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Animism

Respecting the Living World

By: Graham Harvey

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Paperback | 26 October 2005 | Edition Number 1

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Paperback
262 Pages

Age
22+

Dimensions(cm)
0.06 x 0.09 x 0.15

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How have human cultures engaged with and thought about animals, plants, rocks, clouds, and other elements in their natural surroundings? Do animals and other natural objects have a spirit or soul? What is their relationship to humans? In this new study, Graham Harvey explores current and past animistic beliefs and practices of Native Americans, Maori, Aboriginal Australians, and eco-pagans. He considers the varieties of animism found in these cultures as well as their shared desire to live respectfully within larger natural communities. Drawing on his extensive casework, Harvey also considers the linguistic, performative, ecological, and activist implications of these different animisms.

Industry Reviews

No recent author has emphasized it or dealt with its implications as thoroughly as Harvey.Choice Choice The strengths of this book are its fluid and engaging...writing; its openly committed stand on the central question, i.e., whether or not animals, plants, rivers, etc. are people, and its use of major ethnographic sources as evidence, together with conversations with indigenous peoples. -- Stewart Guthrie, Fordham University

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Preface and Acknowledgements	p. xi
From Derogatory to Critical Term
From Primitives to Persons	p. 3
Stahl's elements	p. 3
Hume's sentiments	p. 4
Frazer's trees	p. 5
Tylor's spirits	p. 5
Huxley's antagonism	p. 9
Marett's powers	p. 10
Freud's projections	p. 10
Durkheim's totems	p. 11
Mauss's gift	p. 12
Piaget's development	p. 14
Guthrie's anthropomorphism	p. 15
Philosophers' panpsychism	p. 17
Hallowell's other-than-human persons	p. 17
Anthropologists' revisitation	p. 20
Kohak's trees	p. 22
Goodall's chimpanzees	p. 24
Garuba's literature	p. 25
Quinn's leavers	p. 26
Environmentalists' participation	p. 27
Re-cognising animisms	p. 28
Animist Case Studies
Ojibwe Language	p. 33
Grammar	p. 34
Stones	p. 36
Thunder	p. 38
Seasonal stories	p. 40
Ceremonies	p. 42
Tobacco greetings	p. 43
Waswagoning	p. 45
Legs and what's between them	p. 46
Living well	p. 48
Maori Arts	p. 50
All our relations	p. 52
Evolving relationships	p. 52
Violence and passion	p. 54
Tapu and noa	p. 55
Marae-atea	p. 57
Whare nui	p. 58
Whare kai	p. 60
Ancestral cannibalism	p. 61
Animist construction	p. 63
Enacting animism	p. 64
Aboriginal Law and Land	p. 66
Dreaming and Law	p. 66
Expressing the Dreaming	p. 71
Subjects and objects	p. 73
Time and events	p. 76
Visiting Alice	p. 77
Eco-Pagan Activism	p. 82
Defining Paganism	p. 84
Defining Paganism's nature	p. 85
Eco-Paganism on the road	p. 88
Paganism off the road	p. 90
Knowing nature	p. 92
Gods, fairies and hedgehogs	p. 94
Animist Issues
Signs of Life and Personhood	p. 99
Animals are people too	p. 100
Bird persons	p. 102
Fish persons	p. 103
Plant persons	p. 104
Stone persons	p. 106
The Elements	p. 107
Places	p. 109
Things, artefacts, fetishes and masks	p. 109
Humans are animals too	p. 113
Animals might be human too	p. 114
Death	p. 115
Death happens-deliberately	p. 115
Hunting and domesticating	p. 116
Death is a transformation	p. 117
Death rituals and myths	p. 118
Spirits, Powers, Creators and Souls	p. 121
Faeries and other spirits	p. 122
Ancestors	p. 125
Creators and tricksters	p. 128
Life forces	p. 129
Witchcraft substances and energies	p. 132
Souls	p. 135
Embodiment and spirituality	p. 137
Shamans	p. 139
Shamanic cosmologies	p. 140
States of consciousness	p. 142
Ecstasy, trance and possession	p. 144
Hallucination or vision?	p. 145
Eating 'souls'	p. 146
Killing life	p. 147
Surviving death	p. 148
Shamans as mediators and healers	p. 149
Animists' antagonists	p. 150
Cultural nature and shamans as seers	p. 151
Cannibalism	p. 153
Accusations of cannibalism	p. 153
Real cannibals?	p. 154
Arens' myth	p. 155
Compassionate cannibalism	p. 157
Eating enemies	p. 160
Cannibals as monsters, consumers and carers	p. 162
Animism and cannibalism	p. 163
Totems	p. 164
Ojibwe clans	p. 165
Updating the old totemism	p. 166
Revisiting totemism	p. 166
Revisiting other-than-humans	p. 168
Elders and Ethics	p. 169
The good life	p. 171
Wisdom	p. 173
Initiation	p. 173
Animism's Challenges
Environmentalisms	p. 179
Modernity's environmentalism	p. 179
Depths of green	p. 180
Ecofeminist particularity	p. 182
Sitting and listening	p. 184
Places	p. 185
Consciousness	p. 187
Solipsism	p. 187
Consciousness matters	p. 188
Cyber-consciousness	p. 191
Knowing bodies matter	p. 192
Relational consciousness	p. 193
Philosophers and Persons	p. 195
Personalist persons	p. 196
Phenomenological persons	p. 197
Feminist and queer persons	p. 198
Free and wilful ethical persons	p. 200
Other persons	p. 200
Quantum persons	p. 202
Post-dualist persons	p. 203
Conclusion	p. 205
Re-cognising modernity	p. 205
Re-cognising animism	p. 208
Depth and breadth, turtles and hedgehogs	p. 210
Bibliography	p. 213
Index	p. 237
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

Animism

Respecting the Living World

At a Glance

Paperback

Industry Reviews

Shipping

How to return your order

Defective items

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