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This chapter reviews the controversies of the 1980s and 1990s. It talks about Sam Gill who wrote a book called Mother Earth: An American Story in 1987. Gill argues that the basic idea of Mother Earth is an idea and an adept use of metaphor that the Native Americans had to employ in their negotiations with the US government, but never an actual goddess. Gill's argument is that the concept of Mother Earth was not originally or fully indigenous to Native American people. The chapter also describes Native American leaders, such as Russell Means, Ward Churchill, Deward Walker, Vine Deloria, and others that became activists against Gill during the 1990s that spoke at several Indian conferences and powwows throughout the country.

The chapter analyzes the third act of Shelley’s play, “Prometheus Unbound,” and follows the sequence of events from the fall of Jupiter to the release of Prometheus and his union with Asia. In this act, the tyrannical “Father” is overthrown indirectly through Prometheus and his foreknowledge, in union with the feminine—Mother Earth and his lover. Jupiter is replaced by his son Demogorgon, who is seen as a creative and unifying force, instead of destructive and oppressive. The influence of William Godwin’s philosophies are present in the play, which mirrors Shelley’s vision of an ideal society free from the power of tyrannical institutions and thus enabling its inhabitants to become reformed as well. Through his work, Shelley had intended to support and possibly effect this reformation. The act’s conclusion in the Spirit of the Hour’s speech expands Shelley’s vision for mankind to include a renewal of the cosmos as well.

This chapter considers some dramatic changes in the population of working women by the beginning of the 20th century, as well as continuities of the same ideals that had animated the earliest female industrial workers. It juxtaposes the hopes for self-culture of a generation of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe who worked in the sweatshops of New York with those of the earlier Lowell workers, and explores the fiction that they wrote and that was written about them. It looks closely at Emma Goldman as an extreme manifestation, both celebrated and notorious, of the consequences of working women's aspirations to literariness and self-reliance. Like Margaret Fuller, Goldman edited a literary periodical, Mother Earth, asserted the romantic primacy of her individual mind, and ignored the sexual restrictions of her time. Like Fuller's working-class contemporaries, she appropriated from the romantic ideals of transcendentalism principles probably not developed with someone like herself in mind. Like those factory workers, too, she was a passionate reader and writer and, like them, she was the subject, sometimes admired, frequently ridiculed, of other people's fascinated fictions.

The chapter begins with an accounting of the three versions of Prometheus’ story from Hesiod, Aeschylus, and finally, Shelley. Shelley’s play, “Prometheus Unbound” is contrasted with Aeschylus own drama, “Prometheus Bound.” The two plays differ in the resolution of the conflict. In the former, Shelley does not allow reconciliation between Prometheus and Zeus, unlike Aeschylus’ version, with its recurring themes of female subjugation and male aggression and seduction. The chapter covers the first act of “Prometheus Unbound” and analyzes the significance of the major and minor characters and their actions, in light of Shelley’s unique philosophy in life. In Shelley’s play, the feminine aspect—represented by Earth and Prometheus’ own mother—plays a major role in the denouement, and parallels are seen with Shelley’s own home life. In Shelley’s mind, goals of self-knowledge and self-respect could only be achieved through “mirroring,” and this is illustrated in his play.

Anthropocene Man worships himself via a creed of human exceptionalism and idolization of “tower of power” gods—speed, profit, domination, and accumulation. Anthropocene Man proclaims that he is becoming god—able to engineer a new genesis to replace nature, yielding a fully controlled manmade world. The divine role model for this project is the heaven-based and reportedly immortal, omnipotent, and purely male father god. Man’s self-deification is contingent upon deicide—simultaneously ecocide and matricide—of the original earth deity Mother Nature-Earth. Western ways of thinking reduce Mother Nature-Earth to mere metaphor, but this is wrong. Environmental justice theorists and activists worldwide speak to the reality of Mother Nature-Earth and call for the defense of the planetary Mother, including through the legal establishment of Mother Earth Rights.

This chapter explores the way in which the pilgrims celebrated menstruation as a way of bleeding without being wounded and countered Christian theories labeling menstruation as impure. An overview of the literature on the sacralization of menstruation introduces the main theories the pilgrims use for their ritual crafting. The chapter offers a detailed description of a pilgrim group’s ritual of offering of menstrual blood to Mother Earth and shows how it represents a refiguration of the Christian Eucharist. In this ritual context the pilgrims understand Mary Magdalene as a guardian of menstrual blood with many elements in common with the figure of the red dakini in Tibetan Buddhism. The chapter compares these crafted rituals with other contemporary menstrual rituals and refers to theories by Jean Comaroff, Michael Houseman and Simon Coleman. These rituals appear to be ways of making sense of menstruation at a historical moment when menstrual bleeding is no longer an inevitable event thanks to the most recent developments of the contraception pill. Menstruation appears as an event ambiguously related to both life and death and the menstrual offering can be seen as a celebration of the woman’s power to give birth but also of her choice not to have a baby. The author argues that through their menstrual rituals and their theories about sacred sexuality the pilgrims decouple sexuality from reproduction and question the religious and social system.

This chapter analyses the multiple meanings the pilgrims ascribe to the mountain, shrine and the cave of the Sainte-Baume. This was the most important pilgrimage site associated with Mary Magdalene. Following Jungian theories the pilgrims considered it a place to commune with Mary Magdalene and Mother Earth. The pilgrims learn from their leaders a kind of sacred geography whereby the mountain is a power place rich in healing energy where important ley lines intersect. The pilgrims believe that as other power places the Sainte-Baume was used in pre-Christian times to venerate the Goddess, until it was appropriated and monopolized by the patriarchal Catholic Church. The chapter details the pilgrims’ comments about their perceptions as they visit the cave of the Sainte-Baume and the chapel of Saint-Pilon; it focuses upon their strategies for bypassing Christian strata of these places and connecting with what they hold to be more ancient, pre-Christian and pre-patriarchal layers. Individual pilgrims attribute different meanings associated with Mary Magdalene and have different nuances of attraction and repulsion towards Christianity.

This chapter refers in detail to the pilgrims’ life histories and focuses on the sexual wounds they experienced. These wounds are related to sexual abuse, sexual discrimination, miscarriage, abortion and surgery on reproductive organs. The pilgrimage leaders describe Mary Magdalene as the archetype of the lover that has been condemned by the Church and needs to be restored to her true importance. The chapter argues that in this context Mary Magdalene acts as a sort of wounded healer helping the pilgrims to come to terms with traumatic experiences related to their sexual organs. The pilgrims try to recover their connection with Mother Earth through a process of grounding. Drawing on Jean Comaroff’s idea of a “body at war with itself” (1985), the chapter argues that through their pilgrimages these men and women try to deal with conflicts and wounds they feel were not addressed by existing institutions or religious traditions.

Throughout world oral traditions, literature, pop culture, and the visual arts, numerous stories, ancient and new, feature a solution to social and environmental crisis that takes shape in a calling and a calling upon the “Mutha’,” resulting in a return of a departed life force-source and a renewal of the world. Examples come from Hopi, Greek, and Japanese traditions, as well as contemporary culture. A call to the mother particularly characterizes Afrofuturism, including the poetry of June Jordan, the art of John Thomas Biggers, Kevin Sampson, and Wangechi Mutu, the novels of Octavia Butler, and the musical compositions and poetry of Nicole Mitchell. These stories offer wisdom and direction for spiritual-political activism to bring about a world other than the Anthropocene.

This chapter describes the first gathering of each pilgrimage group and explores the way in which the trip forms part of the pilgrims’ quest for the feminine. The most important meta-empirical beings related to the pilgrimage are Mary Magdalene, the Goddess and Mother Earth. Drawing on the writings of Marina Warner, the pilgrims conceptualize Mary Magdalene as a model for female empowerment both complementary and opposed to the Virgin Mary. Neo-shamanism has deeply influenced these pilgrims’ theories and practices, in particular two so-called indigenous traditions from Mexico (the Concheros) and the Andes of Peru.

This coda is inspired by a dream in which an elemental being advises that those of us seeking to make life in the face of ecological, political, and spiritual disaster “gather and vote.” Voting goes beyond casting a ballot at the polls as it derives from the same root as devotion and convocation. Undoing the Anthropocene requires devotion to the Earth “Mutha’ ” as well as recognition that life is a convocation, a coming together of all participating in the continuous process of making life. This is perhaps the most needful of knowledges in the Anthropocene. This knowing cannot be abstract but must be felt with the heart and put into practice—individual, communal, ritual. Consider it, then, our most profound civic birthright and responsibility to recognize the larger earth-community of which we are a part and to gather and vote, in the sense of invoking and expressing devotion, for Mother Nature-Earth.

This book examines how landless and dispossessed peoples have redefined our understanding of citizenship in the twenty-first century through multiple uses of indigenous-based discourses, motion, and language at the grassroots level. This conclusion revisits the language of indigeneity and shows how it has greatly informed the creation and building of the new plurinational state of Evo Morales. It also discusses new ecological shifts in Bolivia, the problems that lie ahead, and the passing of the Bill of Rights for Mother Earth, which draws deeply on indigenous concepts viewing nature as a sacred home.

Chapter Four interrogates what is defined as “sounding Navajo” and what happens when someone refuses to adhere to these expectations. Looking at how gender, nation, and the idea of a prescriptive “Navajo” sound intertwine, I show ethnographically how Navajo blues and rock bands such as Chucki Begay and the Mother Earth Blues Band are often told they don't “sound Navajo'” by local radio station deejays who refuse to play them on air. Instead, these deejays insist that sounding Navajo is defined as a male vocalist singing either Anglo-affiliated genres such as country music, or genres historically associated with Navajo tradition, such as social dance- and ceremonial songs. Tracing why Navajo identity came to be aligned with country music, the “rez” accent and the male singing voice through the work of the late singer and comedian Vincent Craig, it becomes clear how Navajo musical taste is inflected by class, generation, and gender ideologies.

The epilogue reflects on what has changed since the years when the fieldwork for the book was carried out, providing updates on key interlocutors and musicians in the book. This includes discussion of Chucki Begay and Mother Earth Blues Band, Candice Craig and the Wranglers, Native Country Band, and Re-Coil. I discuss the cover songs “Mississippi,” Gram Parsons/Emmylou Harris’ version of “If I Could Only Win Your Love,” and Charley Pride’s “Is Anybody Goin’ to San Antone.” Epilogue concludes with a reflection on artists from the Navajo Nation visiting the author’s class at the University of New Mexico and Candice Craig’s performances of songs including “Redneck Woman” and “Okie from Muskogee.”

This chapter addresses the influence of human migration into the Middle Cumberland Region by examining the circulation of ritual goods as represented by four groups of objects: ceramics, shell cups and gorgets, stone tablets, and symbolic weaponry. While the presence of Ramey Incised and Cahokia Cordmarked ceramics in the MCR demonstrates the arrival of a community from the American Bottom in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, the manufacture, use, and deposition of negative-painted ceramics in the MCR between A.D. 1250 and 1400 represents the adoption of motifs in contemporary use at Cahokia and the sustained interaction between a group of polities, including those in the American Bottom. The adoption of Braden-style imagery on marine shell and its association with female effigy vessels in an MCR mortuary practice centered on the graves of children reveals a pronounced ritual dedication to an Earth Mother deity in the MCR that is an important focus of our research. Furthermore, the sharing of iconography intimately associated with the Hero Twins in ceramics, marine shell, and stone tablets, and their association with symbolic weaponry, links these culture heroes with the female deity as the central figures in the religious practices of the MCR devoted to reincarnation and rebirth.

This chapter presents the first of two case studies. It offers a detailed narrative of a vision quest, which is one part of an initiatory process. Set in the one million acres of the Cranberry Wilderness Preserve in Hillsboro, West Virginia, the chapter describes the ritual protocols and experience of going forth to find a vision for one’s life, a near-death experience, and returning to share one’s vision for the sake and survival of the village. It discusses Huichol Shamanism and the vital role nature plays in rites of passage.

This book turns on the word motherfucker, springing from the genius of what Geneva Smitherman calls “Black Talk” and bearing a seemingly infinite range of variations and meanings. The Man in the proposed new geological age, the Anthropocene (“Age of Man” or “Age of Humans”), is the motherfucker in the word’s worst sense, while perennial Mother Nature-Earth epitomizes the word’s best sense—the “Mutha’,” the indomitable and inexhaustible force-source of continuous being, transformation, and renewal. The word motherfucker holds powers of invocation, curse, swear, prayer, and convocation. These powers structure this book.