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Summary Sociology, beliefs in society
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Religion and consensus - functionalist ideas10 October 2022 13:33
- Collective conscience promotes integration
- Religions contribution to society's pre-requisite needs creates social solidarity
- Religion promotes value consensus and promotes social harmony
- Integration is promoted by religious worship, as well as a shared set of values of
beliefs
- People accept moral bonds which unite them collective conscience)
- Durkheim: upholding shared value is the same as worshipping society
- Societies divide the world into two categories: the sacred and profane
- Totemism - symbols
- Durkheim: worshipping worldly objects is the worship of society, not God, making
society the real object of religious veneration. There is a primitive need for religion
- Durkheim and Mauss - religion performs cognitive functions, an original understanding
of intellectual human thought and a way of understanding time and space
- Tylor - animism is the earliest form of religion
- Muller - naturism, a religion which arose from profound feelings caused by nature, is
the earliest form of religion
- Yinger - religion performs psychological functions (explanation of life after death, for
example)
- Normlessness > alienation, may lead to anomie
- Malinowski - death is the most disruptive factor of life events, it disorganises human
plans and is thus the strongest source of religious belief. Religion is prepared for
death. For example, social solidarity in rituals of a funeral service, comfort at funerals,
coping mechanism
- Parsons - cultural norms derived from social system which controls human values
- Ten commandments - guidelines for social control in western countries
- Suffering is imposed by God to test faith - rewards in heaven if faithful
- Criticisms:
- Theories mostly speculative
- No simple explanation to explain evolution of religious beliefs (sociology formed as a
result of the modernization of society)
- Lang - many simple societies are monotheistic, contradicting that monotheism is only
complex societies
- Functionalists - ignore internal divisions within religion, social divisions which it causes
SUMMARY:
religion Page 1
,Definitions of religion
10 October 2022 13:44
• Substantive - functionalist and social constructionist
- Concerned with content of religious belief
- Weber - religion is a belief in a superior power that cannot be scientifically explained
- Critic of Weber - excludes religions that do not conform to the Eurocentric idea of God
- Durkheim - functionalist definitions are substantive, analyse religion in terms of function it
performs for society
- Durkheim and Mauss - primitive consciousness religion performs cognitive functions and
facilitates ideas of time, space, existence, with religion being the origin of human thought
- Social constructionist - interpretivist, focused on how members of society define religion
- Aldrige - scientology is a religion to who follows it but the government doesn't recognise it
Summary:
religion Page 2
,Marxist ideas of religion
10 October 2022 13:53
- Individualism weakens shared values
- Mestrovic - Durkheim's idea that religion promotes social solidarity only applies to short-scale
societies
- Marx - religion is an illusion
- Marx - religion distorts reality and provides basis of ruling class ideology, justifies the
legitimate subordination of the working class and domination of the ruling class
- Marx - there is hierarchy in religion - it is the basis of social control and the opium of the
people
- Engels - religion distorts reality, Christianity is a religion of slaves
- Religion is used by the rich to spread ideology, it promises bliss after death, if you work hard
- Used to control working class and keeps them submissive, numbs the pain of daily oppression
- Suffering becomes a virtue, with religion offering hope of supernatural intervention to solve
earthly problems - justifies social order
Criticisms:
- Religion does not always legitimise power, it's just an expression of alienation - can influence
positive social change
religion Page 3
, The dual character of religion - Marxist
10 October 2022 14:17
- Marx: religion is a means by which the proletariat seeks to find his humanity in a world made
inhuman by capitalist exploitation
To elaborate on this, once he has found religion, he finds comfort in the legitimate
subordination of his labour - he understands that suffering is a virtue, and he becomes a slave
- An illusion maintaining inequality creates a false class consciousness
- Engels: religion inhibits change by disguising inequality
- But as expressed by its dual nature, it can also challenge status quo and encourages social
change (for example, Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement)
- Lower levels of church congregations preach against ruling class
- Traditional marxism - conservative stance
- Neo-marxism - religion can have relative autonomy, it can be a force for change and maintain
social stability
- Bloch - religion has a dual character - it expresses the principle of hope, images of a utopia in a
depressing concrete world
- Maduro - religion can be a revolutionary force
- Lawry - religion can be a force to challenge status quo
- Hegemony - persuasion over coercion it is the way the ruling class maintain their control by
persuading the working class into accepting their ideas rather than controlling them by
coercion (ISA, RSA - Althusser)
When hegemony is established, the ruling class can rely on popular consent to reinforce their
rule without a need for coercion (cultural hegemony > domination of catholic church)
- Weltanschuaang - ruling class manipulation of society's value system
- Examples of how religion can be a revolutionary force (Bloch, Maduro, Lawry) - counter-
hegemony
- Cassanova - liberation theology
- Emerged within catholic church in Latin America around 1960-1970. Its members had a strong
commitment to the poor, and occurred because poverty and urban slums were increasing as
well as human rights abuses following military takeovers
- Praxis informed by theory
- Catholic priests resisted state terror in LA
- Pope John Paul condemned liberation theory on grounds of Marxism - terrorism
- Priests concentrated on religious stuff and revolutionary struggle, the consequence was a
gradual decline in influence of liberation theorists
religion Page 4
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