Pre-Columbian Americas and their rich history and heritage have long remained unknown to the Persian-speaking world. From culture, art, and architecture to literature, mythology, societies, and systems of thought, there have not been many significant, solid studies available in Persian to shed light on this vast expanse of human history. Notably, their philosophical traditions have been quite unexplored and inaccessible for both scholars and laypeople in Iran, Afghanistan, and beyond. By translating this scholarly collection of twenty-two essays written by nineteen different American Indian scholars, I endeavored to introduce this broad framework which provides a comprehensive and distinctive examination of the “Indian thought-world.”

By bring together a varied assembly of American Indian intellectuals, this book explores both traditional and contemporary philosophies and their perspectives on topics such as time, location, history, science, law, religion, nationhood, and art. Arranged under eight sub-headings—American Indians and Philosophy; Epistemology and Knowing; Science, Math, and Logic; Metaphysics and Being; Phenomenology and Ontology; Ethics and Respect; Social and Political Philosophy; Esthetics—this pioneering book states its goal as “to present a different way of looking at and being in the world.“