Introduction

The introduction contextualizes the historical, ethnographic, and theoretical accounts of wind in the following papers, all of which deal with how wind the 'natural' phenomenon relates to human life and culture. It draws attention to the diversity of relationships with wind whilst also addressing why it is that similar patterns of ideas surrounding wind exist across cultures. It explores the notion that human/wind relationships are tightly bound to the sensuous qualities of wind, which in turn reflect the embedded unfolding of human life as an aspect of environment, and drawing on phenomenology as a particularly apposite hermeneutic approach to understanding the relationship.