Animism and Interconnectivity: Batek and Manya’ Life on the Periphery of the Malaysian Rainforest

Animism and Interconnectivity is an ethnographic study of Batek Dè’ and Manya’ religion on the periphery of the Malaysian rainforest. In the twenty-first century, the lives of these two small-scale groups of former hunter-gatherers take place on the interconnected frontier between forest and the outside world, a nexus of different ideas, peoples and objects of diverse origins. Contesting views of animism as an objectified and timeless ontology, the study adopts a politicizing and historicizing approach. It explores how political marginalization, rapid environmental change and historical conditions of subordination and violence have shaped changes and continuities in shamanistic practices, myths, cosmologies and relations with other-than-human beings. Through an examination of specific events in particular places on the forest periphery, it highlights the many qualities and shades of interconnection to show the depth and breadth of its impact on animistic forms and practices.