Anth 4340: Magic, Witchcraft and
Religion Exam 2024
Ethnocentrism - Evaluation of other cultures according to preconceptions
originating in the standards and customs of ones own culture
Religion - A system of beliefs and practices usually involving the worship of
supernatural forces or beings
Dichotomy - A division or contrast between two things that are represented as
being opposed or entirely different: other societies may not make a
supernatural/natural distinction
Identifying the Supernatural - What we consider as supernatural, others may not
(water babies)
Holistic Perspective - Looking at it from all different aspects and how they are
interconnected by the whole
Objective Perspective - Observe without passing judgement
Comparative Perspective - How does it compare to other cultures and peoples
Interdisciplinary - Being open to the ideas and observations from other fields
studying the same subject
,Emic Perspective -
Evolutionism - The study of origin
Functionalism - The study of function
Symbolic and Iterperative approaches - The study of meaning
Knowledge - The study of experience
Rationalism - Reason: beginnings of Anthropology Sociology and Psychology
James Ussher - -1654 he calculates the date of creation to be 23 October 4004 BC
-Catatrophism
Catastrophism - The idea that the earth was shapes by a series of sudden, short-
lived, violent events (ex: the great flood)
Attributed to James Ussher
Charles Lyell - -1830's Principles of Geology argues for uniformitarianism --> the
laws of nature are constant
-The earth is not divinely created
-Geological formations require millions of years
Charles Darwin - -Origin of species
,-"Much light will be shed on the origin of man and his history"
E.B. Tylor - -Quaker
-Deeply anti-catholic
-Wanted to account for the origin of religion and trace its developmental history
-Put himself in the shoes of primitive man
-What makes the difference between a living body and a dead on?
-Animism: belief in supernatural beings (minimal definition of religion)
-Primitive man was a rationalist and a scientific philosopher
-Preliterate religions were essentially consistent and logical, based on rational
thinking and empirical knowledge
Animism - In preliterate cultures
Animals,plants and inanimate objects are endowed with souls
Tylor
Polytheism - The idea of multiple spiritual beings to explain natural events and
phenomena
Belief or worship of one or more god
Tylor
Monotheism - Belief that there is only one god
Animism of civilized man
Tylor
, Sympathetic Magic - -Trying to affect other people
-Get a representative of the person itself and anything done to that object is done
to the person (voodoo)
-Cave art may have been used for this type of ritual
Contagious Magic - -The notion that things which have once been conjoined must
remain ever afterwards, even when quite dissevered from each other, in such a
sympathetic relation that whatever is done to one must similarly affect the other
-Most common example is between man and any severed portion of a person
(hair,skin, nails)
-Baseball Magic
Functionalism -
Emile Durkheim - -Dissatisfied with Tylor's minimal definition of religion, he
claimed we needed a broader definition
-Atheist
-Felt that even the most barbaric and fantastic religious rites must be based on
some human need
-Divided religion into two parts: Rites and Beliefs
-Religion didn't include magic
Beliefs - Durkheim
All Religous beliefs presuppose a classification of all things real and ideal into two
classes or opposed groups: the sacred and the profane
Religion Exam 2024
Ethnocentrism - Evaluation of other cultures according to preconceptions
originating in the standards and customs of ones own culture
Religion - A system of beliefs and practices usually involving the worship of
supernatural forces or beings
Dichotomy - A division or contrast between two things that are represented as
being opposed or entirely different: other societies may not make a
supernatural/natural distinction
Identifying the Supernatural - What we consider as supernatural, others may not
(water babies)
Holistic Perspective - Looking at it from all different aspects and how they are
interconnected by the whole
Objective Perspective - Observe without passing judgement
Comparative Perspective - How does it compare to other cultures and peoples
Interdisciplinary - Being open to the ideas and observations from other fields
studying the same subject
,Emic Perspective -
Evolutionism - The study of origin
Functionalism - The study of function
Symbolic and Iterperative approaches - The study of meaning
Knowledge - The study of experience
Rationalism - Reason: beginnings of Anthropology Sociology and Psychology
James Ussher - -1654 he calculates the date of creation to be 23 October 4004 BC
-Catatrophism
Catastrophism - The idea that the earth was shapes by a series of sudden, short-
lived, violent events (ex: the great flood)
Attributed to James Ussher
Charles Lyell - -1830's Principles of Geology argues for uniformitarianism --> the
laws of nature are constant
-The earth is not divinely created
-Geological formations require millions of years
Charles Darwin - -Origin of species
,-"Much light will be shed on the origin of man and his history"
E.B. Tylor - -Quaker
-Deeply anti-catholic
-Wanted to account for the origin of religion and trace its developmental history
-Put himself in the shoes of primitive man
-What makes the difference between a living body and a dead on?
-Animism: belief in supernatural beings (minimal definition of religion)
-Primitive man was a rationalist and a scientific philosopher
-Preliterate religions were essentially consistent and logical, based on rational
thinking and empirical knowledge
Animism - In preliterate cultures
Animals,plants and inanimate objects are endowed with souls
Tylor
Polytheism - The idea of multiple spiritual beings to explain natural events and
phenomena
Belief or worship of one or more god
Tylor
Monotheism - Belief that there is only one god
Animism of civilized man
Tylor
, Sympathetic Magic - -Trying to affect other people
-Get a representative of the person itself and anything done to that object is done
to the person (voodoo)
-Cave art may have been used for this type of ritual
Contagious Magic - -The notion that things which have once been conjoined must
remain ever afterwards, even when quite dissevered from each other, in such a
sympathetic relation that whatever is done to one must similarly affect the other
-Most common example is between man and any severed portion of a person
(hair,skin, nails)
-Baseball Magic
Functionalism -
Emile Durkheim - -Dissatisfied with Tylor's minimal definition of religion, he
claimed we needed a broader definition
-Atheist
-Felt that even the most barbaric and fantastic religious rites must be based on
some human need
-Divided religion into two parts: Rites and Beliefs
-Religion didn't include magic
Beliefs - Durkheim
All Religous beliefs presuppose a classification of all things real and ideal into two
classes or opposed groups: the sacred and the profane
