Religion and agency

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Religion and agency

• 20.11.2003

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Readings

• Lewis, I. 1986. Shaman's Career (Chapter 6). In
  Religion in Context Cults and Charisma.
• Turner, V.  2001 1989. Religious Specialists.
  (In Lehmann and Myers)

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Discussion topics

• I Religious specialists
• Society and religious specialization
• Typology of religious practitioners
• Priest vs shaman
• Anthropological study of shamanism
• Religious use of drugs
• Anthropological study of possession
• Ioan Lewis
• II Ordinary believers
• Psychology of religion
• Religious conversion

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Modes of religious specialization I

• Increased complexity of society (Turner)
• -gt increase of the degree of religious
  specialization.
• -gt contraction in the domain of religion in
  social life
• Simple societies
• every adult has some religious functions
• Elders/men have most religious functions
• Women receive more recognition than in more
  developed societies
• Religious specialization
• knowledge of herbs
• skill in witchcraft
• the capacity to enter a state of trance or
  dissociation
• physical handicap
• Still part-time / spare-time specialization

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Modes of religious specialization II

• Complex societies
• religion
• no longer pervades all social domains
• limited to its own domain
• acquires a contractual and associational
  character
• Believers
• may choose the form and extent of their religious
  participation
• Religious specialists
• specialization on the organizational level
  (Weber)
• routinization of tasks
• a hierarchy of authority and function
• gt a large number of types, grades and ranks of
  religious specialists
• Medium-scale societies
• a wide variety of intermediate types

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Max Weber prophet vs priest I

• Text on religion
• The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism
• Collected Essays in the Sociology of Religion
• The Sociology of Religion (part of Economy and
  Society)
• Progressive rationalization of life
• A unifying theme of Webers sociology
• The main directional trend of Western society
• Diviner, magician, shaman, prophet
• The oldest of all vocations
• Permanently endowed with charisma
• Able to experience ecstatic states

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Max Weber prophet vs priest II

• Priest is associated with
• a religious institution (regular and permanent)
• religious doctrine as a rational system of
  religious concepts
• a distinctively religious ethic
• particular norms, places, times
• specific social groups
• Prophet vs priest
• Prophet
• personal call
• Priest
• office
• Prophets authority
• derives from revelation and personal charisma
• Priests authority
• derives from service in a sacred tradition

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Lessa Vogt Shaman vs priest I

• Religious practice
• Shaman
• personal communication with a supernatural being
• Priest
• no necessary face-to-face relationship with the
  spirit world
• required competence in conducting ritual
• Religious powers
• Shaman
• powers come by a divine stroke
• Priest
• powers inherited
• derived from the body of codified and
  standardized ritual knowledge
• Type of society
• Shamanism
• food-gathering societies
• Priestly cult organizations
• food-producing (agricultural) societies

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Lessa Vogt Shaman vs priest II

• The nature of rituals
• Shamanistic rites
• personal rites
• non-calendrical
• contingent upon occasions of mishap and illness
• Priestly rites
• public rites
• performed for the benefit of a whole village or
  community.
• calendrical, or performed at critical points in
  the ecological cycle.
• communication between supernatural and humans
• Shamans
• Mediums mouthpieces of spirit beings
• Priests
• Intermediaries between people and the spirits
  whom they wish to address
• Evans-Pritchard
• Whereas in the priest man speaks to God, in the
  prophet God speaks to man.

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Raymond Firth inspirational vs institutional
functionaries

• Mediums, shamans and prophets
• inspirational functionaries
• subtypes of a single type of religious
  functionary
• control over spirits
• communicate in a person-to-person manner
• I-thou relationship with deities or spirits.
• conduct a séance
• Priests
• institutional functionaries
• institution - between the priest and the deity
• I-it relationship with the transhuman
• preside over rite

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Anthropological studies of shamanism I

• shaman
• Russian sources in the 17th century
• from the Evenks (Tungus)
• occupies a central position in ritual and
  religious practices
• mediator between the human world and the world of
  spirits
• various social and religious roles
• soothsayer, therapist and interpreter of dreams
• plays an offensive and defensive role
• shamanism
• derivative term of the 18th century
• travelers, explorers and missionaries in the
  Americas
• curandero in Spanish
• wizard, medicine man in English
• jongleur or magicien in French
• giocolare in Italian
• Gaulker in German
• 19th century - gradually replaced by shaman

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Anthropological studies of shamanism II

• 18th and 19th centuries
• Great interest in shamanism
• Enlightenment and early Romantic intellectuals
• Diderot, Herder and Goethe
• an expression of irrationalism
• the source of art, esotericism, religion and
  medicine
• opposed to the scientific rationality
• Evolutionism
• As a collective phenomenon
• socio-religious system
• an intermediary stage between magic and religion

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Anthropological studies of shamanism III

• First half of the 20th century
• increase in ethnographic research in the field
• well-documented monographs
• focus on particular region
• little interest in the comparative
• Psychologism
• focus on individual aspects of shamanism
• personality of the shaman
• charismatic / ecstatic / psychopathological

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Anthropological studies of shamanism IV

• Mircea Eliade
• Shamanism Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy (1951)
• Importance
• Revival of the comparative analysis of shamanism
• Attempt to pull together the results of research
  on shamanism from all over the world
• Historical perspective
• Emphasis on
• the mystical aspect of shamanic practices
• trance / ecstasy
• Still the best introduction to shamanism
• Criticism
• reduced shamanism to trance
• reduced a symbolic system to psychological
  state
• ignored certain forms of shamanism
• too selective in his choice of sources

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Anthropological studies of shamanism V

• By the end of 1960s
• Interest in shamanism outside anthropology
• questioning of industrial development and its
  logic
• emergence of environmentalism
• return to alternative medicines
• development of religious sects
• psychedelic experiences associated with drugs
• gt Searched in shamanism truth or justification
• Psychological anthropology
• Study of altered states of consciousness (ASC)
  and hallucinogens
• Ethnopsychiatry
• psycholanalytic rather psychopatholical
  perspective
• Shamanism - as a therapeutic cure
• gt neo-shamanism and schools of shamanic training
  
• Eg. Castañeda

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Anthropological studies of shamanism VI

• 1980s, 1990s
• Spirits, Shamans, and Stars (1979)
• three sections preoccupations of the 1980s
• magico-religious use of psychotropic drugs
• shamanic therapies
• analysis of shamanic symbols
• Contemporary situation
• shamanism not dead
• contrary to the pessimistic prognosis
• revival in numerous regions of the world (eg.
  Siberia)
• urban forms of shamanism
• New areas of research
• political dimensions of shamanic power
• gender relations
• sexual distribution of shamanic roles
• dream activities
• shamanic texts and performances

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Anthropological studies of shamanism VII

• Shamanism and postmodernism
• objection to the concept of shamanism itself
• Clifford Geertz (1966)
• dry and insipid category
• Robert Spencer
• residual category
• Michael Taussig
• radical deconstruction of shamanism
• modern construct created in the West
• brings together otherwise diverse practices

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Religious use of drugs I

• Marston Bates (1971)
• Drugs substances taken for other than
  nutritional reasons
• extraordinary variety of substances
• eaten, drunk, smoked, chewed, or rubbed on the
  skin
• Homo medicans - man the drug taker
• All cultures
• use of drugs and existence of a medical system
• Motivations
• Hedonism
• Escape
• Medical
• Religious
• dominant in traditional societies
• divining, gaining supernatural knowledge,
  contacting spirits
• Anthropologists and drugs
• Michael Harner The Way of the Shaman (1980)
• ayahuasca session among the Conibo Indians of
  Peru
• Napoleon Chagnon Yanomamö The Fierce People
  (1977)
• use of ebene snuff

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Religious use of drugs II

• Scientific categorization of drugs
• Lewis Lewin (German toxicologist)
• 1) Euphoria
• sedatives which reduce mental activitiy and
  induce mental and physical comfort
• morphine and cocaine
• 2) Phantastica
• Hallucinogens
• bringing on visions and illusions
• vary greatly in chemical composition
• mescal buttons, hashish and marijuana
• 3) Inebrientia
• produce an initial phase of cerebral excitation
  followed by a state of depression
• Chloroform, alcohol, ether
• 4) Hypnotica
• sedatives or sleep producers
• chlorals, sulphonol, and synthetic barbiturates

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Religious use of drugs III

• 5) Excitania
• mental stimulants (analeptics)
• Coffee, tea, betel, tobacco (all plants
  containing caffeine, nicotine)
• tranquilizers, or ataraxics
• all six categories
• known to non-Western cultures
• phantastica
• Particularly used for religious purposes
• Salem witch trials in Massachusetts (1692)
• 200 accused of witchcraft
• 20 executed
• yeast spores on wheat -gt bread
• contain LSD-like drug

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Salem witch trial I
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Salem witch trial II
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Anthropological studies of possession I

• Geographical occurrence
• Africa, the African diaspora
• Middle East, Pacific, South and Southeast Asia
• A state when
• humans temporarily displaced, inhabited by
  particular spirits
• voice and agency are attributed to the sprit
  rather than the host
• Speaking in tongues (glossolalia)
• The host
• not held accountable for what occurs
• may claim subsequently to have no knowledge of it
• The spirits
• generally discrete persons
• ancestors, foreigners, historical figures, gods,
  other species
• Common cultural forms
• zar (Northeast Africa)
• Bori (Hausa)
• Vodou (Haiti)
• Umbanda and Candomblé (Brazil)

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Anthropological studies of possession II

• Explanations
• Reductive attempts
• expressions of
• Illness
• Hysteria
• Relative deprivation
• more nuanced forms of understanding
• possession as performance
• possession vs shamanism?
• categorical distinction does not appear to be
  useful

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Ioan Lewis Ecstatic Religion I

• Ioan Lewis Ecstatic Religion (1971)
• a sociological interpretation of shamanism and
  spirit possession
• functionalist approach
• Influenced by Durkheim
• Aim
• to isolate the particular social and other
  conditions, which encourage the development of an
  ecstatic emphasis in religion

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Ioan Lewis Ecstatic Religion II

• two broad types spirit-possesion cults
• the distinction between them is not absolute
• historically one type can develop into the other
• 1) peripheral possession cults
• coexist with a more dominant moralistic religion
• 2) central possession cults
• as main form of religious expression
• Eg. Shamanism in tribal communities
• criticism of Douglass theory
• ecstatic style of religiosity
• a response to an oppressive excess of structure
• not to lack of structure

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Ioan Lewis Ecstatic Religion III

• shamanism and spirit-possession
• religions of the oppressed
• peripheral possession cults
• protest cults
• Subordinate individuals who lack political
  influence
• especially women
• central possession cults
• similar interpretation
• Eg. general physical and social pressures,
  general instability
• Thus
• relates the ecstatic tendency to external
  pressure
• social stability
• gt Ritualistic religion
• Social instability
• gt ecstatic religions
• In reality
• shamanism under a variety of environmental
  conditions

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Psychology of religion

• Ralph Hood (1998)
• six psychological schools of thought regarding
  religion
• 1) psychoanalytical school
• draws from the work of Freud
• unconscious motives for religious belief
• 2) Analytical school
• Based on Jung's description of spiritual life
• 3) Object relations school
• draws from psychoanalysis
• Focus on maternal influences on the child
• 4) Transpersonal school
• confront spirituality directly
• often with the assumption that spiritual
  phenomena are real
• 5) Phenomenological school
• focus on the assumptions underlying religious
  experience
• favors description and critical reflection over
  experimentation and measurement.
• 6) Measurement school
• construction of scales to measure religious
  belief and practices

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William James (1842-1910)

• wrote one of the first psychology textbooks
• Varieties of Religious Experience (1902)
• classic work in psychology of religion
• institutional religion vs personal religion
• Institutional religion
• religious group or organization,
• plays an important part in a society's culture
• Personal religion
• the individuals mystical experience

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Alfred Adler (1870-1937)

• Individual Psychology (1928)
• Emphasis on the role of goals and motivation
• we try to compensate for inferiorities that we
  perceive in ourselves
• Belief in perfect and omnipotent God
• God embodies our goals
• perfection and superiority
• A way to compensate for our imperfections and
  feelings of inferiority

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Gordon Allport (1897-1967)

• important contributions to the psychology of
  personality
• interested in differences among individuals
• Refined the concept of "traits"
• The Individual and His Religion (1950)
• people may use religion in different ways
• eg. attending a mass
• "religious orientation" scales
• To measure these two approaches to religion
• intrinsic religious orientation
• interest in religion itself
• extrinsic orientation toward religion
• religious behavior is a means to some other end

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Abraham Maslow (1908-1970)

• psychology of mental health
• hierarchy of needs
• physiological needs
• safety
• love, affection, belonging
• esteem
• self-actualization
• Self-actualized persons
• have reached their potential for self-development
• mystics
• more likely to be self-actualized than are other
  people
• "peak experiences"
• sense of ecstasy and oneness with the universe

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Religous conversion (Zapotecs of Oaxaca)
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Marielas story

• from Ixtlan (Oaxaca)
• I converted five years ago because of the
  testimonies that God sent me. I had cancer and no
  doctor could help me. The Christians started to
  pray for me, I started to study their religion
  and God cured me. Now I have no pain anywhere.
  Before I was also very Catholic but despite that
  I felt a bit ridiculous when putting flowers in
  front of an image made of paper or wood.
  Initially many criticised me but I am already
  used to this and do not pay any more attention to
  it. Previously I had many compadres, and I went
  to their fiestas. But not anymore. Some of them
  still do not talk to me.

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Reasons for conversion

• Economic reasons
• Lured by missionaries
• Avoiding the constraints of Catholicism
• being a non-Catholic is less expensive
• Alleviates poverty
• The spirit of capitalism (Weber)
• Political reasons
• Access to prestige and authority
• Social reasons
• Congregation as family
• Personal reasons
• illness, alcoholism or problems in the family
• Intellectual reasons
• better answers to the eternal questions of human
  existence
• Religious reasons
• Otto and numinous experience

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Critique of conventional explanations I

• conversion as a response to economic
  marginalisation
• non-Catholic churches
• churches of the disinherited (Niebuhr)
• not only religious but also economic refuge
• Turner (1979)
• Tzeltal community in Chiapas
• a non-Western perspective on Webers thesis
• conversion alleviates three major problems of
  many Indian communities
• poverty, disease and illiteracy

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Critique of conventional explanations II

• no strong link between conversion and economic
  change
• no emergence of particular capitalist spirit
• Martin
• macro-level study of Pentecostalism in Latin
  America
• Conversion
• marginalises individuals
• cuts through the economically and socially
  beneficial relationships between the converts and
  the rest of the community
• eg. compadrazgo

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Critique of conventional explanations III

• Conversion
• satisfies the need for power and authority,
  prestige and acknowledgement
• religious movements
• an ideological alternative
• provide the politically marginalised groups with
  new spaces for expression and participation
• Especially women, the poor, indigenous groups,
  subordinate classes
• Sánchez (1995)
• study of the Presbyterians of Chiapas
• power acquired by conversion
• not explicitly economic or political
• manifested only on the micro level as
  acknowledgement within the group itself

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Critique of conventional explanations IV

• Conversion
• more common among women
• Weber
• great receptivity of women to all religious
  prophecy
• Ioan Lewis
• women are particularly prone to join marginal
  possession cults
• Womens possession cults
• thinly disguised protest movements directed
  against the dominant sex
• a way to manipulate their husbands
• Smilde
• Evangelicalism has elective affinity towards
  Latin American women
• Loreto and Das Dores Campos
• Pentecostalism has led to the emergence of a
  new man and a new woman

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Critique of conventional explanations V

• statistical data
• 12.0 (w) vs 11.6 (m)
• How religious do you consider yourself to be?
• Very/quite religious 16.6 (w) vs 14.0 (m)
• Not very religious 14.0 (w) vs 27.0 (m)
• conversion
• tends to involve couples rather than individuals
• does not lead to increase in public power
• congregation leaders usually men
• Protestants
• conservative about gender relationships
• increased domestic violence
• religious affiliation
• generally follows the patrilineal line

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Religious devotion

• new relationship between an individual and his or
  her religion
• increased devotion due to active choice
• How religious do you consider yourself to be?
• Very / quite religious
• Non-Catholics 44
• Catholics 5

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