This document provides an overview of key anthropological concepts related to the study of religion. It discusses how anthropologists view religion as part of culture rather than focusing on its truth claims. Religions are examined as social and individual phenomena that provide systems of meaning. Gods, spirits, and various beliefs are reviewed as are myths, cosmologies, and altered states of consciousness used by shamans. Rituals, ceremonies, and beliefs are identified as core components of religions.

1. Religion

2. Anthropology of Religion
• Anthropologists treat religion as a
component of human culture.
• Is not concerned with the “truth” or
“falsehood” of religions.
• Attempts to connect religion to other
aspects of society (holism).

3. What is religion?
• How do we define religion as a
phenomenon? What is true of all
religions?
• Anthropologists use a number of
different definitions to understand
religion cross-culturally.

4. Religion is…
• A social phenomenon. It involves
collective practices.
• An individual phenomenon. It involves
the psychic experiences of individuals.
• A system of meaning. It answers “big
questions.”

5. Religion…
• is composed of practices: rituals and
ceremonies…
• as well as beliefs and perspectives.

6. God(s) and Spirits
• Animism is the belief in spirits or
spiritual beings.
• This term is sometimes also used for
the belief that all things have a spirit.
• Animism, in some form or another, is a
hallmark of most religious systems.

7. God(s) and Spirits
• Gods refer to powerful spiritual beings
that have personal characteristics (i.e.
characteristics like gender,
personalities, motivations…etc.)
• Theism refers to the belief in the
existence of one or more gods.

8. God(s) and Spirits
• Polytheism: the belief in many gods.
• Pantheon: the collection of deities
worshipped by a particular people.
• Monotheism: the belief in only one god.

9. Myths and Cosmologies
• Myth: a sacred story, one that often
describes the nature or origin of the
universe or some element of human
existence.
• Myths are involved in building the
cosmology of a religion: its model of the
universe and humanity’s place in it.

10. The Nine Worlds

11. Religion and Philosophy
• Religion tends to answer “big questions”
relating to the meaning of live, the
nature of good and evil…etc.
• The question of what falls into the
“religious” category and what falls into
the “philosophical” category sometimes
confuses people.

12. Religion and Philosophy
• Some forms of Buddhism reject the idea
of a Creator or God in the Jewish,
Christian or Muslim sense and thus see
Buddhism as a philosopy…
• However, like all religions, Buddhism
provides rituals and practices that are
designed to integrate people into a
particular world view and lead them to
particular spiritual goals.

13. The original “Shamans”
• The term “Shaman” refers to a particular
religious practitioner amongst
indigenous Siberian people.

14. The “other” Shaman
• The term “Shaman”, however, is also
used by anthropologists to refer to
collection of spiritual practitioners
throughout the rest of the world.

15. The people we call shamans typically:
• Act as intermediaries between this
world and the “other world.”
• Divine the future
• Function as healers

16. Altered States of
Consciousness
• Shamans typically use some means to
enter a shamanic state: a state of
altered consciousness to do their work.

17. Methods
• Drumming/Rhythmic Music
• Dancing
• Chanting
• Consumption of psychoactive
substances…etc.

18. Entheogens
• An entheogen is a pschoactive drug
used for spiritual/religious purposes.

19. Questions about The Sound
or Sushing Water.
• What is real to the Jivaro Shaman?
What is unreal?
• How does one become a shaman?
• How does the shaman uses his powers
to heal…and harm?