Sanapia: Comanche Medicine Woman

This little book gives valuable insight into the Comanche culture of healing and the training of at least one of its healers. I only wish it was even more detailed and broader in its scope. I am grateful to the author and to Sanapia herself for their efforts to preserve this essential and often overlooked part of Comanche culture. We can all learn from these ancient ways. Particularly those of us in the healing arts.

While this ethnographic study was informative, it suffered from a curious lack of concrete specifics about Sanapia's greater social context.

Since I am Comanche, I really enjoyed reading about this woman. It was a shame that her children did not wish to follow in her path, and of how much knowledge was lost forever with no one to take her place.

very enlightening on a culture that is rapidly passing.

Good scholarly, ethnographic study, but not enough for those interested in native medicine and Comanche spirituality, Definitely worth reading, just makes you want more such as what specific plants did she use and specific techniques. Very sad that she might be the last Comanche medicine woman.

As an author myself, I appreciate what author David E. Jones did--keep a memory alive of a "medicine woman" he had come to know. I found it helpful in my writing my Native American history book THE COMANCHE (Chelsea House, due out 2010). Some passages are unclear and a little choppy, though, which is why I gave it three stars. I would have liked it to be longer, and more like a story--a complete biography. David, I'd like to see this more fleshed out, somewhat more refined, and longer. Rework it and get it republished! In the meantime, though, all people who consider themselves well versed in Native American history should read this. [...]

I took Dr. Jones in 1997, for the Indians of the High Plains class, at UCF, Orlando. He is, without a doubt, one of the most articulate, fascinating, and knowledgable people I have ever had the pleasure of knowing. Sanapia is based on the time he spent with a Comanche woman of the same name, and it is a fascinating glimpse into the customs of the Comanche tribe. He spends a great deal of time discussing the spiritual concepts of the Comanches, as well as the use of various plants for ritualistic purposes. I recommend this book to anybody not only to anthropology students, but also to anybody with even a slight interest in Native American beliefs/culture.

David Jones gives an overview of Comanche history and a biography of Sanapia and her tradition training in Comanche doctoring and lore. Highly interested for historians as well as anthropologists, or anyone interested in Native American life and custom.