Table Of ContentEcologies of Participation
Postcolonial and Decolonial Studies
in Religion and Theology
Series Editor
Sheryl Kujawa-Holbrook, Claremont School of Theology
Series Editorial Board
Jon Berquist, Stephen Burns, Cláudio Carvalhaes, Jennifer Te Paa Daniel, Lynne St.
Clair Darden, Christine J. Hong, Wonhee Anne Joh, HyeRan Kim-Cragg, Boyung Lee,
Aprilfaye Tayag Manalang, Loida Yvette Martell, Stephanie Y. Mitchem, Jea Sophia Oh,
Nicolas Esteban Panotto, Jeremy Punt, Patrick Reyes, Joerg Rieger, Fernando Segovia,
Melinda McGarrah Sharp, Kay Higuera Smith, Jonathan Y. Tan, Mona West, and
Amos Yong.
This series responds to the growing interest in postcolonial studies and reexamines the
hegemonic, European-dominated religious systems of the old and new empires. It critically
addresses the colonial biases of religions, the academy, and local faith communities, in
an effort to make these institutions more polyvocal, receptive, and empowering to global
cultures and epistemologies. The series will engage with a variety of hybrid, overlapping, and
intersecting definitions of postcolonialism—as a critical discursive practice, as a political
and ideological stance concerned with exposing patterns of dominance and hegemony,
and as contexts shaped by ongoing colonization and decolonization. Books in the series
will also explore the relationship between postcolonial values and religious practice, and
the transformation of religious symbols and institutions in postcolonial contexts beyond
the academy. The series aims to make high-quality and original research available to the
scholarly community. The series welcomes monographs and edited volumes that forge
new directions in contextual research across disciplines and explore key contemporary
issues. Established scholars as well as new authors will be considered for publication,
including scholars “on the margins,” whose voices are underrepresented in the academy
and in religious discourse. Authors working in subdisciplines of religious studies and/or
theology are encouraged to submit proposals.
Titles in the Series
Colonialism and the Bible: Contemporary Reflections from the Global South,
edited by Tat-siong Benny Liew and Fernando F. Segovia.
Ecologies of Participation: Agents, Shamans, Mystics, and Diviners, by Zayin Cabot.
Ecologies of Participation
Agents, Shamans, Mystics,
and Diviners
Zayin Cabot
LEXINGTON BOOKS
Lanham • Boulder • New York • London
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All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Cabot, Zayin, author.
Title: Ecologies of participation : agents, shamans, mystics, and diviners /
Zayin Cabot.
Description: Lanham : Lexington Books, 2018. | Series: Postcolonial and decolonial
studies in religion and theology | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018007477 (print) | LCCN 2018015701 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781498568166 (Electronic) | ISBN 9781498568159 (cloth : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Religion—Methodology. | Religions—Comparative studies. |
Religion—Study and teaching. | Participation.
Classification: LCC BL41 (ebook) | LCC BL41 .C327 2018 (print) | DDC 200.72—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018007477
∞ ™ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
For My Wife, Elizabeth
Who Was There Every Step of the Way
Contents
Preface: A Note on Terminology ix
Introduction: Participatory Philosophia and our Planetary Predicament 1
1 Decolonial Mutations 31
2 Whitehead, Creativity, and Agential Functions 53
3 A Participatory Raft 75
4 Ecologizing Language: A Neo-Whorfian Agential Approach 93
5 Agential Bricolage: A Neostructuralist Hunch 121
6 Agential Participation: Toward Freedom and Concern 149
7 Participatory Knowing, Ecologizing Ethics 191
8 Mystics, Mutants, and Co-Authored Gods 215
9 Shamanic Perspectivism and Comparative Method 247
10 Talismanic Thinking as Comparative Method 271
Conclusion: A Guest Protocol 293
References 311
Index 331
About the Author 339
vii
Preface
A Note on Terminology
In order to read the argument offered in these pages, a certain charity is
required from the beginning. The use of terms like agents, shamans, mystics,
and diviners will scare off many a reader that might otherwise benefit from
engagement with this material. In writing this text, innumerable terms were
considered—for example, shamanizing, shamany, shamaning; divination,
divining, divinatory—but were all found too cumbersome. The argument in
these pages moves us away from overly noun-based languages. It calls into
question an over emphasis on individual experience, as well as tendencies to
essentialize both “persons” and traditions. And yet, for ease of both reading
and writing, nouns have not only been used, but highlighted. Shamanism, for
example, too easily becomes a homogenous essentialized tradition. Shamanic
body-swapping, the acts of shamans, can be freely associated with post-Prot-
estant individual experiences. Both of these are problematic, and yet, again,
nouns are used throughout this text. As such, there are four important points
to consider about terminology and reasons some might dismiss the arguments
in these pages before you begin.
First, it is important to note that throughout these pages, emphasis is
placed on four distinct linguistic starting points: relative, intrinsic, absolute,
functional. Language can be relative and noun based, whereby the external
ground is assumed in relation to a given person, place, or thing. For example,
“Let’s go to the left side of the boat.” In contrast, language can be intrinsic
and topographical. In such a scenario, nouns become less important than thick
rich descriptions. Language can be verb based. These tend to be verb-based
languages, where the act of description is more important than the speaker.
For example, “Tree on hillside.” This might mean the same thing as going
left around a boat, but the person’s verb-based assertion would not reference a
viewer, but rather describe an action that is context specific. Pointing out what
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