Paper short abstract:

Supporting an interdisciplinary discussion bringing evolutionary and cultural anthropology together, this paper considers how systematic consideration might be given to cognitive engagements with social and material agencies, and the processes through which the mind is composed.

Paper long abstract:

Recent research increasingly emphasises the unity of cognitive, affective and sensory-motor processes that, through the individual’s interaction with and experience of its world, also co-constitute that world. Understanding the mind as a holistic and recursive process of engagement acknowledges both human commonalities and the specificity of cultural and historical contexts in which the mind is represented and experienced. Articulating a cross-cultural ‘meta-categorical’ concept of mind may be assisted by considering the range of social and material agencies with which people engage, and their spatialities and temporalities.

Locating and describing the mind in a way that is both comprehensive and comprehensible requires a cross-cultural model similar to that which enables ethnographic comparison. It calls for a systematic account of the broad categories of agentive interactions experienced by individuals and groups. Given the intangibility of the mind, it may be useful to employ a fluid proxy. Human engagements with water flow through and connect the diverse internal and external, social and material agencies with which the mind interacts. Considering how the mind is ‘reflected in water’ therefore assists an interdisciplinary conversation about the location of the mind, and the dialectical processes through which it is composed.