Who else do you know that could fish up our fair nation with their grandmother’s jawbone (this is after scamming her out of all ten of her fire-giving nails) while slowing the turbo sun in ropes before his optimistic demise crushed in the obsidian toothed vagina of Hine-nui-te-Po (because he couldn’t resist a cheeky attempt at cheating death). Maui too is indeed a most worthy representative of the productive mischief maker. It’s usually a mixture of both no one humiliates futile binaries like the trickster.Ī polarising fav and trickster go-to in the South Pacific is local demigod Maui-Tikitiki-a-Taranga, often our first introduction to the idea Oceania-side.
Whether I signed up for it or not, I usually end up either falling head over heels for these historical characters OR cringing my way through their bungling genius. I find when one crosses my path I’m destined to compute them cautiously, but ultimately be schooled by their avant garde relationship with truth. But cosmic pranks are the buffet bread and butter of the trickster. Those who don’t have the stomach for cosmic pranks or satire in visceral motion will also be unsettled by the trickster’s sacred role. This can be to the chagrin of those who struggle to trust modalities such as change, conflict, paradox, transition, or fluidity. French philosopher Michel de Certeau says that these people “use impersonation, disguise, theft, and deceit to expose hypocrisy and inequality, to subvert existing social systems, and to widen the sphere of power.”Ī Trickster is the epitome of ‘both/and,’ meaning they can easily (even festively) encompass two truths or extremes within the one ambiguous ambassador. Traversing various cultures, ages and lore (including numerous Māori and Pasifika traditions) the trickster emerges a precious archetype and provocative mode from way back.
0 kommentar(er)
