Åke Hultkrantz, religionsøkologi og studier av sjamanisme på 1960- og 1970-tallet

Abstract

This article analyses parallel and interwoven discourses as background factors for the religio-ecological approach to shamanism developed by the Swedish historian of religions Åke Hultkrantz. Historical discourse analysis and the related analytical concepts “fields of discourse” and“discursive knots” from the scholar of religions Kocku von Stuckradare used as a general framework to identify different research-historical developments and points of contact. By analysing literature and conclusions from earlier research, the article paints a picture of significant changes in studies of shamanism in the 1960s and 1970s and relates them to societal changes in the Western world during the post-war years. One of the main arguments is that the environmental movement’s heightened recognition during these years influenced how shamanism was both researched and practiced in the West. A question about primitivism as a shared discursive knot ties these discourses together and exemplifies how shamanism is seen as a part of non-Western or pre-Christian hunting societies even today. Hultkrantz’s theoretical approach is highlighted as an example of comparative phenomenology of religion that dominated post-war research on religion, especially promoted by the historian of religions Mircea Eliade and visible in his book Shamanism.