Don’t Fall Asleep by a Boulder: Time, Communication, and Consciousness in relation to Andean Stone

My paper addresses perspectives on powerful stones among rural farmers and pastoralists in the contemporary Andes. Stones are considered sites of transformation that transcend temporal dimensions. Some boulders are considered to have been people in previous ages; their petrification is an ongoing process that affects human beings in their vicinity, suggesting an ontological orientation in which time, place, materiality, and consciousness are intimately interrelated. Significant stones, ranging from miniature livestock to huge monoliths, are connected with powerful mountains through a play of fractal relations that animates the cosmos.