LEJRE FOLKEUNIVERSITET: LECTURE: Animism and Shamanism from Rock Art to Climate Crisis

Animism is not a distant phenomenon: the ancient Greeks and Romans were animists, as were the Vikings of the Iron Age, and hundreds of millions of people in South America and Asia are animists today. Shamans appear under different names in most animistic cultures throughout history, with the task of creating and maintaining connections to the spirits of nature and culture. But what does that role actually entail, and how have historians and anthropologists understood these traditions?

The lecture begins with Stone Age rock art and traces the threads through antiquity and the Viking Age to the present day. The speaker is Rune Engelbreth Larsen, an intellectual historian and author, former member of the Danish Ethics Council and currently a member of the Natural Science Committee of the Danish Nature Conservation Association. He has published the book 'Animism from Rock Art to Climate Crisis': https://alteria.dk/animisme/

The event is free but requires registration at: lejrefolkeuni@proton.me