The Dance of Person and Place: One Interpretation of American Indian Philosophy (review)

The aim of this book is to demonstrate that American Indians have a world-view that is consistent, intelligible, and legitimate. It is a deft and self-aware exemplification of the task of cross-cultural comparison.

The overall strategy in the argument is to employ a modified version of Nelson Goodman’s notion of world-making and then construct a simplified model of the American Indian worldview. Norton-Smith accomplishes this difficult task and in the process modifies Goodman in a realist direction, making a strong case that the Native view deserves intellectual respect. The writing is accessible and shows a deft and helpful interplay between abstract language and concrete illustrative material.

He opens with an argument for the use of the label “American Indian,” rather than “Native American” or “Indigenous.” He then points out that there is no single American Indian philosophy. Nevertheless, there are some common themes that are found across various American Indian cultures. Other interpreters might select a different set of themes, so this is one possible interpretation. Further, if philosophy is a distinct discipline, there is no analogue to it in American Indian culture. Yet ontological, epistemological, and axiological beliefs and actions abound in Native world versions.

Norton-Smith recognizes two challenges to his project. First, the sources for examining American Indian thought are unreliable. Older sources—linguistic studies, ethnographies, anthropological and archeological theories—are mainly filtered through Western eyes. Black Elk Speaks is an example. Newer accounts by Native writers lack a depth of knowledge of tribal traditions. The second challenge is that any translation of Native thought forms into Western language cannot do full justice to the original version. Thus, the best we can hope for is one possible rational reconstruction of a Native philosophy.

Chapter 2 sets forth Nelson Goodman’s constructivist view that “there is a plurality of internally consistent, equally privileged, well-made actual worlds constructed through the use of very special symbol systems—true or right-world versions” (17). Among the tenets are:

(1) the view that facts are fabricated by world versions; (2) the doctrine of ontological pluralism, that there are many internally consistent, equally privileged, well-made actual worlds; (3) the criteria for an ultimately acceptable world version; and (4) the view that ultimate acceptability is sufficient for truth, and true versions construct well-made actual worlds.

(16)

The author modifies Goodman’s nominalism into a constructive realism. The aim of the book is to show that the American Indian world version is an actual well-made world and so is worthy of respect and philosophical treatment from the Western perspective.

The first theme of the reconstructed American Indian world version is the importance of relatedness. Knowing the world involves actively searching previously overlooked connections between experiences. This point is frequently made by most Native stories. To search out the relatedness of humans to frogs, for example, means that we learn to treat frogs respectfully as our relatives. This also means that knowledge is principally not propositional but procedural—not so much knowing something as knowing how to do something.

The second theme is an expansive concept of persons. All sorts of nonhumans can be acknowledged to be persons: animals, plants, physical forces, cardinal directions, Sun, Earth. But not all of these beings are persons. Nonhumans must participate in a social nexus, must become relatives. Likewise humans are not automatically persons. To become a real person means performing the ceremonies, assuming tribal roles, and participating in tribal life so that one becomes part of the kinship group. To become human, one must participate in social practices with obligations to other persons.

The third theme is the semantic potency of performances. Various speech acts (praying, singing, telling stories), dances, naming ceremonies, and gift traditions show how performance empowers the symbols, transforms participants, orders experiences, and helps construct the American Indian world. Here there is a critical engagement with John Locke and Marcel Mauss...