Visiting the Six Worlds: Shamanistic Journeys in Canadian Mi'kmaq Cosmology

Mi'kmaq Indians' descriptions of journeys between worlds, as we find them in tales collected from the early seventeenth century to the early twentieth, are far too complex to fit into Mircea Eliade's model of shamanism or romantic images of Indians as being "at one with nature." The tales reveal six parallel worlds in which all types of beings belong to families, have wigwams, and search for food. The parallelism between worlds has no significance for beings living their ordinary lives, but it is of the utmost importance for understanding how differing types of beings in the stories (people, animals, supernaturals) achieve interworld journeys. The notions of cosmological deixis and perspectivism are used to explore the narratives and shed light on Mi'kmaq cosmology.