Click the star to add/remove an item to/from your individual schedule.
You need to be logged in to avail of this functionality.
Log in
- Convenor:
-
Tomoko Nakata
(Kobe City University of Foreign Studies)
- Location:
- 201 B
- Start time:
- 15 May, 2014 at
Time zone: Asia/Tokyo
- Session slots:
- 2
Short Abstract:
This panel discusses various religious phenomena that reveal the complexity of religious and ritual practices in multiethnic and/or multicultural situations, which cannot be simply understood by the existing religious category.
Long Abstract:
Anthropology has been long interested in change or alteration in cultural and religious practices often caused by close and constant contact between different groups (ethnic or others). These changes have been often explained in terms of acculturation or syncretism. Today, various effects of globalization and modernization, which stimulate to intensify contact with different people from different cultures and different ideas without necessarily entailing direct contact with them, can sometimes lead to more complex situations than before. While religious fundamentalist movements in different regions have been making news in the world for several decades, the process of change or alteration in religious practices is often proceeding at local level sometimes in more unnoticeable way. Carefully considering the process makes the existing religious category difficult to adopt to fully understand the situations, and this inspires us to search for alternative theoretical frameworks.
This panel, examining from both local and global perspectives, various religious and ritual practices in multiethnic and/or multicultural situations of different parts of the world, demonstrates their complexity, which is revealed in such diverse ways as ambiguity of the borders between different religions, fluidity of religious identity, association of factors of different religions, reevaluation of one's own culture and religion in relation to another, emergence of a ritual with reference to the tradition. By showing various local practices based on the ethnographical research in different areas of the world, we hope to present some theoretical perspectives to understand old and new religious phenomena.
Accepted papers:
Session 1Ana Keila Pinezi (Universidade Federal do ABC)
Paper short abstract:
This paper aims to discuss the body and its performance in two different Brazilian religious groups. The research is justified because of the importance of demonstrating how body and its performance in these religions are associated with soul and spirit in possession and cure rituals.
Paper long abstract:
In Brazil, the contemporary religious field shows itself more and more plural. It results an intense religious transit and it produces religious segments based on elements of many religions. One of this elements that has occupied a huge space in emotional religions and that has been breaking the dichotomy of sacred and profane is the body. The place of the body in tradicional christian religions was thought as the place of danger and sin. According to the religious context, in afro-brazilian religions and pentecostalism the performance of the body can mean the cure, the devil or god´s possession and the evil´s purge. This paper aims to discuss the body and its performance in both religions: candomble and neopentecostalim. The research is justified because of the importance to demonstrate how body and its performance in both religions are associated with the notions of soul and spirit in possession and cure rituals.
Wai-chi Chee (Hong Kong Baptist University)
Paper short abstract:
This research seeks to explore the relation between religion and education in the context of migration where the students are both an ethnic and a religious minority. It specifically examines three important factors: religious participation, religious tenets, and religion-based social networks.
Paper long abstract:
Substantial research has documented that religion plays an important role in educational attainment (E.g., Lehrer 1999). Yet the relation between religion and education remains confusing because conflicting conclusions are offered by different studies. While some studies find that religion is positively related to educational attainment (E.g., Regnerus 2000; Muller and Ellison 2001), others suggest a negative association (E.g., Darnell and Sherkat 1997).
My research on the education of South Asian immigrant students in Hong Kong also reveals diverse opinions regarding the relation between Islam and education. Local Chinese educators tend to see that certain practices endorsed by Islam may discourage students from developing their academic potential to the full. However, South Asian teachers and parents think the other way. They claim that Islam encourages education, for both male and female, and that the Quran stipulates that Muslims should learn both religious knowledge and secular knowledge to enhance life on earth. They also emphasize education as an avenue to social mobility.
Indeed, religion has an impact on values and priorities which in turn shape how people make decisions about important issues such as education. This research seeks to explore the relation between religion and education in the context of migration where the students are both ethnic and religious minority. It specifically examines three important factors: religious participation, religious tenets, and religion-based social networks, to shed light on how these factors, individually or collectively, shape the academic achievement of South Asian Muslim immigrant students.
Hisashi Ogawa (Osaka University)
Paper short abstract:
The aim of this paper is to describe the Tsunami image of Muslim inhabitants in a 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami-affected village of Thailand through their religious practices. It shows the multifaceted nature of the 2004 Tsunami disaster, which is not exclusive to physical damage by focusing on religion.
Paper long abstract:
The aim of this paper is to describe the Tsunami image of Muslim inhabitants in a 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami-affected village (M village) of southern Thailand through their religious practices. The Indian Ocean Tsunami, not only the phenomenon itself, but human and material damages caused directly or indirectly by it, was beyond the imagination of inhabitants in M village. After the tsunami, Under such conditions, a transnational Islamic religious movement called Tablighi Jama'at which succeeded to collect the villager's support before the tsunami went around to preach them using a newspaper article sent from the head quarter in India that this tsunami disaster was a punishment for unbelievers brought form the Allah and there is no way unless to become pious in Islam to avoid it. This tsunami image rapidly rippled through them with religious legitimacy of Tablighi Jama'at in M village. It was easily understood that following new religious practices have been widely expanded among them, such as enthusiastic prayer for the Allah and the use of printed materials as talisman. This paper shows the multifaceted nature of the Indian Ocean Tsunami disaster, which is not exclusive to physical damage by focusing on religion. Also this paper would draw an aspect of globalization in the 2004 tsunami-affected areas of Thailand from religious side by showing that M village locating in the fringe of the Islamic world were entrapped further more into the global network of Tablighi Jama'at by tsunami.
Kengo Konishi (Otani University)
Paper short abstract:
This paper deals with the manner in which the religious minority in the Tibetans maintains their position. Evaluated as the source of indigenousness under socio-cultural changes from the mid-20th century, they aim to reconfirm their own values while seeking a symbiosis with major Buddhists.
Paper long abstract:
In the Tibetan plateau, the socioeconomic system based on Tibetan Buddhism was constructed after the diffusion of Buddhism from India in the 7th century. Since then, the presence of Bon religion, which is believed to be spread in ancient Tibet, has diminished. The followers of Bon religion called Bonpo have been reduced to a religious minority within Tibetan ethnic group. Their beliefs and rituals had been often regarded as "primitive", not only by major Tibetan Buddhists but also by Western scholars until the middle of 20th century.
However, the position of Bon religion has considerably changed since the late 20th century, along with the transnational diffusion of Tibetan culture and the governance by China. This paper deals with the manner in which Bonpo maintain their position in the contemporary contexts.
The discourse that evaluates Bon religion as "indigenous source of Tibetan culture" has been constructed by two factors: one is the development of Tibetology in which Western and Tibetan scholars collaborated to indicate historical and cultural importance of the Bon, the other is the Chinese official's tendency to define Bon as the "ethnic culture" of the Tibetans while considering Buddhism as a "foreign religion".
The changing position of Bon has influenced the self-orientation of Bonpo. On the one hand, they assert their uniqueness and authenticity by recalling its history and universality. On the other hand, they advocate the compatibility of the Bon with Buddhism, by emphasizing common values such as enlightenment and altruism in order to avoid sectarianism.
Chiyoko Nagatani (Kyushu University)
Paper short abstract:
Expanding Guanyin cult among ethnic minorities in China, is often seen as a sign of assimilation into Han-Buddhist culture. However, the modern classification on ethnic groups and religions has become inconsistent with reality. We propose a new viewpoint by adopting the concept of ortho-syncretism.
Paper long abstract:
Since late 90's, interest in religion has apparently risen among Chinese people, even PRC started to value religions for their social contribution. They highly evaluate Chinese civilization (Zhonghua wenming), centering Confucianism which are to be shared among all nationalities in China. However, the concept like 'sinisization' or 'Han-hua' is too rough to describe this situation, and also the stereotyped understanding about religions and ethnic groups, such as 'the Han believe in Confucianism, and the Dai believe in Theravada Buddhism', becomes invalid. In reality, the separating lines among ethnic groups and religions are more fluid.
To understand such situation, the concept "ortho-syncretism" is adopted. The concept by Timothy Light allows us to see religion not as a given objective system but a cognitive formation made by people. People are making their own religions by syncretizing many items out of traditional religions and even daily events.
For the concrete analysis, we investigate the case of expanding Guan-yin (Avalokiteśvara) cult in Dehong, Yunnan. Dehong is the Dai and Jimpo Autonomous Prefecture, though the minority's population has been outnumbered by the Han immigrants. Expansion of Guan-yin cult is seen as an index of sinisization by Chinese scholars and local people, but in reality, this is a result of the more complicated interaction among various phenomena. In this presentation, we will clarify what "Sinisization" actually means by describing the new religious situation rearranged by people's interaction.
Tomoko Nakata (Kobe City University of Foreign Studies)
Paper short abstract:
This study, based on ethnographical material collected by fieldwork, examines complex relationships between Buddhism and a spirit cult in a relocated village settled by ethnic minorities in Southern Laos.
Paper long abstract:
Although Laos is regarded as a Buddhist country, most of its ethnic minorities have traditionally worshiped various spirits and conducted diverse rituals related to them. However, as they move to the lowlands where the ethnic Lao is the majority, their religious practices tend to be transformed. Several families from the Ngae, a Mon-Khmer group, fled from the battlefields during the Vietnam War, and settled in the present site in Champasak Province, Southern Laos. The village has been populated since 1970s by different groups including the Lao. In the circumstance where Ngae villagers have established daily contact with Buddhists, the influence of Buddhism is progressively apparent in many respects. However, the religious practices of Buddhist Lao do not remain intact either. Not only is the change in religion not rare among the villagers for the reasons of intermarriage between different groups or the intention of escaping from the heavy burden of animal sacrifice, but the boundary between the two religions is vague and blurred. Some Buddhists come to conduct an animal sacrifice which they have not done, and similarly some spirit worshipers participate in Buddhist festivals. The influence of the other religion are thus exercised bilaterally. In analyzing the statements and discoursed of the villagers from the perspective of language game by Wittgenstein, this study intends to contribute to a comprehensive understanding of religious complexities.
Mare Kõiva (Estonian Literary Museum) Rahel Laura Vesik (Estonian Literary Museum)
Paper short abstract:
This paper investigates and compares two kinds of contemporary rituals dedicated to the Sun and Moon: 1) the ethnic (pagan) rituals performed around equinoxes and solstices, and 2) occasional rituals performed by contemporary masters of rituals.
Paper long abstract:
This paper investigates and compares two kinds of contemporary rituals dedicated to the Sun and Moon: 1) the ethnic (pagan) rituals performed around equinoxes and solstices, and 2) occasional rituals performed by contemporary masters of rituals. The rituals reflect combinations of Pagan, Christian, and secular approaches, use texts from old manuscripts, with additions from different cultural areas. The aim of the paper is to reevaluate and deconstruct these rituals using Hobsbawm and Ranger's (1983) concept of invented tradition, studies of new religiousity/spirituality (cf. York, 2001), ritual theories (Bell, 1992). The presentation in based on Eastern European (Estonian, Bulgarian, Slovenian) material. Instead of the term "bricolage" I have used "convergence", a more widely accepted characteristic describing various phenomena in new media and cultural disciplines. From the point of view of the emergence of a belief or ritual, the personal worldview and ethical evaluations of the person formulating the ritual and belief, "convergence" is more information-laden.
In both cases under examination (a, b) the rituals are tailored to resemble traditions of the past, including prayers to stellar objects. Typically to modern rituals they are very much person/individual-centered, and we can characterize them as the convergence rituals. The purpose of the rituals is to involve participants in the cultural process of constructing a ritual, to direct city dwellers in finding a new inner balance.