mediums and healers but were not really shamanic.

Michael James Winkelman 1990. “Shamans and Other "Magico-Religious" Healers: A Cross-Cultural Study of Their Origins, Nature, and Social Transformations,” Ethos 18(3): 308-352.


"The characterizations of shamans and other magico-religious healing practitioners provided here are based on a cross-cultural study (Winkelman 1984, 1986a; Winkelman and White 1987) that utilized a 25 percent stratified subsample1 (n = 47) of the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample (SCCS) (Murdock and White 1969). The SCCS is the best statistical sample available, and both the sample and the analyses employed here have utilized controls for diffusion and sample unit intercorrelation, major sources of sampling, and inference problems in cross-cultural research (see Dow, Burton, White, and Reitz 1984). The subsample utilized here includes societies from all of the major regions of the world and covers a time span ranging from 1750 B.C. (Babylonians) to the present century. (1) The subsample does have its limitations in representing the range and variation in language groups, and limited regional representation prevents analysis of regional patterns. The pinpointed time of the SCCS tends to focus on societies in the past, when they were under less influence from foreigners, particularly Western Europeans. This historic focus precludes consideration of magico-religious healers found in modern cosmopolitan societies. However, the variety of practitioners found in this study appears to represent much of the variation found cross-culturally in contemporary societies.

(1)Societies in the sample used here include Afn'ca: Narna Hottentot, Kung Bushmen, Ovimbundu, Mbuti, Ibo; Circum-Mediterranean: Wolof, Fulani, Fur, Kafa, Arnhara, Tuareg, Babylonians, Romans, Kurd; Eurasia: Sarnoyed, Toda, Kazak, Garo, Vietnamese, Sernang, Tanala, Japanese, Chukchee; Insular PacrJic: Iban, Alor, Kimam, Lesu, Pentecost, Marquesans, Trukese, Atayal; North America: Montagnais, Kaska, Twana, Paiute, Hidatsa, Creek, Zuni, Aztec; South America: Bribri, Callinago, Sararnacca, Jivaro, Siriono, Tupinarnba, Cayua, Mapuche.
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"The present study finds that altered states of consciousness as a basis for training magico-religious healers are universal. The common physiological parameters underlying a variety of altered-state induction procedures (Winkelman 1986b) suggest that this biological basis provides the substratum from which these universally distributed trance and healing practices are derived. The research reported here indicates that increases in social complexity bring about the transformation of shamans into other types of magico-religious healers-the shaman/healer, healer, and medium, discussed below."
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"The variables actually used to characterize the magico-religious healers are reported in Winkelman (1984); an updated/revised variable and data set is available on computer disk (Winkelman and White 1987). The variables used included assessments of magicoreligious practices in the following areas: selection procedures, such as illness, involuntary visions, spirit selection or possession, self-selection, vision quests, purchase, social inheritance or succession, political appointment, social labeling, and biological inheritance; training, such as solitary quests, training by spirits, group instruction, and uses of trance; altered states of consciousness, including conditions labeled as soul flight or possession, and the use of such procedures as auditory driving (e.g., chanting, singing, and drumming), fasting, drugs, austerities, isolation, sleep and sleep deprivation, seizures, collapse, unconsciousness, and so forth (cf. Winkelman 1986a);power relationships, such as animals and animal spirits, individual spirits, possessing spirits, superior gods, mana/impersonal power, and concerns with the control over and awareness of use of power; magico-religious activities performed as a practitioner, including healing, divination, propitiation, agricultural rites, protection, and malevolent acts (e.g., cause illness, kill, destroy crops); techniques employed, such as massage, physical care, herbal remedies, spells, power discharges, control of spirits, manipulative, imitative, and exuvial magic, charms, exorcism, spirit control, and sacrifice; context and motive of activities assessing whether activities were performed in private, family, or community settings, and at individual request, the practitioner's need, or as a social function (calendrical rites); and sociopolitical evaluations, including social and economic status, role specialization, practitioner group organization, life-cycle activities, sex role restrictions, psychological characteristics, moral evaluations, and political, legislative, judicial, and military powers."
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[BOM After analysis, these practioners were classified as follows-- notice that they include a number of African

Healer and Medium

Igbo curer dibea ( M )
Igbo oracle aghra, igm, kamala, ibini ( H )
Wolof M'Dnrp or [Ifdrar ( M )
Wolo fya bopa ( H )
Fulani mo h ior kmdo ( M )
Fulani bokajo or ndamowo ( H )
Fulani mwdibbo, modibbe (Islamic) ( H )
Amhara zar, balazar ( M )
Amhara dabfara, debfzra (Catholic) ( H )
Tuareg friends of Kel Asouf ( M )
Tuareg marabouf, shofra, amekclleou, Imiliman
(Islamic) ( H )
Babylonia oracle- raginfu ( M )
Babylonia exorcist ashipu, mashmash ( H )
Toda teuol, fewdip01 ( M )
Toda utkoren, ufpol ( H )
Kazak baqca, baski, bagsh ( M )
Kazak molah, iman (Islamic) ( H )
Vietnamese Dong ( m y , Dong, Phu Dong, Ba Dong, Ong Dong ( M )
Vietnamese T h y (myphap, T h y phu fhuy, T h y nagi, T h y boi ( H )
Tanala mbiasy manangatra ( M )
Tanala mbisay nkwo ( H )
Marquesa tauapaca, faua m k o , taua hiko efua ( M )
Marquesa fahum o'ono (o'oko ( H )
Japanese miko, kyso ( M )
Japanese ascetic kitosh kannushi (SH)
Saramacca gadu,gadu ma bu ( M )
Saramacca obia, obiamc, man mggr obia ( H )


Healer (or Medium)
Ovimbundu ochimbanda, chongo, charfi
Fur magician (SH)
Furpuggee (Islamic)
Kafa ekko, eqqo, ego ( M )
Garo kamal
Alor seer ( M )
Mapuche machi

The Aztecs in this paper were classified as “Shaman/healers”

What Winkelman finds is that as groups change from hunter/gatherers to farmers and as the complexity of a society increases there is a shift from (1)shaman to shaman/healer to healer ; (2) medium; (3) priest; (4) Sorcerer/witch

Bernard