Chapter 10 Flashcards
What is religion?
religion is beliefs, behaviours, and actions related to supernatural beings and forces and their relationship to everyday life
What is religion according to Sir Edward Tylor?
Belief in spirits
What two components is religion associated with?
Belief and behaviour. Belief systems shape patterns of behaviour.
What is Animism?
A belief system in which supernatural is conceived of as an impersonal power, belief in souls
What is animatism?
Belief that all things including men and women, are endowed with pervasive spiritual power
What is an example of a supernatural force belief?
Polynesians believe in Mana, which is a force that endows natural beings and phenomena with a special power that is both sacred and dangerous. Is an outside nature that works automatically.
What is totem?
An object that has special significance and meaning for a groups of believers.
What is zoomorphic?
Images of supernatural/ deities are like animal or partially animal
What is anthropomorphic?
Images of supernatural/ deities are like human.
Is belief in sacred space common?
Yes in all religions.
What are some examples of sacred spaces.
Saami people of Norway have rock formations that resemble humans or animals.
Pakistani female muslim immigrants have Khatam Quran which is a transformation of sacred space.
What is contested space?
Spaces that have sacred meanings to different groups. Ex. Kotel in Jerusalem is sacred place of pilgrimage but is on Palestinian land.
What is a myth?
A narrative with a plot that involves the supernatural forces, expresses core beliefs, teaches morality, helps people deal with their lives.
What is a myth to Malinowski?
A charter for society.
What is a doctrine?
Direct and formalized statements about religious beliefs, people’s roles and relationships with supernatural power and other humans, associated with institutionalized religions.
What was the evolutionary school?
Tried to explain the physical world and events by magic, religion and science. Theorized that magic evolved into religion and then science. From primitive to rational.
What is magic?
The attempt to compel supernatural forces and beings to act in certain ways.
What were Sir James Frazer’s two principles of magic?
Law of similarity and law of contagion.
What is world view?
Conception of the world and how people should behave.
What is world view? Example?
An encompassing picture of reality created by members of a society. Ex: Redfield’s peasant world view, including notions of limited goods and the lord as shepherd.
According to Functionalists (Durkheim), all religions originate in ___? Separating the world into ___?
Society. Separating the world into the profane and sacred.
What is the profane?
The secular aspects of life (objects, practices, behaviors).
What is the sacred?
The things that we set apart, ritualize and form emotional connections to.
What is the function of religions according to functionalism?
Religion functions to join members of the group according to shared meanings and world views.
What is Malinowski’s functionalist opinion on religious rituals?
Religious rituals help reduce anxiety and uncertainty.
What is Tylor’s functionalist opinion on religion?
Religion supports people to cope with the universal problems such as life and death, illness and misfortune.
What are some examples of functionality of religion in different societies?
Bring order, develop social cohesion, immigrant religious practices, production and distribution processes (i.e. christmas shopping).
What does structural functionalism say about religion?
Religious rituals maintain and restate dominant norms of society, like how men generally lead rituals.
What was Tylor’s model of evolution of belief systems?
Over time religions evolve from simple to complex. Animism -> Polytheism -> monotheism.
What is polytheism?
Belief in many dieties.
What is monotheism?
Belief in supreme power.
What does Freud (psychological anthropology) say about religion?
Religion is a “projective system” that expresses people’s unconscious thoughts, wishes and worries.
How does cultural materialism explain explain aztec cannibalism?
Human sacrifice by it was a way of showing political strength and feeding the poor, as well as pleasing the gods.
What is Geertz’ symbolic theory of religion?
Religion is a cultural and symbolic system that provide a model or life and worldview for people.
What is Marx’s critical theory of religion?
Religion is like a drug and provides superficial comfort or false consciousness to the poor.
What is the feminist theory of religion?
Women are not equally represented in major patriarchal religions and they do not have equal rights to practice religious rituals. We need to rewrite major religious texts.
What is religious pluralism?
When one and more religions co-exist as either complementary to each other as competitive systems.
What is syncretism? Examples?
Elements of 2 or more religions blend together. Local christianity, Burmese buddhism, kochi Jewish lifestyle.
What is secularism?
It is not simply absence of religious practice, but more than that. The idea is connected to the history of european enlightenment, separation between state and church.
What is a world religion?
19th century idea of a text based religion, institutionalized religion that is transnational and concerned with ideas of conversion and salvation.
What are the key components of hinduism?
- periodic and non periodic rituals
- fasting, taking bath, or not eating particular foods
- relationship between spirit and supernatural spirit
- Karma
- rebirth
What are the deities of Hindusim?
Range from stone to carvings of gods (Rich Polytheism)
Who is the founding figure of Buddhism?
Siddhartha Gautama
What is the buddhist religious text?
No single accepted text but honor Gautama’s teachings.
What is the goal of Buddhism?
To reach nirvana.
What are some key components of Judaism?
High regard for human life, emphasis on truth, words (spoken and written) of importance, appropriate religion, belief in one god, sacred land to return to.
What are some key components of Islam?
Submission to the will of one god, presence of culturally constructed differences, based on teachings of Prophet Muhhamad.
What are the two schools of Islam?
Sunni and Shi’a (Sufism is another but more secular and humanistic).
What are the five pillars of islam?
Faith in Allah, daily prayer, fasting, giving to the poor, Hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca).
What are common features of many Indig. religions?
- Stories of complex relationships between spirits and humans
- A plethora of supernatural spirits
- Elaborate initiation rituals and sacrifices
- Close links between healing and divination
What are revitalization movements? Examples?
Socio-religious movement in response to social crisis. Ghost dance amongst Native Americans, Cargo cult in Melanesia in response to Western and Japanese influences.
What is the connection between colonialism and religion?
Key mechanism to control and assimilate colonized societies. Proposed to bring civilization, modernity, individualism, rationality, cultural hegemony, absorption of western ideals.
What is James Frazer’s idea of religion?
Magic is peoples’ attempt to compel supernatural beings and forces to act a certain.
What is a myth to Claude-Levi Strauss?
Helps to deal with deep conceptual contradictions.
What are some examples of myths?
- Pueblo Indians: myths juxtapose grass-eating animals and predators
- Klamath and Modoc Indians: theme of food uncertainty
What are the world religions?
christianity, islam, buddhism, judaism, hinduism, taoism, confucianism, shintoism
Who are the Hui muslims of China?
One of china’s largest designated minorities that the state classifies as backward and feudal.
What are some features of african religions?
- myths about a rupture
- pantheon
- elaborate initiation rituals
- animal sacrifice rituals
- altars with shrines as focal places
- close links with healing
- some combine aspects of christianity and African traditions
What is Rastafari?
Afro-caribbean protest religion about Pan-African unity.
