// \\ By Cleo Mikutta “It is hard to write a beautiful song. It is harder to write several individually beautiful songs that, when sung simultaneously, sound as a more beautiful polyphonic whole. The internal structures that create each of the voices separately must contribute to the emergent structure of Read more
Making Senses: Poetic Knowledge of Nature in Science, Art, and Shamanic Ritual by Kocku von Stuckrad Download a PDF Version of this essay (6 MB) Abstract The five senses of seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, and touching are regarded in European and North American tradition as the central channels through which human Read more
Counterpoint: Conducting Edward Said’s ‘And Also’ by Alissa Jones Nelson Binaries are bogus constructions. We live in a world of continuum, of three-dimensional spiral. Linear progress is a myth we’ve told ourselves almost to death. It’s hardly original to suggest that contemporary approaches to the complexities of globalization–multiculturalism, populism, cosmopolitan Read more
Berlin’s Contrapuntal Agency: Or, How Admitting the Knowledge of Place Can Change Science, Politics, and Culture by Kocku von Stuckrad Do places have knowledge? Do they have memory? If places convey these to us, is this in some way agency? And what would science and politics look like if we Read more
The Time of Loneliness by Whitney A. Bauman We live in a world of sped-up reality. Sociologists describe the fossil-fueled pace of our world as a “space-time” crunch. This means that the communities near to us are intersected by global flows of energy and information on a daily basis and Read more
Beyond Epistemicide: Toward Multiple Forms of Knowledge by Joram Tarusarira Knowledge production, authentication, and dissemination require transcending a universal, fundamentalist[1] canon of thought that privileges one knowledge system at the expense of others. With modernity, a particular knowledge system came to occupy and dominate the academy and claim universality, neutrality, Read more
Ten Theses on Academia, Society, and the Planetary Future: A Counterpoint Manifesto by Whitney A. Bauman & Kocku von Stuckrad [For a German version of this manifesto, please click here.] 1. The so-called “Anthropocene” is the result of several thousand years of human thought-regimes that emphasize human domination and exceptionalism. Read more
In Memoriam: Michael J. Harner (1929–2018) by Kocku von Stuckrad Michael J. Harner passed on the morning of February 3. As announced by the Foundation for Shamanic Studies, his transition to the other world happened peacefully, surrounded by family and friends. He was 89 years old. Harner earned his PhD Read more