Neo-Paganism, Animism, and Kinship with Nature

Abstract

‘Love for and kinship with nature’ is the first principle of the Pagan Federation and putatively provides the foundation for contemporary Western Pagans’ relationships with the natural environment and other-than-human beings. This article explores the meanings of kinship with nature and animism for neo-Pagans and asks whether expressions of such a worldview are more than metaphorical, rhetorical or simply wishful. The meanings for some indigenous animist peoples are discussed and compared with neo-Pagan understandings. The article concludes that kinship with nature is meaningful for most neo-Pagans largely within the domains of religious belief, ritual, and recreational activity; it does not usually determine the rules of everyday life in the ways it does, or traditionally did, for indigenous animist peoples. This is not to say that it is not a relevant or useful proposition in the modern or postmodern world. A neo-Pagan worldview provides a model of social relations among ‘people’ of all kinds, along with an ideological and motivational charter for human action which has urgent, contemporary ecological relevance.

Notes

1. Many, perhaps most, contemporary Western Pagans prefer to call themselves ‘Pagan’ to express a broad affinity with other nature religions which have been generically labelled ‘Pagan’. Some scholars of the movement follow this practice in keeping with participants’ preferences (and perhaps also their own, given that many are insiders to the movement). Others use ‘neo-Pagan’ to draw attention to contemporary Western Paganism as a new religious movement (originating in the twentieth century) and to distinguish this iteration of ‘Paganism’ from traditional, Christian-derived uses and meanings of ‘Pagan’ and ‘Paganism’. In this article, I use ‘Pagan’ and ‘neo-Pagan’ interchangeably.

2. The countries affiliated with the Pagan Federation International are listed at http://www.paganfederation.org/, access date: 24 September 2010.

3. The principles of The Pagan Federation are found at http://www.paganfed.org/about-princ.shtml, access date: 24 September 2010.

4. Irving Hallowell (1960) introduced the term ‘other-than-human’.

5. See the official web site of The Pagan Federation: http://www.paganfed.org/paganism.shtml, access date: 24 September 2010.

6. See Harvey's discussion of this issue in Chapter 6 of Animism.