00:01.28 Alan Um, okay gang it's your ah it's Dr. Allen Garfinkel here and we have we're honored and blessed to have John Hoops professor university of Kansas. Talking about his experience and expertise in all things related to the far latin America and south american realm both the archeology the ethnography, the remarkable realm of theology and I think in this final segment. Going to do a bit of talking about the repertoire of animals that appear in both the artifacts themselves and in the consciousness of the theological metaphors for this culture. John shall we kick it off. 01:03.34 Alan And I'm ah I'm honored to have you on board. Thank you for the opportunity. 01:04.50 John Hoopes Absolutely it's it's so so so nice to be talking about these things Alan so thank you so much for giving me a context to to do that? Um, but the issue the issue of the animals actually one of the first things I need to say is that. We are animals so we're going to be talking about not only humans but also non-human animals that that's sometimes cumbersome to say but I think within the worldview and cosmology of indigenous peoples. It's important to recognize that that humanness. Ah personhood. Um, is something that's viewed in a different way so that personhood is extended to persons with wings persons with fins persons with two legs and persons with four legs. Um. And so this distinction between humans and animals we fall into so neatly in our western theology um is not something that was shared by indigenous peoples of the Americas and I think that probably one of the reasons it it wasn't was simply because um, domesticated animals. Sheep goats cattle pigs and the like were so much a part of the daily life of people of the ancient Middle East and and and Europe but there were relatively few domesticated animals in the Americas um, and so the kind concept of of herd animals or. Beasts of burden or those types of things that's a european introduction. Um, and that I think is important to keep in mind when approaching questions of sort of theology. Um, which of course is is about deities and and and divinity. Um, and the recognition of the identities of. Um, personhood and non non non human animals in in the natural world um of the objects that we've been talking about the the jadite and gold objects from the isthmo colombian area which is this area between ah Honduras and. Northern Colombia sort of sits between Mesoerica and and South America and intersects simultaneously with Mesoerica the Antilles Amazonia and the Andes so I I tend to like to think of it as the center of the Americas that's really touching. Touching on all of these other places um is is the way that people found particular animals good to think um and among the earliest representations that we have are those of birds. Um. 03:44.49 John Hoopes And representations of birds are are ubiquitous from the jadite objects all the way up to gold objects and in fact, ah the spanish remarked on what they called agilas or eagles that were gold gold eagles that were worn by the leaders. They encountered the indigenous leaders that they encountered. Um. This was a 2000 year tradition of decorating oneself with images of of birds. Well why are birds. So so important why are birds so so critical well I think part of it is recognizing that powerful individuals. Um. Shamans in particular if you want to use that term although we can we can unpack that a bit but individuals who had magical abilities um could also be birds and they and they could they could fly in the air they could perch in a tree. Um and part of this cosmology. Interestingly um, has to do with control. Um and has to do with knowledge. Um, and um, you know one of the things that birds are ah in in the natural world and especially in places like central America and Northern South America they're ubiquitous they're everywhere there's always a bird that you can see someplace. Um, and we have an expression in english that we use. Um, where ah you know somebody knows something and you don't know how they found it out and they say well a little bird told me. Well I think something similar was happening in indigenous practices in that the shaman might know something that he wasn't supposed to know or she wasn't supposed to know and you sort of wonder how how did they know that how did they find out that information. Um, well. Ah, very simple explanation is that they were transformed into a bird and they saw it happen because they were sitting in the tree or flying overhead. How did you know that? oh do you remember that Eagle that was in the sky. Oh yeah, well that was me I was watching you um and the idea of ah of. Of um, birds being associated with surveillance and with knowledge may be 1 of the reasons why they're selected early on as symbols of those people who are all seeing all knowing or at least have. Deeper insight and deeper knowledge than than other people do um, does that make sense. 06:11.90 Alan How did the ind indigenousit people recognize birds and think about birds were they particular super mundane beings was there associated qualities about only certain birds that were depicted. 06:36.41 John Hoopes Absolutely there were there were very particular birds that that they tended to focus on because of what their qualities were um, among the most important birds was the harpy eagle which was the principal alpha predator of the sky harpy eagles are large enough to. Carry off monkeys I don't think they could carry off a small child although people sometimes worry about that. Um, but they are very um, you know, very very devastating predators with huge huge talons and sharp beaks and and and they can be quite dangerous. Um. Another category of birds that they frequently represented were vultures which are associated with the transition from life into death because of course they can detect death they smell death they go after dead things and then they eat them and a vulture disposes of carrion and disposes of the dead so vultures were a very important bird. Um, another important bird was the Tocan which has a very long beak. Um, and people often associate you know two cans with twocans sam and and and and breakfast cereal and things like that. But the reality is that 2 cans are very aggressive birds. Um, and they're predatorial birds they will destroy the the nest. 07:49.71 Alan Well. 07:52.18 John Hoopes Other birds and they will attack the young and eat the the young of other birds or carnivorous birds to cans are not not really very nice birds but they're beautiful and and they're also something you can spot very easily because of their bright yellow colored beaks. And then another category of birds that was often represented are these kind of magical little tiny birds or hummingbirds and there's a huge variety of hummingbirds in the isma colombian area. Um, and ah, you know you don't have to watch a hummingbird for very long to realize just how magical that creature is. Ah, there's a reason why Aztecs picked Huisi laportcheli as as as this hummingbird deity but I would say those are probably the main the most important and and most frequently represented birds would be would be the the the harpy eagle the vulture. 08:39.17 Alan So those birds make a lot of sense to me in terms of being predators and also involved with Civil Life death experience as well as being ah you know some of the most magical or supernatural or. 08:43.90 John Hoopes Um, the two can and the hummingbird. 08:57.90 Alan Exotic of the bird Kingdom What other animals are part and parcel of that repertoire. 09:10.88 John Hoopes Well I would say after after birds the other important category is is reptiles and in particular Iguanas Crocodiles and Caymans Um, who are just as the um. 09:11.32 Alan M. 09:28.38 John Hoopes Harpy Eagle is the alpha predator of the air. The crocodile is the alpha predator of of brackish and freshwater places now yet another important predator is the shark and there are representations of sharks. But that's a saltwater predator. But. Inshore and and and most commonly encountered predators were the ones of lakes and deltas and coastlines and and those included the crocodiles. So crocodiles were very fearsome very ah, powerful animals and of course. Grow to enormous sizes. Um, and so that those are also ones that we find represented ah more often and well actually we have some examples of of crocodiles in in Jade work. We also have examples of crocodiles in goldward. 10:12.51 Alan Fascinating is there. Um, go ahead. 10:21.93 John Hoopes And it and well I was say another dimension to both of these Allen which I think merits some attention. Um is the fact that we also find what I refer to as theoryanthropic beings that is beings that are part and. Part animal part human that will have a bird's head and a human body or that will have a crocodile head and a human body. Um, and ah this is a way of visually representing the fact that humans can transform into these creatures. Um, and you know they're. There are stories that abound in Amazonia and central america alike where um, the person who's the shaman or the sorcerer is found to have been wounded. Um and someone invariably comes up with a story. Well yes I I shot a jaguar last night. 11:13.23 Alan That was me. 11:17.86 John Hoopes And and the the so shaman or sorcerer will say oh that that was me or someone will identify it as that that being him um that um the idea that that that humans can transform into non-human animals. Um and move in the forest or swim in the water or fly in the air or do these other types of things. 11:34.32 Alan Now within the oral traditions The sacred narratives I don't like to use the term mythology but the ah those types of stories that that try to characterize the theological realm the cosmology of the people. 11:37.46 John Hoopes Um, they were sort of like the ah the indigenous superheroes of the ancient world. 11:53.52 Alan Are there these animalhuman super mundane persons Sometimes yeah. 12:04.44 John Hoopes Ah, sometimes we have we have stories of um we have ah stories of women being impregnated by snakes and giving birth to snakes. We have stories of ah shamans. Ah. 12:19.36 Alan Well. 12:21.54 John Hoopes Transforming into Jaguars or sometimes we have stories of parts of shamans being transformed into jaguars there's a very famous or very well-known. Ah breebery story that comes from Costa Rica um about a shaman who was killed and the people who killed him took his head and were. Carrying it home with them when the head begins biting people. Um, and then they to keep it from biting people. They sort of put it in ah in a safe place and at night it turns into a huge jaguar that then breaks out of its enclosure and and eats people. Um, so. Yes, there are stories that refer to this theoryanthropic transformation and I like to point out that they have parallels in western stories as well. Um, you know Dracula can be turned into a bat. Ah the werewolf um is a man who turns into a wolf. Ah, these ideas about humans turning into animals is something that we still and I talked to super talk about superhero think about Spiderman think about Batman um, this this idea of humans with with. 13:22.13 Alan Um, yeah. 13:29.42 Alan It does doesn't it and it it seems to capture the imagination of quite a plethora of viewers and and others and certainly the magical realm as you keep alluding to the wizardry and the the shamanism is something that. 13:31.70 John Hoopes Animal qualities non-human animal qualities is something that still persists in our own stories today. 13:49.39 Alan You've talked about and I guess bringing us full circle you were mentioning that even in contemporary culture. There is a fascination if not an obsession with this kind of of dealing. Maybe you can allude to that to some extent. 14:12.58 John Hoopes Just yes I think um, it's very much a part of our contemporary culture. These are not things that were done only by indigenous people. There has been a tremendous fascination. Um in in magic and in shamanism and in healing. Um, and these are things that I found especially in intriguing um in part through some of my own ah personal experiences and and research including ah visits to the burning man festival in the early 2000 where in fact, ah, there's a lot of. Contemporary shamanism that takes place in terms of ecstatic dance. The use of of psychotropic substances the creation of ritual spaces in which unusual things can occur and unusual connections are made resulting in tremendous insight and creativity. Um, and so I think that. Shamanism is still very much with us. Um, and I think anyone who likes to have little magical objects whether they be Kaleidoscopes or crystals or whatever will be able to relate to the fact that these objects that were being made by ancient people probably were were being used and in in fashions that are. That are similar not the same but but quite similar to the way that that we use objects in order to to to manipulate our own experiences into ones that are departing from what our normal everyday experiences are that that seeking of a magical experience. Um, whether through objects or through. Ecstatic dance or through chants or trance or the use of psychotropic substances are very much a part of this pursuit of something that is more than what our normal everyday existence is. 15:51.36 Alan And it seems as though the interface between science and religion are becoming more and more of an interconnected thread and especially when it comes to the medicinal side understanding of the use of shamanism and psychotropic substances to heal. And Alter. Someone's physiology and Health has been found to be quite a remarkable platform or or you know a medicinal realm and this is becoming more and more accepted by the medical profession. I'm sure you found something along those lines as well. 16:38.15 John Hoopes Yes, of course and I think it's also something that ah resonates quite well with the whole theme of rock art which is the context and in which we're discussing all of this is that rock art whether it appears whether it appears and in in caves or whether it appears in. 16:43.14 Alan Definitely. 16:54.90 John Hoopes Special places on large boulders in waterfalls or or in deserts or wherever is is created for the purpose of of generating this non-normal sense of awe this this sense of the presence of something unusual that's inspiring or this contact with. Ancient this contact with something primordial this contact with the people who were here hundreds or thousands of years ago is all a part of I think how some of this rock art is created in in the first place and ah something that we haven't. Talked about that I really would like to encourage your listeners to pursue further is that there's an enormous amount of rock art. Um in the ismo colombian area in Costa Rica in Panama in Colombia um, and it really deserves much more attention than it's received. 17:45.45 Alan Well thank you so much we've run it out time but we've just scratched the surface if you use a rock art analogy and John you've been an incredible resource and your reflections you know have have have resonated with me. 17:46.24 John Hoopes Ah, especially because we can contextualize it now within a much deeper understanding of the cultures that would have made and used it. 18:04.20 Alan At at various levels. So I hope we can have you on again and we can continue this discussion further well, that's about it for today. Thank you see you next week all you rock art podcasters see on the flip flop.