Chapter 15, Religion

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Chapter 15, Religion

• Key Terms

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• ReligionA social process that helps to order
  society and provide its members with meaning,
  unity, peace of mind, and the degree of control
  over events they believe is possible.
• CosmologyA system of beliefs that deals with
  fundamental questions in the religious and social
  order.

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• Sacred narratives Stories held to be holy and
  true by members of a religious tradition.
• AnthropomorphicHaving human shape.

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• ZoomorphicHaving an animal shape.
• Naturalism Endowing features of the natural
  world with spirit, soul, or other supernatural
  characteristics.

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• AnthropopsychicHaving thought processes and
  emotions similar to humans.
• GodA named spirit who is believed to have
  created or to control some aspect of the world.

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• PolytheismBelieve in many gods.
• MonotheismBelief in a single god.

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• TricksterA supernatural entity that does not act
  in the best interests of humans.
• ManaReligious power or energy that is
  concentrated in individuals or objects.

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• Ritual A patterned act that involves the
  manipulation of religious symbols.
• Rite of passage A ritual that marks a persons
  transition from one status to another.

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• SeparationThe first stage of a rite of passage
  in which individuals are removed from their
  community or status.
• LiminalThe stage of a ritual, particularly of a
  rite of passage, in which one has passed out of
  an old status but not yet entered a new one.

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• ReincorporationThe third phase of a rite of
  passage during which participants are returned to
  their community with a new status.
• CommunitasA state of perceived solidarity,
  equality, and unity among people sharing a
  religious ritual, often characterized by intense
  emotion.

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• AntistructureThe socially sanctioned use of
  behavior that radically violates social norms.
• Rite of intensification A ritual structured to
  reinforce the values and norms of a community and
  to strengthen group identity.

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• TotemAn animal, plant, or other aspect of the
  natural world held to be ancestral or to have
  other intimate relationships with members of a
  group.
• TotemismReligious practices centered around
  animals, plants, or other aspects of the natural
  world held to be ancestral or to have other
  intimate relationships with members of a group.

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• Prayer Any communication between people and
  spirits or gods in which people praise, plead, or
  request without assurance of results.
• SacrificeAn offering made to increase the
  efficacy of a prayer or the religious purity of
  an individual.

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• MagicA religious ritual believed to produce a
  mechanical effect by supernatural means.
• Imitative magicThe belief that imitating an
  action in a religious ritual will cause the
  action to happen in the material world.

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• Contagious magicThat belief that things once in
  contact with a person or object retain an
  invisible connection with that person or object.
• DivinationA religious ritual performed to find
  hidden objects or information.

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• ScalpulomancyDivination using the shoulder blade
  of an animal.
• Shaman Individual who is recognized as having
  the ability to mediate between the world of
  humanity and the world of gods or spirits but who
  is not a recognized official of any religious
  organization.

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• Vision quest An individual, emotionally intense
  search for a special relationship with a
  particular spirit that will provide protection,
  knowledge, and power.
• PharmacopeiaA collection of preparations used as
  medications.

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• PriestOne who is formally elected or appointed
  to a full-time religious office.
• WitchcraftThe ability to harm others by
  harboring malevolent thoughts about them the
  practice of sorcery.

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• WiccanA member of a new religion that claims
  descent from pre-Christian nature worship a
  modern day witch.
• Nativism A religious movement that aims to
  restore a golden age believed to have existed in
  the past.

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• Vitalism A religious movement that looks toward
  the creation of a utopian future that does not
  resemble a past golden age.
• Messianic Focusing on the coming of a messiah
  who will usher in a utopian world.

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•  MillenarianThe belief that a coming catastrophe
  will signal the beginning of a new age and the
  eventual establishment of paradise.
• Syncretism The merging of elements of two or
  more religious traditions to produce a new
  religion.

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• OrichaA Yoruba deity identified with a Catholic
  saint in Vodou and Santeria.
• Ghost DanceA Native American religious movement
  of the late nineteenth century.

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• Native American ChurchA religious revitalization
  movement among Native Americans, also known as
  the Peyote religion.
• PeyoteA small hallucinogenic cactus found in
  southern Texas and northern Mexico.