Sacred Landscape and Pilgrimage: Indigenous Geographies in Native American and Indian Traditions

Abstract

The study examines the spiritual geography of Indigenous traditions that is contained in the transformative nature of landscape and their ritual practices. It explores sacred sites and the significance of traditional paths in pilgrimage as profoundly important to not only the communities being investigated but also as informative of a spiritual sensibility characteristic of many Indigenous cultures. Eliciting the nature of this understanding entails evaluating the physicality of place in the context of a vibrant, living entity imbued with ancestral memory and a cosmology that lends symbolic coherence to both the landscape and the rituals performed by its more-than-human inhabitants. Instances featured include sites integral to Lakota spirituality in the Black Hills, sacred mountains of the Navajo, and earthy tirthas of India, as well as various tribal pilgrimage routes. Ritual movement and storytelling are significant in promoting ecological ethics and cultural identity. The disruption of sacred geographies by colonization is addressed. These ongoing efforts to reclaim lands are emphasized. Connections are made between Indigenous spatial awareness on different continents. This enhances understanding of how land is absolutely sacred and central to Indigenous resistance and recovery.