Barbara Tedlock's The Beautiful and the Dangerous: Encounters with the Zuni Indians is a fascinating book. The author accompanied her anthropologist husband to the Southwest in the early 1970s. She became so intrigued by the wonder and the terror of Zuni sacred beliefs and practices that she switched her career path from art to ethnography.

Tedlock's friendship with a tribal elder and his wife enables her to explore their sacred songs and ceremonies. She witnesses the activities of Zuni sacred clowns, the making of pottery, the butchering of a deer, the preparation of special foods, and poignant prayer and healing rituals. Throughout these accounts, the author is sensitive to the poverty of most Zuni Indians and their susceptibility to alcoholism and debilitating diseases.

Tedlock concludes: "In today's rapidly changing multicultural world we are all becoming ethnographers, gathering, inscribing, and interpreting what others say and do in order to make sense of our own sayings and doings." The Beautiful and the Dangerous is a tribute to the spirituality of these survivors.