Kelly Hayes, Lane's Three Approaches

Lane discusses three approaches to understanding sacred place; ontological, cultural, and phenomenological. The ontological approach explains how supernatural forces have invaded the ordinary in order to create a sacred place. The cultural approach deals with the human attribution of sacrality is a social construction of reality. The phenomenological approach gets places to participate in the perception that is made of them and gets humans to notice them and recognize the reciprocity between them and the landscape. Lane givens the example of Medicine Wheel, Wyoming in order to try to synthesize these three components. He states that the place needs all three facets in order to work as a sacred place. Ontologically, the place is thought to be sacred due to the supernatural forces of its placement or unusual energy channels created by the earth. Culturally, the place is a cultural artifact worshipped by the Native Americans who live in the area. It has very strict rules on who can and can’t see it or touch it in fear that unknown people may desecrate it. A phenomenological point of view states that the Medicine Wheel deals with the sum of all the places parts. The environment works with the Medicine Wheel to show its sacrality. All of these components, mixed with human imagination, create an undeniable sacred place. The three approaches push and pull with each other but have a way of self-correcting themselves to maintain order.