Aztec Religion and Art of Writing

Dr. Isabel Laack, Privatdozentin at the Institute for the Study of Religion, Heidelberg University, Germany, is the author of Religion und Musik in Glastonbury (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2011) as well as numerous articles in the field of the aesthetics of religion.

• ContentsForewordAcknowledgmentsList of IllustrationsIntroduction1 Introducing the Subject2 Indicating Sociopolitical Relevance3 Realizing the Aesthetics of Religion4 Outlining the Chapters1 Methodology1 Doing Research in a Postcolonial World2 Writing History3 Clarifying Perspectives and Objectives4 Summary2 Living in Cultural Diversity1 Drawing on History2 Living in the Central Highlands3 Living in Religious Diversity4 Conclusion: Diversity within the Nahua Tradition3 Living in Relation: Being Human in Tenochtitlan1 How the World Came to Be2 How the Human World Came to Be3 How the Cosmic Dynamics Unfold4 Living in Cosmic Relations5 Living in Social Relations6 Living Properly—Living in Balance4 A World in Motion: Nahua Ontology1 Aztec Notions of “Divinity”2 The Nature of Teotl3 Teotl’s Realization: Nahualli and the Layers of Reality4 A World in Motion: The Fifth Era5 The Problem of Ephemerality: What Is Really Real?5 Understanding a World in Motion: Nahua Epistemology1 Epistemology2 Knowledge Experts: Wise (Wo)Men and Scribes2 People with Special Insights3 The Inspiration of Knowledge and Its Expression6 Interacting with a World in Motion: Nahua Pragmatism and Aesthetics1 Human Agency: Seeking Balance2 Human Duties3 Interacting with Rituals4 Involving the Senses and Aesthetic Media5 The Concept of the Teixiptla7 Expressing Reality in Language: Nahua Linguistic Theory1 Nahua Oral Tradition2 Reconstructing Nahua Songs3 Thinking in Nahuatl4 Nahua Imagery5 The Relationship between the Spoken Sign and Reality in Nahuatl6 Nahua Imagery and the Problem of Rationality8 Materializing Reality in Writing: Nahua Pictography1 The History of Writing Systems in Mesoamerica2 The Writing System of the Nahuas3 Social Text Practice4 Books and Authors5 Nahua Culture between Orality and Literacy9 Understanding Pictography: Interpreting Nahua Semiotics1 The History of Evaluating Aztec Writing2 Different Kinds of Meaning and Knowledge3 Seeing Reality: Nahua Semiotic Theory4 Interpreting Nahua Pictography10 Interpretative Results: Nahua Religion, Scripture, and Sense of Reality1 From Religion to Being-in-the-World2 From Scripture to Semiotics3 Interrelationships: Semiotic Theory and Embodied MeaningConclusionReferencesIndexPlates

Isabel Laack’s Aztec Religion and Art of Writing makes an important departure from the way aesthetics, semiotics, and studies of religion have been applied to our understanding of Aztec civilization and culture. Furthermore, by relocating the epicenter of scholarly “gaze,” to religion and regions beyond Christianity and Anglo-American or European contexts, Laack offers an innovative postcolonial aesthetic approach to religion. Laack’s bold methodological departure from her own graduate training provides encouragement for scholars of all stages to chart similar pathways for themselves.- Jury of the AAR 2020 Award for Excellence in the Study of Religion: Historical Studies.