Humans maintain a reciprocity with the world around them and give voice to the essence of nature through language and action.  Here we explore five methods by which people from different places, backgrounds, and times sustain this communication:  the use of the sea as a metaphor in Whitman’s poetry and Thoreau’s writings, the myths and legends on which Caribbean oral traditions are based, the magical stories and songs of Native American shamans, the dialogue “modern” shamans maintain with the environment, and the explorative processes of contemporary performace artists.

In literature, one of the most common and effective forms of language syntax is the use of metaphors.  Walt Whitman, the poet, uses the sea as a metaphor for immortality in a cluster of poems which are part of his 1881 Leaves of Grass.  In keeping with the imagery he uses a ship as a metaphor for man’s personal passage through time, from his birth to his death.  Similarly, references to the sea, marine trade and exploration can be found throughout Henry David Thoreau’s work.  Like Whitman, Thoreau was a land man, yet their use of the sea, and its respective terms, as metaphors, gave their literature three-dimensionality and complexity.  Clearly, the influence of the hours spent on the docks in Boston and the visits to “telegraph stations” at every port, is apparent in Thoreau’s form.  Though metaphors are effective in literature, nothing can better describe the fury of the sea like a real fisherman’s tale, like this one:  “another storm-battered king crab boat staggers toward home.  But, burdened by the leaden tonnage of a two-foot-thick layer of sea encasing every inch of her superstructure, she rolls suddenly...” Nights of Ice.

Language is an integral part of human behavior and is the primary means of interaction between people.  Speakers use language to convey their thoughts, feelings, intentions and desires to others.  The oral traditions of the Caribbean region are based on African myths, the memory of the lost homeland, religious belief and resistance and assimilation in the New World.  Caribbean children today are growing up in a world of televisions, computers and “fast foods” - a world dramatically different from that of their grandparents where there were no libraries, no popular newspaper, and no modern technology.  The West Indies in general, and Trinidad and Tobago in particular, are full of stories and legends of their romantic past and an effort has to be made to preserve some of our heritage for them and for the generations yet unborn before they are completely submerged by modern technology and the break up of the village custom of storytelling.

Shamans and sorcerers have been an essential part of all cultures through the ages, yet they have all but disappeared in the Western world, their knowledge so long forgotten that it has become foreign and in our ethnocentrism it is now mostly dismissed or feared.  Most of the shamans that have managed to survive have done so in the isolation of traditional societies that tenuously hold on to their cultures and beliefs.  There they continue to be the bearers of ancient traditions; traveling through the magical realms of perception, their role is that of witness and interpreter.  Through their stories and songs they not only maintain a dialogue with the natural world, they give voice to the forgotten knowledge which is ours to remember.

The shaman’s role is to enter into communication with the environment.  To have a dialogue with the world and report back the findings.  To instruct the rest of us as to the direction we should be taking.  To inform us when we have fallen out of step with our environment.  To tell us when our environment has changed.  To act as the conduit through which we maintain a dialogue with our environment.  This quality, that allows one to perform the role of shaman, is in use in our “modern” world.  We should find comfort in the knowledge that latter-day shamans are at work around us and we do not have to go to indigenous peoples to contact them.  This is our world, right here—NYC, and there are urban shamans, and they can help us communicate with our environment.
 
One distinct form that communication takes is that of performance art.  Contemporary performance artists in New York City incorporate their culture and environment into their work.  The natural environment and the man-made environment are backdrops for much of this art.  Without the environment, the work would suffer and the cohesion of the communication that passes to the audience would break down.  These artist go through processes that allow them to consciously and unconsciously construct their performances from their environment, and in turn the environment plays a role in this cultured society of avant garde and experimental art.