[Linganth] 115th AAA Panel: Language in the Amerindian Imagination (CFP)

[Jan David Hauck]

Dear all,

We are organizing a panel for the upcoming AAA meetings in Minneapolis
about language and ontology in the indigenous Americas.

Eduardo Kohn kindly agreed to be our discussant.
If you're interested please send your abstract offline to Guilherme
Orlandini Heurich (UFRJ) <guiheurich at gmail.com>  and Jan David Hauck (UCLA)
<jan.d.hauck at ucla.edu>.


Abstract:

*Language in the Amerindian Imagination*

A particular imagination of language as autonomous medium of representation
has played a central role in the constitution of the naturalist ontology
(Descola) as it facilitated the scientific and political separation of
nature and society (Latour), as well as the establishment of all kinds of
smaller and greater divides between speakers of “proper” languages and
those of dialects, mixed languages, or otherwise “other” forms of
communication (Bauman/Briggs).

Ethnographies of the indigenous Americas have provided rich evidence of
alternative ontologies, while also documenting a wide range of verbal
practices that defy the privileging of the symbolic, representational,
denotational, or referential properties of language (and culture).  And
these ethnographies describe alternative modes of relation between humans
and non-humans in which language can be twisted, broken, or transformed
through indigenous voices.

Bringing various lines of research together, in this panel we want to
explore the place of language in Amerindian ontologies.  If the notion of
language usually invoked in linguistic and anthropological scientific
practice is based on a "naturalist" or "modern" understanding of the world,
what would a theory of language look like that springs from radically
different metaphysical underpinnings?  Is language an intersubjective
practice, a bodily habit; is it a part of the soul or double?  Does
language possess a subjectivity or agency of its own?

We are looking for contributions that explore these and related issues
through the analysis of Amerindian linguistic and semiotic ideologies,
mythology, and metapragmatic discourse, ritual practices and verbal art, or
everyday language use and interaction among and between species.  We are
especially interested in issues raised by recent transformations of
Amerindian lifeworlds and language practices and language and cultural
contact.  By situating this panel regionally in indigenous North and South
America, we hope to stimulate a conversation that is based on a common
ethnographic understanding of this area, but relevant comparative studies
from other parts of the world are equally welcome.



---

Jan David Hauck

Doctoral Candidate
Department of Anthropology
University of California, Los Angeles
http://www.anthro.ucla.edu/content/jan-david-hauck
https://ucla.academia.edu/hauck

<https://ucla.academia.edu/hauck>
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