Power and Paradox in the Trickster Figure
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/60528273.pdf
 Jacob Campbell
 Winter 1999 

Introduction 
We have only one certainty in this world - that nothing is for certain. The machine of Western science has relentlessly striven to discern patterns and laws which might order reality, yet much of it simply does not conform to rational classification. Of course, the yields of systematic analysis have presented for humans an unprecedented mental grasp on the universe and our place within it. The forces ofchaos, however, continue to manifest in our lived experience, seemingly to check assumptions of omnipotent logic in societies which have come to worship the scientist as a messiah. Massive earthquakes unpredictably wreak devastation upon whole countries, a host of epidemic viruses remain incurable, and the actions of the clinically insane persist as unexplainable phenomena. For many indigenous societies, these mysteries of human experience, both physical and cultural, are dealt with primarily in the realm of myth. One mythic figure in particular frequently emerges to embody the ambiguity and irony of his people's encounter with the world. He is Trickster, a formal paradox - one who sows the seeds of discord, then inspires new possibilities for ritual and social reinvention. In contrast to the Western scientist, the trickster in essence celebrates that which falls through the cracks of rational classification. He reminds indigenous people that logic cannot adequately grapple with a vast array of human experiences, and it is precisely those elements which hold the most potential when successfully harnessed. This thesis attempts to clarify both the means by which cultural groups invoke their trickster and also the influence he has upon their daily worldview.