ANTH 3510 Study Guide - Final Guide: Polygenism, Liminality, Civil Religion
1 Dec 2012
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* durkheim, a de nition of the religious phenomenon . ^ kinds of origins of the study of ritual, dominant intellectual concerns. Degenerationism: the belief that all people once belonged to a single civilization but were then scattered by god - some maintained civilization and others dropped to savagery. Polygenism: diversity of humankind was due to separate acts of creation; each act corresponded to one of the races of mankind". Monogenism: literal interpretation of the bible -- change and variation were natural process. Diffusionism: all human culture derives from a single point of origin, with cultural practices (tools, kinship, religion) spreading out from there. As these ideas spread further from the source, they changed in form. Sacred vs. profane; rituals have a social function -- they are all about the sacred. ^ rise of structural and symbolic theories of ritual. Move from the function to the meaning. 3 part structure, almost anything can be divided up into three parts.
