Manifesting Thunder Beings: The Convergence of Archaeology and Ethnography in Assiniboine Masks from the North American Great Plains
Manifestación de los Seres del Trueno: convergencia entre arqueología y etnografía en las máscaras assiniboine de las Grandes Llanuras de Norteamérica
Some historical Northern Plains Indigenous masks feature designs that display formal resemblances with those found on rock art and on objects made of shell that were traded over large parts of North America during the pre-Columbian period. This article argues that these similarities are unlikely to be coincidental. It examines evidence for the longevity of beliefs associated with pre-Columbian imagery by drawing on repertoires of oral tradition that continued to play a significant role in rites and ceremonies in which ethnographically recorded masks had a central function. Addressing the role of material culture in Native North American societies, the article draws attention to a typology of ritual objects that has not yet received adequate scholarly attention. It argues that these objects should be understood as part of Indigenous North American practices of transformation, based on ideas of inter-species relationships and communication with other-than-human beings, rooted in past iconographies and religious ideologies.
Keywords: Native North American art, masks and masking, manifestation, agency, ritual objects, performativity, ontology.
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