Anthropology Essay

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East Carolina University *

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2015

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Anthropology

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Oct 30, 2023

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1 Chapter 14: Religion and Magic Religion and magic around the world are seen as many different things in different cultures. For example, some might see it as evil or bad and that it descents from hell or the devil while others see it as a way to ward off evil spirits. Every society has its own version of magic, and sometimes the beliefs are similar to those of another culture. One reason that I chose to review this chapter is because when we were learning about this in class, I was able to relate to some of the things that were talked about. One example of this is when they were talking about mana and how it is “a supernatural and impersonal force” (Ember 332). Mana is a supernatural force that tends to bring good energy, if were to be in something such as stones and they were to be placed around something such as crops then that crop season all the crops would grow beautifully and be bountiful. There are cases in which the mana could lose it power and then the crops might not grow at all. Mana isn’t only used for crops, but the Malayo-Polynesian also believe that people can have it as well and just like the rocks they can lose their mana because it is not permanent. Coming from a Hispanic household there are a lot of superstitions that we believe in, some of those being spilling salt, sweeping your own feet with a broom, not fulfilling someone’s death wishes. We also have some things that will bring us good luck, such as your right-hand itching signifying that you will receive money. Every society and culture has their own form of magic or supernatural beliefs whether they admit it or not. For most Americans breaking a mirror means that you will receive bad luck for 7 years. This belief came from the Greeks, because they though that mirrors that were made from polished metals was the way that the Gods would look into people’s souls. They thought that if someone was careless enough to break a mirror then the Gods would punish them. The reason that it is 7 years of bad luck is that they believed that the “ body renewed itself every seven years ”( Markovsky) , so their old soul would be gone and the

2 new one is clean. Magic is a broad term that covers things from superstitions all the way to witchcraft, with all of these being things that cannot be scientifically proven or disproven. Religion is in every single society in one way or another. As seen in the book we are told that every society has “beliefs that can be grouped under the term religion” (Ember 328). When talking and defining religion there are several issues that anthropologist could come across, one of those being finding a clear distinction between religion, spirituality, and even magic. Another issue is that the word “religion,” which is commonly used in the United States to refer to participation in a distinct form of faith such as Christianity, Islam, or Judaism, is not a universally recognized idea” (Brown) Many cultures actually don’t have a word for religion and don’t always , make a clear distinction between spirituality and their religion. This makes it harder for anthropologist because they are studying people and cultures that they may not know. Although not everyone uses or has a word for religion most people are religious especially here in the United States, we have several different religions that people practice, for example some of those would be Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Religion isn’t something that is new at all, actually there were people such as the Ancient Greeks who were polytheistic, this meant that they believed in many Gods not just one. The reason that they can be considered as having a religion is because they believed in some type of higher power that was in charge of them as a whole society. They believed that these Gods were in charge of certain things, such as rewarding them with good or bad things. They also had certain Gods that had specific jobs, such as a God of fertility, Lightning, Sea, etc. Religion is different in every culture and there is no way to solidly define it because to everyone it doesn’t mean the same thing, and some don’t practice religion at all or believe in it either. Religion is something that has been around for hundreds of thousands of years, and it hasn’t gone away. It has changed in many ways, but it is still

3 something that will exist in one way or another. This chapter relates to other chapters because things such as religion and magic can also be seen in things such as in chapter 16 on health and illnesses from the cultural anthropology textbook by Ember and Ember. In this chapter they talk about certain practices that people do in different cultures and how they have specific remedies for certain illnesses. It also is seen in the Susto textbook because Susto is something that is described as an out of body experience or form of illness. Susto is not something that can be treated by normal western medicine, there are certain things that people have to do to get rid of it such as going to a curandero who will make specific remedies to get rid of it. There are many times were these chapter overlap with each other. Learning about religion and magic allows a person to be more open to different ideas, especially in things such as health. This is because just like magic and religion there are some illnesses that people do not believe in while others do. Learning about these is something that is important in anthropology because then we can see where the divide between cultures is at and why the divide happens. There was many strong point in this chapter, some of them being the way that religion and magic were explained. They were able to use a lot of examples from several different cultures. They were also able to tell us about how religion is different for everyone even though everyone has some form of it

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4 Works Cited Articles: Markovsky, Barry. “How Did the Superstition That Broken Mirrors Cause Bad Luck Start and Why Does It Still Exist?” University of South Carolina , 30 June 2021, https://www.sc.edu/uofsc/posts/2021/06/06_conversation_broken_mirror.php . Moro, Pamela A. “Magic.” Obo , 11 Jan. 2012, https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199766567/obo- 9780199766567-0051.xml# . Books: Ember, Carol, R. and Melvin R. Ember. Cultural Anthropology. Available from: Yuzu, (15th Edition). Pearson Education (US), 2018. Brown, Nina, et al. Perspectives: An Open Invitation to Cultural Anthropology . American Anthropological Association, 2017.