Week 10: Religion and Supernatural Belief Systems

Question 1

Religion as a Symbolic System

Answer 1

• Faith in spirits, gods, or unseen forces guides individual behaviour in powerful ways
• It serves important functions for individuals and groups in society
• Other non-religious value systems serve similar functions

Question 2

Defining Religion

Answer 2

• Religion is a set of beliefs that pertain to supernatural forces or beings that transcend the observable world
• The term supernaturalism is used to refer to the broadest range of belief systems

Question 3

Religion has four characteristics:

Answer 3

• Belief in supernatural beings or forces
• Ritual
• Guided by myths
• Symbolic

Question 4

Communal Religions

Answer 4

• Horticulture and pastoralism
• Groups perform rites
• Totemistic
• Durkheim

Question 5

Ecclesiastical Religions

Answer 5

• Agricultural and Industrial States
• Full-time specialization
• Examples include Christianity and Buddhism
• Found in food-producing states
• Once in surplus, not everyone has to be involved
• All the major world religions usually have a certain full-time specialist

Question 6

Religions of the Oppressed

Answer 6

• Vittorio Lanternari
  -Millenarian Movements that arise under specific conditions and share certain elements of belief and practice
• Colonialism, rapid economic change, racial or ethnic discrimination and inequality, the introduction of a new religion
  Examples: Cargo Cults, Ghost Dance, Rastafarianism, Zionist Churches in South Africa
• Number of examples of revitalization
• Colonial officials had ideas that were very racist and ethnocentric
• Reasonable responses to circumstaines
• Some of the Cargo Cults because of political standpoints
• Cargo cults: (in the Melanesian Islands) a system of belief based around the expected arrival of ancestral spirits in ships bringing cargoes of food and other goods

Question 7

Revitalization Movements: Ghost Dance

Answer 7

• Nations of the Great Plains
• Buffalo slaughtered to force Nations onto reservations
• Wovoka prophesized the need to dance to change their lives.
• Ended with the slaughter at Wounded Knee

Question 8

Durkheim

Answer 8

There were various means by which individuals and society could be connected. Among these are education, social programs through the state, occupational groups, and laws. Together these could assist in regulating individuals and integrating individuals with society.

Question 9

Malinowski

Answer 9

Social anthropologist, traveller, ethnologist, religion scholar, sociologist and writer. He is the creator of the school of functionalism, an advocate for intense fieldwork, and a forerunner of new methods in social theory.

Question 10

Weber

Answer 10

Employees in a non-personal organization should be linked with organizational responsibilities through division of labour and job specialization

Question 11

Evans-Pritchard

Answer 11

Broke new ground on questions of rationality, social accountability, kinship, social and political organization, and religion, as well as influentially moving the discipline in Britain away from the natural sciences and towards history

Question 12

Geertz

Answer 12

A system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic forms by means of which men communicate, perpetuate, and develop their knowledge about and attitudes toward life

Question 13

Functionalist

Answer 13

Social solidarity and psychological

Question 14

Economic

Answer 14

The Spirit of Capitalism

Question 15

Interpretive

Answer 15

Symbols and meaning

Question 16

Functions of Supernatural Belief Systems

Answer 16

• Creating community: Sense of order
• Instilling values
• Renewing faith: Use the solar eclipse
• Providing reasons
• Solving problems
• The reasons for these belief systems involve creating community, instilling values, renewing faith, providing reasons, and solving problems. Worship occurs in many forms, including the veneration of deities, ancestors, or spirits in nature

Question 17

Sacred Roles

Answer 17

Deities (gods/goddesses)
Ancestral spirits
Spirits in nature

Question 18

Spirits in nature

Answer 18

• Animism: attributing sentience to other beings that may include persons, animals, plants, spirits, the environment, or even items of technology, such as cars, robots, or computers

-Antisemitism

Question 19

Religious Practitioners

Answer 19

• Full-time for all major world religions
• Shaman—part-time religious practitioner

Question 20

Revitalization movements

Answer 20

a deliberate, organized, conscious effort by members of a society to construct a more satisfying culture.

Question 21

Ghost Dance

Answer 21

used as a social dance as well as for healing practices.

Question 22

Cargo cults

Answer 22

some groups cleared out plots of land to create improvised airstrips, believing airplanes would arrive one day to bring cargo for devoted followers

Question 23

Supernatural Beliefs and Cultural Expression

Answer 23

• Belief systems are embedded in cultural practices
• Body piercing, tattooing

Question 24

Animism

Answer 24

Spirit reside in the natural world, the example in the textbook is the volcano/moutine in Hawaii Pele

Question 25

Animatism

Answer 25

there is a force of power that is diffuse, the example in the textbook is mana