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David Abram’s ‘A More-Than-Human World’

September 29, 2008

In David Abram’s ‘A More-Than-Human World’, the author paints a vivid picture of a natural environment that generally goes unseen, unheard, and unfelt in western culture. Throughout his studies in Southeast Asia, Abram worked closely with Shamans, sorcerers, and other practitioners of the “supernatural”. During this time he was exposed to village societies that possessed an astounding appreciation for natural phenomena that would go largely unnoticed in the west. Abram explains “that which is regarded with the greatest awe and wonder by indigenous, oral cultures is, I suggest, none other than what we view as nature itself” (150).

Abram’s most profound conclusions were in regards to the role of “spirits” in the indigenous cultures he studied.

“While the notion of “spirit” has come to have, for us in the West, a primarily anthropomorphic or human association,… the “spirits” of an indigenous culture are primarily those modes of intelligence or awareness that do not possess a human form.”

Abram came to this conclusion after he witnessed a villager leaving offerings of rice for colonies of ants, or “spirits”, which surrounded the village. He soon realized that this seemingly quant custom served the important purpose of keeping the ants satisfied and away from the stores of food kept in the village itself. Witnessing this deep integration between the human and non-human world would have a profound effect on Abram, and he soon found himself able to interact with nature in a way that he never had before. First with ants, and then with fireflies and spiders, Abram “learned of the countless worlds within worlds that spin in the depths of this world that we commonly inhabit” (153).

Tellingly, upon returning to the United States, David Abram found himself slowly losing the deep connection with nature that he had forged in the villages of Southeast Asia. He was no longer able to fully appreciate the natural world around him as the “sentient landscape slowly faded behind” his “more exclusively human concerns” (154). Abram lamented the loss of this “vital source of nourishment” as he resumed life in a culture largely disconnected from nature’s “spirits”.

Filed under: Perspectives on the Environment