Pagans: I'm curious about Shamanism?

i’m not sure, but let me know if you find anything good 🙂

it would be best to look into the shamanism techniques prevailent in your country or town. Here is australia, it is best to practise aboriginal shamanism as the spirits of that people own this land –
i dont know of any good sites but i know of a good book that teaches how into incoporate “celtic shamanism” into your craft.

You might want to run a search-by-path on http://www.witchvox.com for “Celtic Shamanism.”

Oh. My. Gods.
Shamanism is the first Pagan religion I was interested in. :3
Let me see what I can find again in links for you…
Ah, here’s a good one. Lists the traits for different animal totems:
http://www.geocities.com/~animalspirits/index1.html
Here’s just a bunch of other links…
http://www.shamanscave.com/articles/contemporary_shamanism/so_you_want_to_be_a_shaman
http://www.tripzine.com/listing.php?smlid=345
http://www.ttrotsky.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/tribal/ritual.htm
I hope if you do try anything, you figure out who your Spirit Guides are sometime soon! The Other Realms can be a fun place to be, if you’re not a complete dodo head and do stupid things.
Best luck on your learning and journey.
– 17 yo Pagan

There are not really any “rituals” in Shamanism. The core is journeying to the lower or upper worlds. The journey is like a visualization meditation. I would suggest checking out Michael Harner’s website http://www.shamanism.org and reading his book the “Way of the Shaman” this is in my opion the best book on shamnism to start out with since Michael Harner is credited with the revitalization of what he called Shamanism. Another good book I read is Thomas Dale Cowan “Shamanism: As a Spiritual Practice for Daily Life” both books give great examples of the various journeys to find power animals, healing, divination ect.

Harner is probably the most well-known for what he calls “Core Shamanism” – it’s sort of a universalist approach towards spirit-work*, trying to focus on shared practices such as trance, etc.
If you’re looking for a particular tradition’s approach to spirit-work, I’d recommend checking with experts in that tradition. I know that’s not terribly helpful at a high level, but it’s best to get that info direct from the horse’s mouth, as it were.
If you’re just looking to get started, your best bet is to practice meditation and trances – those will be the fundamental skills to have before you really start.
* – Many people prefer the term “spirit-work” to “shamanism”, since shamanism refers to the practices of a specific people. Likewise, most of the shamanistic tribal traditions include initiation via near-death experience, which by nature isn’t a particularly safe thing to just up and try.

Shamanism isn’t a religion so much as it is a spiritual practice (there’s a subtle difference). It takes years to learn properly, and is not an easy path to take.
Shamanism in books is NOT the same as shamanism in traditional societies like Native American tribes. What comes from books is largely drawn from Michael Harner’s core shamanism, outlined in his book “The Way of the Shaman”, which essentially took shamanic *techniques* found in many cultures out of their cultural context and boiled them down to pure practicality. Some people try to place core shamanism into a Native American or other cultural context, but it’s not the same. I would recommend searching for “plastic shamanism” to get some perspectives from Native folk on the topic.
If you’re still interested (which is fine–neoshamanism and core shamanism can still be quite effective) here are a few books to get you started:
The Way of the Shaman – Michael Harner
Exploring Shamanism – Hillary S. Webb
Shamanism – Mircea Eliade
The Shaman – Piers Vitebsky
Shamanism: A Reader – Graham Harvey (editor) – the paperback is available, though you may have to go through the hardback page if you buy it on Amazon
As for animal totems, I’ve reviewed a LOT of books on the topic since that’s my specialty. You can read reviews at http://lupabitch.wordpress.com/tag/animal-magic/ . I’ve also written one of my own, though it’s not entirely a beginner’s text–if you already have some knowledge of paganism and magic in general it’s not too hard to pick up, though. It’s located at http://www.thegreenwolf.com/ffbb.html
Hope that helps! 🙂