Native Traditions: Sociological Reflections on the Sacred

This chapter investigates the enduring presence and epistemological significance of native traditions through a sociological lens, challenging dominant narratives of secularisation and disenchantment. By engaging with the testimonies of students enrolled in the Master’s programme in Partnership Studies and Native Traditions, it identifies recurrent features in shamanic worldviews across diverse geographical contexts. Despite differences in cultural expression, these traditions exhibit striking similarities in their holistic cosmologies, rootedness in nature, and immanent conceptions of the sacred. The research suggests that such convergences may reflect either an innate cognitive disposition shared by the human species or a common proto-cultural origin predating the global diaspora of Homo sapiens. Ultimately, the chapter contends that native traditions resist both the secularising tendencies of modernity and the institutional codification characteristic of monotheistic religions, offering alternative paradigms for understanding the sacred in contemporary societies.