Amerindian rebirth : reincarnation belief among North American Indians and Inuit : Session on Native North American reincarnation beliefs : Annual meeting : Papers

Until now few people have been aware of the prevalence of belief in some form of rebirth or reincarnation among North American native peoples. This collection of essays by anthropologists and one psychiatrist examines this concept among native American societies, from near the time of contact until the present day. Amerindian Rebirth opens with a foreword by Gananath Obeyesekere that contrasts North American and Hindu/Buddhist/Jain beliefs. The introduction gives an overview, and the first chapter summarizes the context, distribution, and variety of recorded belief. All the papers chronicle some aspect of rebirth belief in a number of different cultures. Essays cover such topics as seventeenth-century Huron eschatology, Winnebago ideology, varying forms of Inuit belief, and concepts of rebirth found among subarctic natives and Northwest Coast peoples. The closing chapters address the genesis and anthropological study of Amerindian reincarnation. In addition, the possibility of evidence for the actuality of rebirth is addressed. Amerindian Rebirth will further our understanding of concepts of self-identity, kinship, religion, cosmology, resiliency, and change among native North American peoples Contents 5 Acknowledgments 7 Preface 9 Foreword: Reincarnation Eschatologies and the Comparative Study of Religions 11 1. Introduction 25 2. Reincarnation Belief among North American Indians and Inuit: Context, Distribution, and Variation 39 3. Saving the Souls: Reincarnation Beliefs of the Seventeenth-Century Huron 62 4. The Reincarnations of Thunder Cloud, A Winnebago Indian 79 5. Behind Inupiaq Reincarnation: Cosmological Cycling 91 6. From Foetus to Shaman: The Construction of an Inuit Third Sex 106 7. Born-Again Pagans: The Inuit Cycle of Spirits 131 8. The Name Never Dies: Greenland Inuit Ideas of the Person 147 9. Kutchin Concepts of Reincarnation 160 10. Reincarnation as a Fact of Life among Contemporary Dene Tha 180 11. The Concept of the Person and Reincarnation among the Kwakiutl Indians 201 12. Person, Time, and Being: Northwest Coast Rebirth in Comparative Perspective 216 13. Rebirth and Identity: Three Gitksan Cases of Pierced-Ear Birthmarks 235 14. Cultural Patterns in Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation among the Tlingit Indians of Southeastern Alaska 266 15. Alternate-Generation Equivalence and the Recycling of Souls: Amerindian Rebirth in Global Perspective 287 16. The Study of Reincarnation in Indigenous American Cultures: Some Comments 308 Appendix.A Trait Index to North American Indian and Inuit Reincarnation 323 References 381 Culture Index 415 General Index 419 Contributors 433 "Until now few people have been aware of the prevalence of belief in some form of rebirth or reincarnation among North American native peoples. This collection of essays by anthropologists and one psychiatrist examines this concept among native American societies, from near the time of contact until the present day. Amerindian Rebirth opens with a foreword by Gananath Obeyesekere that contrasts North American and Hindu Buddhist Jain beliefs. The introduction gives an overview, and the first chapter summarizes the context, distribution, and variety of recorded belief. All the papers chronicle some aspect of rebirth belief in a number of different cultures. Essays cover such topics as seventeenth-century Huron eschatology, Winnebago ideology, varying forms of Inuit belief, and concepts of rebirth found among subarctic natives and Northwest Coast peoples. The closing chapters address the genesis and anthropological study of Amerindian reincarnation. In addition, the possibility of evidence for the actuality of rebirth is addressed. Amerindian Rebirth will further our understanding of concepts of self-identity, kinship, religion, cosmology, resiliency, and change among native North American peoples."--Publisher website This book is designed to bring attention to the prevalence and the variety of rebirth and reincarnation concepts among North American Native peoples both in the past and in the present.