Over at The Atlantic, Josh Kron writes about an evangelical group, the Emerging Church, which is influential in Africa and whose leading members are behind Invisible Children and Kony 2012. Kony’s creator, Jason Russell, was earlier in the good news for his viral video and later in the bad news for what appears to be [...]
Tags:Africa·Brian McLauren·Emerging Church·evangelical Christians·Gnostic·Jason Russell·Kony 2012·liberal Christianity·mysticism
When I teach my anthropology of religion course the first order of business is to define and disrupt “religion” as a category. I begin by having students identify everything they consider to be “religion.” Our list grows and all the usual suspects make their appearance. After the list has been compiled, we then ask what [...]
Tags:Ake Hultkrantz·Andrew McKinnon·Buddhism·category of religion·concept of religion·definition of religion·Japan·Jason Josephson·Shinto·Wittgenstein
When it comes to classic anthropology, Margaret Mead may garner the lionesses’ share of attention but Ruth Benedict remains the matriarch. Although Benedict today is dismissed by some as a quaint relic of the “culture and personality” school of anthropology, such demurrals underestimate the theoretical sophistication and continuing relevance of Benedict’s work.
Those who understand Patterns [...]
Tags:Apollo·Chrysanthemum and the Sword·culture and personality school·Dionysius·Dobu·Franz Boas·Great Plains·Japan·Kwakiutl·Margaret Mead·Native American·Nietzsche·nomads·particularism·Patterns of Culture·Plains culture area·psychoanalytic·Ruth Benedict·shamans·thick description·variation·vision quest·Zuni
There is a sense in which we are all cultural narcissists. By this, I mean that because all of us are acculturated at a particular time and in a particular place, we have a strong tendency to view other times and places through our own cultural lens. These lenses are prismatic and what we see [...]
Tags:Abrahamic·animal ceremonialism·animism·animistic·anthropomorphism·Christian·cultural evolution·cultural narcissism·Descartes·diffusion·E.B. Tylor·epistemology·essentializing·Ingela Bergman·intepretation·Jewish·Muslim·Nurit David-Bird·Primitive Culture·provincialism·Sami·social construction·translation
Unlike living organisms, cultural formations do not “evolve.” Evolution, sensu stricto, is a biological process and not a cultural one. Despite this fact, some scholars have fruitfully deployed evolutionary ideas — as analogy and metaphor — to analyze cultural history.
In 1964 the sociologist Robert Bellah did just this in his classic paper, Religious Evolution. Taking [...]
Tags:animism·Arabs·Black Stone·Christianity·cult practice·cultural evolution·Eric Voegelin·Eugene Stockton·Ingela Bergman·Islam·kaaba·landscapes·modern religion·multilinear·Norse·objects·pagans·pantheism·Phoenician·polytheism·primitive religion·religious evolution·religious stages·Robert Bellah·rocks·sacred·Sami·shamanic·stones·symbol systems·typology·unilinear·varro muorra·veneration·Vikings·wood
There is no shortage of research projects whose aim is to “explain religion” or the “evolution of religion.” In addition to the Evolution of Religion Project which I interrogated in a recent post, anthropologist Harvey Whitehouse leads the “Explaining Religion” project based at Oxford University.
Whitehouse is interested primarily in religious variation and sees religions as [...]
Tags:doctrinal·episodic memory·Explaining Religion Project·Harvey Whitehouse·imagistic·modes of religiosity·Neolithic·Oxford·political economy·religious transmission·religious variation·ritual forms·semantic memory·shamanic
Before the 2001 census was taken in Great Britain and several Commonwealth countries, someone suggested that the “Religious Affiliation” question be answered by professing belief in The Force and claiming to be a Jedi Knight. In Britain, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, significant numbers of people did just this.
If you have ever attended a Star [...]
Tags:Buddhism·census·ecumenical·George Lucas·Jedi·Jedi Knights·Jedi religion·John Perlock·Obi Wan Kenobi·science fiction·Scientology·Star Wars·The Church of Jediism·The Force·theoretical physics·Yoda
A high school physics and chemistry teacher in Pennsylvania has filed a federal lawsuit alleging that evolution is atheism and because atheism is a religion, it cannot be taught in public schools. Here is the complaint:
1. The Plaintiff is Thomas J. Ritter, Jr., an adult individual residing at 320 MacArthur Drive, Orwigsburg, PA 17961.
2. [...]
Tags:Anne Creyer·atheism·binary·evolution·federal lawsuit·ID·intelligent design·Kitzmiller·logic·religion·The Blue Mountain School District·Thomas Ritter
Craig Martin is an Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at St. Thomas Aquinas College. He has published several articles (links below) and a recent book, Masking Hegemony: A Genealogy of Liberalism, Religion and the Private Sphere. Craig is also active in the blogging community and is editor of the Bulletin for the Study of Religion.
I [...]
Tags:Anderson University·Anthony Giddens·authenticity·authority·binary·Bruce Lincoln·Bulletin for the Study of Religion·Craig Martin·discourse·disparity·domination·essentializing·Foucault·functionalism·legitimation·Marxist·Masking Hegemony·Pierre Bourdieu·Platonic forms·power·private·public·religious studies·Russell McCutcheon·social construction·St. Thomas Aquinas College·stratification·Syracuse University
It is hardly a secret that one of America’s most religious — or to be more precise, Christian — institutions is the military. Despite the juridical and rhetorical lip service paid to the separation of church and state, the military is a place where such separation is seen as inimical to institutional interests ranging from [...]
Tags:America·Army·atheist·Barbara Hagerty·camouflage·chaplains·Christian soldiers·code·empire·euphemisms·irony·Islamic extremists·Justin Griffith·meditation·military·monks·separation of church and state·spiritual fitness·spirituality·United States
