"A Language in Which to Think of the World" –Animism, Indigenous Traditions, and the Deprovincialization of Philosophy of Religion

A growing number of critical voices within the philosophy of religion have emphasized the need for an expanded vision of this area of inquiry, a vision that promotes the subject’s “deprovincialization” (Sharma 2006) by enabling and actualizing discussion of a wider range both of religions and of religious phenomena than has standardly been the case. Such developments are urgent not least because the preoccupation with issues surrounding the rationality of a highly abstracted “theism” fosters an unduly restricted comprehension of religious possibilities. Although efforts to broaden the subject are increasing, the areas that remain underexplored include the forms of religion typified by the communities that have come to be known most commonly as indigenous peoples.

In view of the paucity of material on indigenous traditions within the philosophy of religion itself, one means of improving the situation is to look towards debates in other disciplines. The work of many anthropologists is a fertile resource, as are certain discussions in the field of religious studies. Among the topics to have generated vibrant debate in these disciplines since the 1990s is that of animism. Having, to a large extent, fallen out of favor among scholars of indigenous religions in the mid-twentieth century, talk of animism has gained fresh approval over recent decades as a means of identifying certain tendencies or orientations that are immanent in the ways in which many indigenous peoples relate to their environment. Indeed, some scholars have spoken of a “new animism” that manifests in the worldviews and lifeways not only of indigenous peoples but also of Neo-Pagans and environmental activists (e.g., Harvey 2017).

This article takes animism as a central concept around which to develop philosophical engagement with indigenous religions. Beginning by examining the origins of the concept and its recent revival, the article then turns to existing treatments of animism by a small number of philosophers. Richard Eldridge and Brian Clack, for example, have emphasized the poetic quality of animistic ways of thinking and behaving, and Mario von der Ruhr and D. Z. Phillips have articulated how we might usefully hear in the words of animistic peoples “a language in which to think of the world” (Phillips 2001: 158–9). While these approaches, which regard animistic talk as illustrative of a particular perspective on the world, are helpful as far as they go, there is a danger of oversimplifying our understanding of that perspective if insufficient attention is paid to the variety of ways in which indigenous peoples interact with their environments. To guard against this danger, the article examines the ongoing debate among anthropologists, historians and other scholars concerning the “ecologically noble savage,” a phrase first coined by Kent Redford (1991). As is often the case when a topic is scrutinized carefully, the conclusions to be drawn in relation to this debate are complex. But gesturing towards complexity is itself a helpful lesson for the philosophy of religion, encouraging – at least among those who wish to participate in the deprovincializing project – further methodological and interdisciplinary innovation.