Paper short abstract

Amazonian Urarina eschatology posits an imminent catastrophic collapse of the climatic system that sustains life, albeit one that can be forestalled through appropriate forms of action. The weather figures here as a kind of common good, continually and collectively produced.

Paper long abstract

Amazonian Urarina eschatology posits an imminent catastrophic collapse of the climatic system that sustains life, albeit one that can be forestalled through appropriate forms of individual and collective action. Cold, rain and darkness are closely linked to the decline of forest animals and the spread of illness, leading eventually to the moment when the sky will fall, lightning will rain down, and the undead will roam the earth. In this view, the health of the land and of people also reflect the present state of the wider social and moral order. All these are addressed through Urarina shamanism, which thus places a considerable burden of responsibility on human agency in delaying or mitigating an inexorable process of decline and loss. Helplessness in the face of the inevitable is thus tempered by a strong sense of the need for courage, wisdom and perseverance. Ultimately, the weather itself figures as a kind of common good, continually and collectively produced through sustained human action.