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Article: When Stones Come to Life.(Ojibwa people, and others, who practice animism)
- Article from:
- Science News
- Article date:
- June 5, 1999
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1999 Science Service, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Researchers ponder the curious human tendency to view all sorts of things as alive
While conducting fieldwork in eastern Canada more than 60 years ago among a hunting and trapping group called the Ojibwa, an anthropologist asked an old man if all the stones strewn about the landscape were alive. "He reflected a long while," the questioner reported, "and then replied, `No, but some are.'"
"This qualified answer made a lasting impression on me," the late A. Irving Hallowell recounted in a 1960 essay on Ojibwa beliefs.
The Ojibwa people, Hallowell noted, said that they communicated with many animals, objects, and events in their local environment. ...