RGST 200: Final Exam

Content from Weeks 1-13

who first defined religion and what what their definition

Tylor; "the belief on spiritual beings"

religion

evidence for magical and religious phenomena since the beginning of human existence; has altered over time + place

Religion is ancient

spirituality/ "shamanism" may be the oldest form of religion; changes constantly (organized and informal)

disenchantment

Age of Enlightenment: the rise of science supposed to mean the death of religion; "God is Dead" -Nietzsche

Who is Max Weber?

German sociologist: states the Theory of Disenchantment; there is no longer belief in deities.

what is religion (anthropological view)?

evolutionary anthropology; unlined trajectory from savagery to barbarism to civilization (armchair anthropological theory)

Who is Tylor?

INTELECTUALIST: states that "religion is a belief in spiritual beings"; functions of religion answer perplexing questions about phenomena (sleep, dreams, death, etc.)

"Primitive Culture"

Tylor: takes an evolutionary approach to anthropology of religion

animism

belief in anama souls; anything can have a souls (most basic religion)

Tylor on animism:

animism meaning faith in the individual soul or anima of all things; was the first phase of development of all religions.

Who is Sir James Frazer?

evolutionary *armchair* anthropologist, founding father of anthropology, wrote 'The Golden Bough'; "religion is an understood propitiation or conciliation of powers superior to man... believed to direct and control the course of nature and human life".

Frazer on magic:

differs from religion, imitation of /'bastard sister to science"; magic is a way to control the supranational event, compared to science which is meant to control natural events (nature).

Frazer on religion:

an attempt to influence the world indirectly through the supernatural; "belief in powers superior to man and an attempt to control"

Social darwinism

all societies progress through stages, western European most advanced (excuses for violence, colonialism, domination genocide.)

ethnocentrism

evaluation of other cultures through one's own preconceptions originating in the standards and customs of one's own culture (disrespect towards other cultures)

Criticism of Evolutionary Approach

demeaning of what evolutionary anthropologists called primitive; incorrect for people still believe in magic and religion.

Who is Needham?

British anthropologist who refutes Tylor's argument; religion means different things to different people, belief is an inadequate term.

Religion as performance

beliefs are not primary, religious acts or performances create belief in the self and in others (religion is both internal and external); repeated acts lead us to see the world in a certain way; belief is displaced onto another .

Religion is auto-poetic

generates itself through actions; repeated acts

Symbols of belief

not cross-cultural; flexible ideas linked together in myths, room for interpretation; often inconsistent or contradictory ideas.

Horton and Frazer on religious belief:

"explain, predict, control"

Durkheim on religion belief:

"collective representations to social cohesion"

What are rituals?

different form everyday behaviours; repetitive forms of behaviour, communicate ideas, values, and sentiments; magic and/or religious, "twice-behaved or restored behaviour" (Schechner); Ritual is at the nucleus of all faiths and is a ubiquitous phenomena; there is no religion without ritual!

What is Scientology

Science has a major role; interplay of science and religion; further disproves the belief that scientific evolution dissipated religious beliefs.

What is myth?

Stories set in a remote period of time that describe origins of human experience and important phenomena in human experience; can explain origins and reinforce certain narratives (the Bible, Greek mythology).

What is magic?

rituals performed without benefit of special agencies in order to secure results (not always true!); personification of misfortune but occur due to ill effect of witches rather than natural occurrence.

What is the etymology of the word religion according to Hoyt?

"to bind and religare"

witchcraft

belief that certain individuals (witches) possess innate abilities to cause harm to others by mystical means

Geertz on religion:

religion is unresolved phenomena, the uncanny, dealing with chaos.

Durkheim on religion:

social order "god is society, writ large".; sacred things (things set apart and forbidden) single moral community called a Church; collective representation

Who is Bronislaw Malinowski?

founding father of fieldwork anthropology; ideas based on Frazer's belief in magic as a 'false science'; functionalist.

Malinowski on magic:

Magic is to be expected whenever man encounters an unbridgeable gap in his knowledge or powers of practical control and still has to continue in his pursuit.

Malinowski on religion:

Religion is not born out of speculation or reflection, still of misapprehension but out of conflict between human plans and realities.

synchronic

PERIOD OF TIME; minimizes factor of social change

diachronic

OVER TIME; examining institutions, etc. as they change through time.

relativism/ cultural relativism

beliefs and behaviours should be assessed according to emic (members) not etic (outsiders) paradigms; attempt to avoid biases/prejudices

Durkheim on anthropology of religion:

structural-functionalists-stasis, balancing out.

Levi-Strauss on anthropology of religion:

structuralist approach (encoded messages)

What is a functionalist?

(Malinowski + Durkhiem) describing or examining something according to its use or purpose

Who is Horton?

intellectualist; EPC; religionNe/magic is closed thought (lack of awareness of alternatives) + science is open thought (awareness of alternatives)

Who is Greenwood?

shamanic pegan; magic mode of consciousness is not separate from academic thought; "not only, but also"

what is theory?

ways of understanding religion; uses ethnographic data; looking beyond beliefs to the WHY and HOW

What is methodology?

ethnography; fieldwork; quality rather than quantity; participant observation

Does methodology effect data?

requires one to be SELF-REFLEXIVE; do research through a non-bias viewpoint

Freud on religion:

"religion is an illusion based on human wishes"; wishes projected onto the supernatural; form of neurotic illness; repressed traumatic memories; answers unconscious needs of a person that stems from inner guilt

The Oedipal Complex

trauma during child development; a child is used to having a mother's sole attention and creates a rival with the father, but is also idolized

etic perspective

OUTSIDER; must emotionally detach yourself in order to arrive at your objective and testable hypothesis

epic perspective

INSIDER; viewing the world as a member of that culture

Law of Sympathy

principal acting on one thing causing relation onto another thing "like produces like"

Homeopathic Magic: Law of Similarity

the attempt to cause a retain to one thing any manipulating a similar thing (voodoo doll)

Contagious Magic: Law of Contact

things that have been in contact continue to act on each other even at a distance; using part of something to influence a whole (casting a spell on someone that you have a piece of their hair)

what does EPC stand for?

explain, predict, control

Observer effect in physics:

Heisenberg; the act of observing a system inevitably alters its state.

totemism

a belief that humans were descended from animal ancestors, originated from denial and a recapture of that incident, resulted in the incest taboo.

Freud and "God the Father"

Eventually their father took on divine significance + became transformed into the gods of religion; God becomes more abstract but as a father substitute.

"...collective representations which express collective realities; the rites are a manner of acting which take rise in the midst of assembled groups and which are destined to excite, maintain, or recreate certain mental states in these groups. Religious facts are… social affairs and the product of collective thought."

Durkheim on religion

The Sacred (holy):

all things set apart as special; have high symbolic value; society demands reverence/ awe toward them.

The Profane (everyday):

ordinary things that hold no special or symbolic significance.

Durkheim Functionalist Theory:

religion has social origins, provide meaning in life, authority figures, reinforced morals and norms to be one with society; a critical part of the social system.

wide-range of beliefs in varieties of gods/goddesses/spirits/souls:

Belief in beings that created the cosmos are widespread; ghosts, gods and goddesses, souls, etc. are all believed to influence human lives; spirits may represent specific aspects; misfortunes vicissitudes of life and even death.

animism

all things (objects) can possess a soul

possession

souls can posses human beings

cultural universals

science and universal laws

Steadman, Palmer, and Tilley: "The Universality if Ancestor Worship"

Ancestor rituals are more widely performed than those intended for creator-god/goddesses; Universal aspect of religion; Claims of communication with the dead are universal; Adorcism

Universal aspect of religion

ancestors influence the living and/or are influenced by the living

adorcism

adoring spirits, wanting them in your life.

Ansestor worship:

potential failure to identify who ancestors are vs spirits; !Kung, Lee states that the main actors in their religious cosmos are 'gangwasi', ghosts of recently deceased.

what can be defined as an "ancestor"?

Omission often made: connection between ancestors + spirits or gods; Mardu religion focuses on ancestral beings, but unnamed.

methodology in ancestor worship:

24 societies studied that were listed as 'lacking ancestor worship', there was communication between the living and dead- Even is ancestor worship is not universal, all religions may have more in common than immortality of the dead (Belief in the afterlife and claims of communication between living and dead are universal.)

Ghost cult in Bunyoro:

A ghost muzimu, plural mizimu, is the disembodied spirits of a bead person; a being of different order from the living (not human) left by 'not-people'; associated with places they frequented when alive or are colour black; never seen, appears in dreams, may cause illness/misfortune only to be diagnosed by diviner using cowry shells.

to be cured of a ghost's powers:

The ghost must 'mount into the head' of the person or surrogate in a possession ritual to achieve communication; some ghosts cannot be appeased; Sanctioning aspect of ghost beliefs/conforms to social norms.

do Nyoro worship the dead?

Religion centers on the Cwezi spirits, race of people who came to Bunyoro centuries ago, performed wonders and disappeared; The answer depends on what is mean by an ancestor cult; They don’t worship, some practice it (a matter of degree); Ghosts ancestral or otherwise are thought of as those who can injure the living when angered.

What kind of theory is Nyoro' worshiping of the dead

One way of thinking about and dealing with situations of stress and anxiety; effective social sanction against certain cruelty, neglect, cheating, and failure, agnatic rapports; dramatic rituals

Ghosts in 21st Century America- Bader and Baker

Reiterate that ghosts are a cross-cultural phenomena and arise from generalized cognitive bifurcation of anima; distinct from material reality intuitively allows spirits to exist or persist without bodily presence; the task is to examine ghost belief, experience, and media consumption, + 'ghost hunting'.

Methodology of 21st Century ghosts/ ghost hunting:

Outlines some of the basic population parameters and patterns of ghost experience and belief; highlighting culture and interactional dimensions; ghost belief is most prevalent in AGE, RELIGIOSITY, then GENDER.

South-west groups; bricolage of ritual practices

referred to as New Age, no discussion of traditional religious versions of supernaturalism

south-eastern groups on spiritual beliefs

Both traditional religion + generalized paranormal beliefs; integrated with belief in haunting (Big Foot + Jesus)

Appalachian groups

Traditional Christian religious beliefs and practices; rejection of other faiths; New Age/ paranormal.

Relation between the Appalachian and South-Eastern groups:

Casting doubt on the often rigidly delineated academic distinction between religion and magic.

techno-mysticism use of technology to ghost-tracking:

personal narratives most powerful form of vicarious experience and source of belief; as with religion, people are more likely to be persuaded by the beliefs and experiences of others they know, than by the media.

Ghosts violate binaries:

they are liminal: (body/soul, life/death, past/present, presence/ absence, human/ inhuman, material/ethereal); liminality lends spirits a potentially powerful cultural position= highly flexible

deathlore:

Historical framing; shared interpretations of experiences: others called in to verify sensation or inspecting technological "evidence"; Experiential recollection: first-hand direct experience with a spirit that spurs one to seek further

Schechner on ritual:

"rooted in animal behaviour"= ritual derives from pre-human origins; language of actions to enhance communication, get what they need, function through a common understanding; ritual displays of power.

Durkheim on ritual:

ritual encourages social cohesion.

Leach: ritual is power

can be invoke supernatural agency to alter a situation, to influence/ command others.

Leach: ritual as belief

it’s the belief that accompanies the ritual that distinguishes such behaviour.

Turner on ritual:

ritual involves SYMBOLS; serve to communication and send messages to the culture

ritual symbols can stand for many things:

stand for he obligatory and desirable; Mudyi tree principals symbol in a day-long rite for pubescent girls called Nkang'a: Pliancy of the sapling= youth of the girl.

Turner on colour and symbols

Colour triad: Redness (blood/hunt/kinship/strength/aggression); Whiteness (health/goodness/fortune/harmony); Blackness (death/fainting/night/sorcery).

Way of Looking at Symbols: Exegetical

what people say a symbol means

Way of Looking at Symbols: Positional

how do they appear in comparison to the placement of other symbols in a ritual

Way of Looking at Symbols: Operational

meanings anthropologists can deduce from what is done to or near the symbol

van Gennep's Rites of Passage: Separation

(old status) an individual may be separated from group/rites and wear special clothing such as a veil or other accoutrements that are not usually worn, entry into a separate locale defined as sacred such as a church.

van Gennep's Rites of Passage: Liminality

(no clear status) when your in-between stages ; marginalized + potentially transcendent state/ a timeless moment.

van Gennep's Rites of Passage: Incorporation

(new status) new status is acquired; often a communal experience; an initiation to integrate one into a society; exit from a sacred space back into society; removal of special clothing.

limen

(Turner) threshold regarding it as a key to the dialogical process between structure and anti-structure.

anti-structure

all hold the same status; communion of equal individuals under ritual authority.

Communitas

(Turner) a blend of lowliness and sacredness, of homogeneity and friendship; a moment in and out of time (NOT COMMUNITY); status disappears; equal beliefs; not only religious

Limonoid vs Liminal

limonoid= modern day activity VS liminal= religious relations

Mystical Danger

magico-religious properties are dangerous + potent; liminal ambiguity and lack of structure leads to risk of pollution (why there are prescriptions and hedges)