W W 2 Agenda

1
W W 2 Agenda

• Fact of the day
• Labor Day
• Sections
• Baseball
• Protips
• Office hours
• Assignment
• Heatwave preamble

2
Society, Religion, and Baseball

• Fall 2006

3
Todays Takeaways

• Sociology of religion yields insights applicable
  to many realms beyond religion.
• Durkheim god is society

4
Revisiting a Puzzle

• Society is full of conflict, yes?
• So, conflict would seem to be natural human
  state.
• Much conflict is between groups.
• How do the groups remain internally
  non-conflictual enough to engage in external
  conflict?

5
Examples

• Family feuds
• Gang wars
• Corporate competition
• Sports
• War
• Gender oppression
• Racism
• Religious bigotry

6
Outline of Collins Chapter

• Puzzle Why Doesnt Religion Disappear
• Durkheim Common basis of all religions
• Why Do People Have Moral Feelings
• A General Theory of Social rituals
• Type of God Corresponds to Type of Society
• The Rise of the Individual Self
• Interaction rituals in Everyday Life
• World of social rituals

7
Puzzle Why Doesnt Religion Disappear

• Enlightenment. Rationality. Rise of science.
  Decline of superstition. Broad education.
  Cosmopolitan life in cities. But

8
Common basis of all religions

• Durkheim treat it as real. Lesson believe your
  Rs
• Over and over, religions posit god as something
  more powerful than the individual.
• Compare. Commonalities? Not doctrine, not type
  of god, not rules.
• Rather beliefs and rituals

9
Beliefs World Divided into Sacred Profane

• Sacred
• Dangerous
• Important
• Demands respect
• Profane
• Everything else. Worldly. NON-Sacred

Terminology Dualism of sacred and profane
10
The Sacred

• http//www.tldm.org/news2/cih.htm
• Communion in the hand is a sacrilege...Each
  Communion in the hand brings more punishment...
• your mother
• Margaret Drabble story.

11
Ritual Strictly Determined Behavior

• Formal how you do it matters
• Not practical not a means to an end
• Commonly repetitive
• Why do we do it that way? Because we do it that
  way.

12
Society Within Me Without Me

• My name is my identity but

Fathers family. Irish.
Uncle Moms brother
Daniel John Joseph Ryan Jr.
A boys name
Same name as father and grandfather
Confirmation name. Catholic tradition. Has to be
a saint/bible figure.
13
Major Pts This Section

• Religion as something REAL
• Rituals Beliefs sacred/profane
• What motivates near universal division of world
  into sacred and profane?
• Society as god
• Outside and inside us
• Source of much that is
• Big contributor to who we are (identity,
  thinking, perceiving, feeling)

14
Religion, Society, Concepts

• Concepts, categories, ideas, abstract thinking
  transcending here and now
• Encounter and communication with others looking
  at the same world allows development of ideas
  that go across time/space/event.
• Religious thinking built around social
  experience. Identity, obligation, conflict.
• The symbolism of religion mirrors the social
  world (37).

15
Why Do People Have Moral Feelings

• Right and wrong always defined with respect to a
  group.
• Recall that we put moral on different side from
  individual
• Theres emotional energy to be derived from
  belonging-ness and acting moral generally means
  identifying with a type of person, a member of a
  group or category.

16
What is the payoff to being moral?

• Moral righteousness makes you a member in good
  standing of the group the secure sense of
  belonging constitutes its reward (38.5).

17
What is the payoff to being moral?

• Not just moral moral, but
• Good teacher
• Good feminist
• Good X, Y, Z
• As a _______ I want to say

18
the emotional energy that one receives from
taking part in intense social gatherings (39.5)

• Athletic events
• Battles
• Night out with the girls or the boys
• Political Rallies Protest Marches
• Concerts
• Academic seminars
• Sex
• Church

19
A General Theory of Social rituals

• Group assembly
• Actions ritualized
• Symbolic object to focus group energy on itself

20
Type of God Corresponds to Type of Society

• Theory predicts ?society ? ? religion
• Tribal culture equal clans equal totems
• Horticultural society matrilineal/local
  fertility gods
• Note DaVinci Code point patriarchal society has
  suppressed goddess aspects of Christianity
• ? social hierarchy ? ? religious hierarchy
• Rationalized, advanced society ? monotheism,
  universalism
• Chicken or Egg? Theories go both ways

21
The Rise of the Individual Self

• Macro Level
• Politics as New ReligionAssociation of religion
  with group conflict and persecution undermines
  attachment to organized religion but same logic
  lives on in attachment to political ideologies.
• Micro Level
• ?groupsize ?division of labor
  ??individualization Association of religion with
  group conflict and persecution undermines
  attachment to organized religion but same logic
  lives on in attachment to political ideologies.

22
Erving Goffman

• 1922 1982
• Presentation of Self in Everyday Life
• Asylums
• Stigma
• Interaction Ritual

23
Interaction rituals in Everyday Life
24
World of social rituals