Performing Flights: Perspectivism and Shamanic Epistemology in the Amazon

Abstract

Alfred North Whitehead famously compares the philosophical method of knowledge acquisition with the process of flying an airplane. Likewise, “shamanic flight” marks stages of cognitive processing in navigation through perceptible and imperceptible worlds. This article focuses on the cosmovision of the Amazon people Huni Kuin, the Whiteheadian method of imaginative rationalization, and the concept of Amerindian perspectivism. This study also investigates shamanism as an experience of knowledge generation. Furthermore, “shamanic flight,” as an ecstatic technique experienced in many diverse Amerindian rituals, will be explored as a method in the discovery and organization of nonhuman alterities. Finally, Amazonian-based shamanic epistemology will be discussed within a “multinaturalist” ontology.