Global Religion
Lecture notes
Lecture 1: Introduction and what is religion?
Religion in a globalizing context / religious globalization in relation to other forms of
globalization
- transnational fields (migration, modern media, networks)
- homogenization and increasing diversity
Three focal points
- material approach
- religion as a practice
- methodological question
What is the anthropological study of religion?
vs. theology
- normative (vs neutral?)
- reflecting on the (intentional actions of) the sacred is relevant (but not for anthropologists?)
vs religious studies
- text research
- nature of religion, comparative (eg what is prayer?)
- eclectic (includes anthropology
vs sociology of religion
- often quantitative
- focus on western societies and large themes: secularisation, religion and migration
vs psychology of religion
- psychological consequences of religion, e.g. in development of children, conversion and
personal identity
What do we do?
Religion: practical and material
- religion as ‘belief in’ is a very particular Christian - Protestant - notion of religion
- ‘religion as belief’ has had a strong influence on the study of religion from various
disciplinary angles
- practice: being religious is doing something religious
- the material dimension shapes practice and experience (fabrication part)
Disclaimer: religious traditions and practices are diverse!!
Lecture 2: What is Religion? (and what isn’t)
- what is our object of inquiry?
- is there a definition of religion that is applicable in all situations and socio-cultural settings
and throughout history?
1
,What is religion?
- we are used to think about religion in terms of ‘belief’
- religious people will often not refer to belief as a concept that is meaningful to them
- some religous traditions do not require their adherents to believe (in a doctrine or a set of
rules)
- but see: (protestant) christianity - student religion is built upon protestant christianity
- Practice vs belief?
Some problems with defining
- why do we need a definition?
- how do definitions help us to observe and analyze phenomena?
- can we formulate definitons that are applicable to diverse situations and phenomena (etic)?
- how etic are etic definitions?
- what about comparison?
How to define religion: a classical debate
Clifford Geertz vs Talal Asad
Geertz
- interpretive anthropology
- anthropology as writing
(Universal) definition of religion by Geertz
1. a system of symbols which acts to
2. establish powerful, pervasive and long lasting moods and motivations in [humans] by
3. formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and
4. clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that
5. the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic
System of symbols.
A symbol is
- a vehicle for meaning
- the tangible formulation of a notion
- an abstraction of reality, experience fixed in perceptible form (flag)
- a concrete embodiment of ideas, attitudes, judgements, longings or beliefs
- social, public, observable
A system of symbols is…
- symbols are extrinsic sources of information: they lie outside the boundaries of the
individual
- symbols are building-blocks for the creation of meaningful worlds
- they provide a model of reality (descriptive, ‘this is what the world is like’)
- they provide a model for reality (prescriptive, ‘this is how it should be’)
- symbols offer a way of interpretation via model for reality
establish powerful, pervasive and long lasting moods and motivations.
Symbols (in religion)
- symbol systems induce in the worshipper a certain distinctive set of dispositions
(tendencies, capacities, skills, habits)
- it produces motivations (inclination to perform certain sort of acts; evocation of particular
feelings in particular situations)
- it produces long lasting moods
2
, Conceptions of a general order of existence
- meaning is existential
- people create meaning to dounter chaos and disorder in our reality
- we fear events that lack comprehension, that we cannot deal with by our analytical
capacities or through our moral insights
- meaning is consolation: we may not understand everything but in the end there is a
meaning to it all
Religious perspective is a special perspective that shows the reader a wider truth
Meaningfullness of symbols within the system gives it meaning
But..
how do we know what symbols stand for?
And how do they ‘establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations’? (where
do they come from)
- Asad: in order to give meaning, we have to learn what it is
Are these symbols self-evident?
Are meanings the same for everybody and under all circumstances?
How does one know the meaning of Agnus Dei unless one has learned the meaning?
Universals and particulars in religion (Asad)
- any attempt to speak without speaking any particular language is not more hopeless than
the attempt to have a religion that shall be no religion in particular…
- thus every lived religion has a marked idiosyncrasy
- it is the peculiarity that we are interested in
Talal Asad → specialist on early Christianity (extensive work on Augustinus)
- rejects essentialist definitions of religion > there is no single transcultural and transhistorical
definition of religion
- religion is a historical product > religious imagination is formed through power and
discipline (and thus through learning)
- definitions are often rooted in specific religious traditions (for example in Protestant
understanding of religion)
Talal Asad:
- genealogical approach:
- religion is a historical product
- religion and power are inseperable (truth claims, discipline, hierarchy)
Critique on the notion of the symbol as a vehicle for meaning
- the meaning of symbols is acquired knowledge
- the meaning of symbols is contested (because of power relations)
- you can only study the context and the power-relations which make some definitions of the
symbol dominant and others subordinate
- power to define what is ‘religion’ and ‘superstition’, for example
Summarizing: why does Asad reject a universal definition of religion?
3
Lecture notes
Lecture 1: Introduction and what is religion?
Religion in a globalizing context / religious globalization in relation to other forms of
globalization
- transnational fields (migration, modern media, networks)
- homogenization and increasing diversity
Three focal points
- material approach
- religion as a practice
- methodological question
What is the anthropological study of religion?
vs. theology
- normative (vs neutral?)
- reflecting on the (intentional actions of) the sacred is relevant (but not for anthropologists?)
vs religious studies
- text research
- nature of religion, comparative (eg what is prayer?)
- eclectic (includes anthropology
vs sociology of religion
- often quantitative
- focus on western societies and large themes: secularisation, religion and migration
vs psychology of religion
- psychological consequences of religion, e.g. in development of children, conversion and
personal identity
What do we do?
Religion: practical and material
- religion as ‘belief in’ is a very particular Christian - Protestant - notion of religion
- ‘religion as belief’ has had a strong influence on the study of religion from various
disciplinary angles
- practice: being religious is doing something religious
- the material dimension shapes practice and experience (fabrication part)
Disclaimer: religious traditions and practices are diverse!!
Lecture 2: What is Religion? (and what isn’t)
- what is our object of inquiry?
- is there a definition of religion that is applicable in all situations and socio-cultural settings
and throughout history?
1
,What is religion?
- we are used to think about religion in terms of ‘belief’
- religious people will often not refer to belief as a concept that is meaningful to them
- some religous traditions do not require their adherents to believe (in a doctrine or a set of
rules)
- but see: (protestant) christianity - student religion is built upon protestant christianity
- Practice vs belief?
Some problems with defining
- why do we need a definition?
- how do definitions help us to observe and analyze phenomena?
- can we formulate definitons that are applicable to diverse situations and phenomena (etic)?
- how etic are etic definitions?
- what about comparison?
How to define religion: a classical debate
Clifford Geertz vs Talal Asad
Geertz
- interpretive anthropology
- anthropology as writing
(Universal) definition of religion by Geertz
1. a system of symbols which acts to
2. establish powerful, pervasive and long lasting moods and motivations in [humans] by
3. formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and
4. clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that
5. the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic
System of symbols.
A symbol is
- a vehicle for meaning
- the tangible formulation of a notion
- an abstraction of reality, experience fixed in perceptible form (flag)
- a concrete embodiment of ideas, attitudes, judgements, longings or beliefs
- social, public, observable
A system of symbols is…
- symbols are extrinsic sources of information: they lie outside the boundaries of the
individual
- symbols are building-blocks for the creation of meaningful worlds
- they provide a model of reality (descriptive, ‘this is what the world is like’)
- they provide a model for reality (prescriptive, ‘this is how it should be’)
- symbols offer a way of interpretation via model for reality
establish powerful, pervasive and long lasting moods and motivations.
Symbols (in religion)
- symbol systems induce in the worshipper a certain distinctive set of dispositions
(tendencies, capacities, skills, habits)
- it produces motivations (inclination to perform certain sort of acts; evocation of particular
feelings in particular situations)
- it produces long lasting moods
2
, Conceptions of a general order of existence
- meaning is existential
- people create meaning to dounter chaos and disorder in our reality
- we fear events that lack comprehension, that we cannot deal with by our analytical
capacities or through our moral insights
- meaning is consolation: we may not understand everything but in the end there is a
meaning to it all
Religious perspective is a special perspective that shows the reader a wider truth
Meaningfullness of symbols within the system gives it meaning
But..
how do we know what symbols stand for?
And how do they ‘establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations’? (where
do they come from)
- Asad: in order to give meaning, we have to learn what it is
Are these symbols self-evident?
Are meanings the same for everybody and under all circumstances?
How does one know the meaning of Agnus Dei unless one has learned the meaning?
Universals and particulars in religion (Asad)
- any attempt to speak without speaking any particular language is not more hopeless than
the attempt to have a religion that shall be no religion in particular…
- thus every lived religion has a marked idiosyncrasy
- it is the peculiarity that we are interested in
Talal Asad → specialist on early Christianity (extensive work on Augustinus)
- rejects essentialist definitions of religion > there is no single transcultural and transhistorical
definition of religion
- religion is a historical product > religious imagination is formed through power and
discipline (and thus through learning)
- definitions are often rooted in specific religious traditions (for example in Protestant
understanding of religion)
Talal Asad:
- genealogical approach:
- religion is a historical product
- religion and power are inseperable (truth claims, discipline, hierarchy)
Critique on the notion of the symbol as a vehicle for meaning
- the meaning of symbols is acquired knowledge
- the meaning of symbols is contested (because of power relations)
- you can only study the context and the power-relations which make some definitions of the
symbol dominant and others subordinate
- power to define what is ‘religion’ and ‘superstition’, for example
Summarizing: why does Asad reject a universal definition of religion?
3
