1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910370051303321

Autore

Guenther Mathias

Titolo

Human-Animal Relationships in San and Hunter-Gatherer Cosmology, Volume I : Therianthropes and Transformation / / by Mathias Guenther

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cham : , : Springer International Publishing : , : Imprint : Palgrave Macmillan, , 2020

ISBN

9783030211820

3-030-21182-7

Edizione

[1st ed. 2020.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (XXIV, 302 p. 58 illus., 34 illus. in color.)

Disciplina

306

299.681

Soggetti

Ethnology

Ethnography

Religion and sociology

Ethnology—Africa

Social Anthropology

Religion and Society

African Culture

Cultural Anthropology

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di contenuto

1. Introduction -- 2. Therianthropes -- 3. Transformation in Myth -- 4. Therianthropes and Transformation in San Art -- 5. Transformation in Ritual -- 6. Animals in San Dance and Play: Between Mimesis and Metamorphosis -- 7. Transformation and Hunting.

Sommario/riassunto

Exploring a hitherto unexamined aspect of San cosmology, Mathias Guenther’s two volumes on hunter-animal relations in San cosmology link “new Animism” with Khoisan Studies, providing valuable insights for Khoisan Studies and San culture, but also for anthropological theory, relational ontology, folklorists, historians, literary critics and art historians. In Volume I, therianthropes and transformations, two manifestations of ontological mutability that are conceptually and phenomenologically linked, are contextualized in broader San myth.



Guenther explores the pervasiveness of human-animal hybridity and transformation in San expressive culture (myth, stories and storytelling, ludic dancing and art, ancestral rock art and contemporary easel art), ritual (trance dance curing, female and male rites of passage) and hunting. Transformation is shown to be experienced by humans, particularly via rituals and dancing that evoke animal identity mergers, but also by hunters who may engage with their prey animals in terms of sympathy and inter-subjectivity, particularly through the use of “hunting medicines.”.