Landscape and Cosmology

Abstract

The notion of the landscape has become a central issue in anthropological debates (Hirsch 1995). By comparing different conceptualizations of the relationship between people and land we can get a better understanding of our own categories of nature and landscape. But the notions of nature and landscape are not a universal categories. Each society has its own categories to conceptualize the land. Notions of landscape are always embedded in cosmological notions. Burial places, river-crossings, or mountains are not neutral places. They have meanings and values. A landscape derives its meanings and values from a wider whole encompassing the earth, the sky, the underworld, and the sea. It is populated by people, animals, imaginary beings such as dwarfs, spirits, spirits of the dead. It is also embedded in temporal categories. It has a history. Each place derives meaning from its history. Therefore a landscape is never objectively given, it is a social construction.