Landscapes of Origin in the Americas : Creation Narratives Linking Ancient Places and Present Communities.
Title:
Landscapes of Origin in the Americas : Creation Narratives Linking Ancient Places and Present Communities.
Author:
Christie, Jessica Joyce.
ISBN:
9780817382476
Personal Author:
Edition:
2nd ed.
Physical Description:
1 online resource (221 pages)
Contents:
Contents -- List of Illustrations -- Preface and Acknowledgments -- Introduction - Jessica Joyce Christie -- I. NORTH AMERICA -- 1. The Center of the World: The Principle People and the Great Smoky Mountains - Christopher Arris Oakley -- 2. Xeroxed on Stone: Times of Origin and the Navajo Holy People in Canyon Landscapes - Polly Schaafsma and Will Tsosie -- 3. Nu-vagantu-, "Where Snow Sits": Origin Mountains of the Southern Paiutes - Richard Stoffl e, Richard Arnold, Kathleen Van Vlack, Larry Eddy, Betty Cornelius -- 4. Origin Narratives, Places, and Concepts among the 'Namgis, a Kwakwaka'wakw Group in British Columbia, Canada - Jessica Joyce Christie -- II. MESOAMERICA (CULTURAL REGION WITHIN CENTRAL AMERICA) -- 5. Malinalco: A Place between Heaven and Earth - Manuel Aguilar-Moreno -- 6. The Map of the Province of Maní: A Record of Landscape and Northern Maya Lowland Concepts of Origin - Merideth Paxton -- 7. Ancestral Presence at the Navel of the World: Francisco Sojuel and Santiago Atitlán - Allen J. Christenson -- III. SOUTH AMERICA-REGION OF THE ANDES -- 8. Landscapes as Metaphor: Resources, Language, and Myths of Dynastic Origin on the Pacific Coast from the Santa Valley (Peru) to Manabí (Ecuador) - Patricia J. Netherly -- 9. Inka Pacariqtambo: It Depends Which Eyes Are Looking at It - Jessica Joyce Christie -- References Cited -- Contributors -- Index.
Abstract:
Landscape is a powerful factor in the operation of memory because of the associations narrators make between the local landscape and the events of the stories they tell. Ancestors and mythological events often become fixed in a specific landscape and act as timeless reference points. In conventional anthropological literature, "landscape" is the term applied to the meaning local people bestow on their cultural and physical surroundings. In this work, the authors explore the cultural and physical landscapes an individual or cultural group has constructed to define the origins or beginnings of that cultural group as revealed through shared or traditional memory. The cultural landscapes of origins in diverse sites throughout the Americas are investigated through multidisciplinary research, not only to reveal the belief system and mythologies but also to place these origin beliefs in context and relationship to each other. In a continual interaction between the past, present, and future, time is subordinate to place, and history, as defined in Western academic terms, does not exist.
Local Note:
Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, 2017. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries.
Genre:
Electronic Access:
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