When Gods Drown in Plastic

Since the turn of the twenty-first century, the category animism has seen a remarkable resurgence in Western scholarship, capturing the interest of many anthropologists, scholars of religion, and philosophers. Some authors have argued that animism can provide a model for a new environmental ethics that acknowledges more-than-human agencies and interdependencies. However, the question remains as to how so-called animist ontologies can transform not only individual moralities, but also the extractivist economic-political structures underlying the current crisis. In this article, we assess some of these claims by examining an Asian ritual tradition that is arguably animistic, while also containing elements of Buddhism, Daoism, and ancestor worship: the worship of whales, widespread along the coast of South and Central Vietnam. Fishing communities here believe that whales are divine beings, incarnations of the maritime god Ông Nam Hải (Lord of the South Sea)—also known as Cá Ông (Lord Fish)—who rescue people in distress at sea. When fishers find beached whales, they offer them elaborate funeral ceremonies and enshrine their bones in local temples. Whale worship constitutes a way of relating to the physical environment, and rituals help people respond to problems such as coastal erosion and overfishing. However, there is no evidence suggesting that this particular animistic belief system has given way to environmentalist action, let alone induced systemic change. Animistic ontologies certainly have ethical dimensions, and they may provide ways for people to make sense of and cope with Anthropocenic crises, but that does not mean they teach people how to act sustainably. At the very least, that would require an active process of translation and adaptation.