This is about the most salient differences between Old World (Eurasian) cosmologies and New World (or Amerindian) cosmologies, as seen by three Americanists, Franz Boas, Claude Lévi-Strauss, and Karl Anton Nowotny. Three possible (and correlated) distinctions are discussed: 1) the etiquette of ritual obligations for a metamorphic (primeval) sphere of beings, utilized as a major focus of political organisation; 2) ‘iconocratic’ instead of iconoclastic modes of government and social integration; and 3) substantial elements constituting the body and the cosmos alike (in the Old World).
- By M. Shobhana Xavier Since my arrival at CAS-E, I’ve been provoked by the question of what is (western) esotericism. It’s been only three weeks for me here at the centre,...
