Cosmopolitical Trans-temporalities: Relational Landscapes, Shamanism and Indigenous Futurism in Southeast Asia
Ivan Tacey
Ethnos April 20, 2026 DOI: 10.1080/00141844.2026.2650472 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Population | The Batek of Malaysia |
| Topics | Shamanism |
| Key points | Argues that the Batek's cosmopolitical engagements unsettle colonial mappings of land, history, and identity while contesting environmental degradation, economic marginalisation, and political exclusion. Proposes that Batek shamanic, place-making, and mythopoetic practices navigate multiple ontological frameworks across a 'transtemporal zone,' challenging linear, state-imposed temporalities rather than representing a clash between incompatible worlds. |
Abstract
In Southeast Asia, Indigenous worlds have long been shaped through entanglements with outsiders. But how do such relations intersect with shamanic, place-making, and mythopoetic practices? This paper explores how the cosmopolitical engagements of the Batek of Malaysia unsettle colonial mappings of land, history, and identity, while creating space to contest environmental degradation, economic marginalisation, and political exclusion. It traces how origin myths are tied to land claims, how animist imaginations echo pre-colonial and colonial encounters, and how cosmopolitical practices appropriate foreign imagery and transform traumatic histories. Rather than viewing Indigenous actors as locked in the past – or cosmopolitics as a clash between incompatible worlds – I show how the Batek navigate multiple ontological frameworks, interweaving pasts, presents, and futures to challenge linear, state-imposed temporalities. Southeast Asian cosmopolitics thus emerge within a transtemporal zone, where shamans mediate relationships with diverse human and nonhuman actors, forging new forms of alliance and agency.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on shamanism, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ayahuasca Shamanism in the Amazon and Beyond | 2014 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Shamanism as the Original Neurotheology | 2004 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Cognitive Neuroscience, Shamanism and the Rock Art of Native California | 1998 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| From Culture to Experience: Shamanism in the Pages of the Soviet Anti-Religious Press | 2020 | Historical analysis | |
| Anthropology, Shamanism, and Alternate Ways of Knowing–Being in the World: One Anthropologist's Journey of Discovery and Transformation | 2010 | Reflective essay or personal narrative |