A Fixture of Temple and Festival Life

A jitong typically operates in close association with a specific local temple and its resident deity, most often a martial or protective god such as one of the Wangye plague-expelling gods or various city and territorial deities, and is called on both for scheduled public appearances during a deity's birthday procession or annual festival and for private, walk-in consultations sought by individual devotees over illness, business trouble or family conflict. The medium is frequently accompanied by an assistant, sometimes called a sai, who interprets the jitong's often garbled or archaic speech, records or transmits the deity's pronouncements, and manages the practical side of a consultation, since the entranced medium is not expected to conduct ordinary conversation.

Scholarly attention to the role, notably David Jordan's ethnographic study of a Taiwanese village, has emphasized how thoroughly the jitong's authority is embedded in and dependent on the surrounding temple community rather than resting on any personal or institutional credential, making the office a clear illustration of how Chinese folk religion organizes religious authority through recognized function and community consensus in place of the ordination hierarchies characteristic of more centrally organized traditions.