Shamanism and Crisis: Seeking Human Identity
The 21st century has begun in the midst of an epoch marked by radical anthropogenic changes and often described, perhaps somewhat problematically, as the Anthropocene. Interconnected changes include the transformation of ecosystems across the planet to orient them towards human needs, the pollution of landscapes, oceans and the planet’s atmosphere, climatic changes and mass extinction events. Entering these uncertain times has been accompanied by a widespread existential crisis relating to human identity – one that involves a sense of confusion about the position humans should have within the environment in which they live, and both guilt and fear about the human power to radically alter it. The ‘othering’ implied in the use of the term ‘environment’ (which carries with it a separation between humans and other species) leads, arguably, to an attitude towards other species and landscapes (which are in ‘nature’) that is instrumental; they only exist to be used by humans. This ‘naturalistic’ way of thinking and being, regarded by some scholars (Descola, 2013; Viveiros De Castro, 1998) as the ontology of modernity, is arguably the basis of the radical changes that have come about in the Anthropocene. A ‘naturalistic’ ontology has a very different perspective on the presence and nature of consciousness and sentience from that taken by animistic societies. In animism, connectivity, interaction and flux are emphasized, all kinds of matter may be regarded as containing life and hence consciousness which moves and flows and may be present to varying degrees. In the strictest version of the Cartesian, ‘naturalistic’ approach, on the other hand, consciousness does not flow, does not exist to different degrees; it is either present or absent. While there is a good deal of debate around what is actually meant by consciousness, the possession of it is often associated with being human, and is often regarded as the key means of differentiating humans from other animals. In capitalist societies, attitudes to other species, and the treatment of them, have been accompanied – and justified – by the view that only humans are conscious and sentient. This contrasts sharply with the perspectives of animistic peoples and their shamans, who regard all matter as having the capacity to be sentient, conscious persons, expressed in the presence of spirits or souls. However, Cartesian dualities are not by any means universally accepted in Western modernities. There is a widespread, and growingly open and explicit, undercurrent of doubt, both in popular culture and within different scientific disciplines, regarding the truth and ethics of the view that we are separated from a mass of other species that are not sentient and exist purely for humans to utilize as they see fit. An increasing number of studies in the natural and social sciences have demonstrated the consciousness and sentience of many other lifeforms (Bekoff, 2006; Proctor, Carder, & Cornish, 2013; Rose, 2018; Smuts, 2008), thus breaking down Cartesian boundaries between human and animal, as well as a gamut of other dualisms. There is also wealth of research pointing to the centrality of connection, relationality and communication as inherent aspects of evolutionary processes, living systems and ways of ‘being’. The idea of distinct and indissoluble ‘individuals’ has not only been questioned by ontological anthropologists (Descola, 2013; Kohn, 2015; Viveiros De Castro, 1998) and by scholars in Science and Technology Studies (Haraway, 2016; Latour, 2017; Mol, 2014; ScheperHughes & Lock, 1987); it also has a long tradition in biology (Margulis, 1999) and biosemiotics (Sebeok, 2001; von Uexküll 1928). In this context, animism arguably has much to offer the West in terms of anconnected ways of understanding and engaging with reality; and shamans, who have the potential to help to regenerate connection and communication with other species. Crisis is, of course, central to being a shaman. In many societies, individuals become shamans through a personal crisis; and their main role is to address crises experienced by others. Shamans, spirit mediums and other practitioners in such societies (henceforth referred to generally as shamans) put things right when they go wrong – for an individual, for a group or for an entire society (which may well be a more-than-human society). Most of the crises they address are cosmopolitical (Latour, 2004; Stengers, 2005); which is to say they deal with problems, connections and relations with other species, spirits, and/or with representatives of a wider, connected consciousness, such as the Master of the Animals. In tackling such crises, shamans enter altered states of consciousness to engage with spirits, using particular senses, some of which are beyond or extensions of those used in everyday life. Shamanic practices focus on identities and subjectivities that are grounded in connection and relationality. While such practices are most developed in ‘traditional’, rural, or straightforwardly animist societies, they are also present in ‘modern’, urban societies. In the plethora of recent New Animism studies, many accounts have continued to focus on ontological difference between animists and ‘modern’ societies and have homogenized internal differences within shamanic and animist societies (Blaser, 2014, 2016; Holbraad, Pedersen, & Viveiros de Castro, 2014; Pedersen, 2007; Viveiros De Castro, 1998, 2004). Most of these studies have not paid attention to questions of political exclusion, ecological destruction, political action and how shamanic and animistic practices have been produced by particular historical conditions, or the presence of animistic beliefs in ‘modern’ societies and of ‘naturalistic’ beliefs in animist societies. We suggest the ontological differences between ‘modern’ and ‘animist’ societies are not as sharp as has been suggested. Despite the rise of organized religion and of science, animistic beliefs have persisted in Western modernities; indeed, there has been a rise in neo-shamanism and other ritual practices in ‘modern’ contexts, accompanied by a widespread desire to ‘re-connect’ with ‘nature’ and to recognize the sentience of other living beings. In this conference, we invite speakers to examine the multiple ways in which shamans – both those in animistic societies and neo-shamans – engage with spirits and non-human others in contexts of crisis. We want to look at how shamanic practices have developed during the Anthropocene and how this relates to reactions to crisis and ways of managing crisis.
We define crisis widely, to include, for example, overwhelming and rapid change; personal and group crises; economic and political crisis; violence; and environmental crises at multiple scales from the local to global. We are particularly interested in exploring ways in which shamans are being turned to in addressing the existential crisis in the relationship between humans and non-human others, rooted in the sense that humans need to rethink their relations with other entities and ecosystems, in a holistic and interconnected fashion that addresses the nature of being, identity and consciousness. We are interested in ways in which shamans are helping individuals and groups to shape their identities and to seek a new kind of human identity that is more connected to other beings and to a wider whole. In this, we want to move beyond questions of ontological difference between classically animist societies and ‘modern’ societies and look at all kinds of shamanistic practices, broadly interpreted and including neo-shamans, within a wide range of societies. We invite panels and speakers to discuss this from a variety of angles. We encourage those submitting panel proposals and papers to be innovative in approaching these ideas – even heretical, in relation to academic orthodoxies! Themes that might be covered include: How are shamans engaging with spirits of petroleum (Cepek, 2016; Kopenawa & Albert, 2013), palmoil and previously unknown disease-causing spirits? How do doubt and uncertainty inform these encounters (Bubandt, 2015; Cepek, 2016)? How are ‘traditional’ societies mixing and matching animistic beliefs, and shamanistic practices, with organized religion and modern science? In what ways are ‘Western’ and urban societies moving away from organised religion and science towards animistic ontologies and ways of relating to reality, including those that draw on elements of both science and religion? What new definitions of spirits and attitudes to spirits are developing? What can science learn from animistic and shamanic thinking? Is scientific animism a possibility? How do shamanistic approaches to the nature of consciousness feed into their work and to the crafting of a new sense of the place of humans in the world?
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