Orientador: Claude Lépine / Banca: Sérgio Adolfo / Banca: Edemir de Carvalho / Resumo: O nosso trabalho apresenta o objetivo de realizar uma análise de duas das principais obras escritas por Pierre Fatumbi Verger ("Notas sobre o culto aos Orixás e Voduns" e "Orixás"). Em primeiro lugar, procuramos investigar como o autor consegue elaborar um panteão de deuses relativamente estruturado. Dito de outro modo, nosso primeiro objetivo foi compreender como Verger constrói o panteão do candomblé e, dessa forma, denunciar as profundas mudanças entre uma religião e outra, ou seja, questionar a tese central do livro Orixás, a qual postula uma congruência inalterada de dois corpos religiosos separados pelo Atlântico. Por último, propomos avaliar a apresentação da religião dos orixás no Novo Mundo, defendida pelo autor, que sugere uma religião tradicional preservada. Dessa forma, debater a questão, sustentada pelo etnógrafo, de uma pureza afriacana existente no Brasil. Por meio de nossas leituras e pesquisas realizadas, não temos o conhecimento de nenhum trabalho acadêmico analisando a obra de Verger sob essa perspectiva. Pretendemos, assim, proceder a uma análise crítica contribuindo não só para a literatura específica, mas compreender os pressupostos contidos em um autor que se tornou referência não só para os estudos afro-brasileiros mas também para os religiosos em geral. / Abstract: Our task presents the goal of realizing analyses of two works written by Pierre Fatumbi Verger ("Notes about cult for Orixás and Voduns" and "Orixás") First we investigate how the author can make a pantheon of gods relatively structured. In other words, our first goal was to understand how Verger builds the pantheon of candomblé. Second we look up to point tea main differences between religion of orixás and candomblé and this way report the deep changes between one religion an other one so to question about the central thesis of the book of Orixás, that assume an unchangeable congruence of two religion bodies separated by the Atlantic. Finally we propose evaluate the presentation of Orixás religion in the new world carried out by the author, the sugget a preserved tradicional religion. This way to debate the question supported by the ethnografer of an African purity existing in Brazil. Through our readings and researches carried out, we don't know any work analyzing the work of Verger under this perspective. We intend to proced an critic academic analyses contributing for specific literature and understand the contained presupposed in an author that became a reference to African brazilian studies and for religious people generally speaking. / Mestre

This dissertation examines uncertainties about the supernatural among members of the urban middle class in Tehran, Iran. In particular, I attend to the ways in which the category of the supernatural (mavara) has become, for some people, an object of potential scientific (`elmi) inquiry that must be distinguished from approaches usually ascribed to the rural, the uneducated, and the poor, often deemed as either superstitions (khorafat) or parochically religious (dini). By examining a range of encounters with the supernatural - such as attempts to explain communications with the souls of the dead, make sense of spirit possession, and differentiate real magic from charlatanism - I highlight the varied modalities through which perspectives and forms of reasoning imagined to be rational and scientific are brought to bear on matters that are understood to lie, at least partially, within the purview of religious knowledge. I situate such supernatural encounters against a backdrop of state disciplinary and coercive measures, thereby illuminating important shifts in Iran's politico-religious landscape in the past two decades, such as the waning of the religious authority of the Shi`i ulama among certain sections of society. This declining authority does not necessarily imply a weakened interest in Islam (although this is sometimes the case). Rather, it has opened up a space for reception and deliberation of a multiplicity of sources of religious knowledge, both Islamic and non-Islamic. These include forms of Western-imported spirituality and occultism that have been entering Iran for over a century, with their most recent wave consisting of translated texts of New Age spirituality, self-help success literature, and popular psychology that have gained popularity since the end of the war with Iraq. The metaphysical models on offer through these spiritual systems are usually promoted and understood as scientific rather than religious. That is, rather than being seen as contradicting Islamic notions, these formulations are often viewed as parallel to them. By attending to such notions and their everyday manifestations, my project brings into focus various hybrid forms of religious-scientific knowledge, experience, and discourse that have largely been ignored in the study of modern Muslim societies.

Almost daily emotional worship pours from a warehouse-sized evangelical church in the small rural community of Santa Cruz, Costa Rica. Within twenty years an evangelical presence has gone from virtually non-existent to standing alongside the Catholic Church in the area’s religious landscape. Scenarios like this are going on throughout Latin America as evangelical faith has become firmly rooted in the region. In this thesis I provide another ethnographic research context to the growing body of literature focused on Pentecostalism/evangelicalism in Latin America. Like others addressing this dynamic, I explore the factors and motivations that lead people to become evangelical. I approach these questions with particular emphasis on the characteristics of evangelical faith as it is constructed and practiced during church services. Through participant observation during church services and interviews with practicing evangelicals in and around Santa Cruz, I highlight the relationship between the characteristics of an evangelical faith and the factors and motivations that lead people to seek it. To be religiously active in the manner of my informants requires deep commitment and is not a faith adopted and practiced lightly. Those who become evangelical and sustain the demanding practice are likely to seek it for spiritual solutions to difficult life situations.

Orientador: Ronaldo Rômulo Almeida / Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-25T10:26:20Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Rodrigues_Elisa_D.pdf: 2343786 bytes, checksum: b81cb99c242530813a4d790e26b4c1df (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014 / Resumo: A Igreja Mundial do Poder de Deus (IMPD) é uma igreja cristã reconhecida como igreja pentecostal de terceira geração. Nela identificamos elementos do pentecostalismo clássico, cuja ênfase recai nos rituais de cura semelhantemente ao movimento pentecostal dos anos 1950, além de práticas que remetem a um tipo de religiosidade denominada "popular". A irreverência ao discurso teológico, a materialidade da devoção, além do acento nos testemunhos durante as reuniões públicas, fazem dessas as práticas centrais que identificam a igreja. Embora o demônio seja o malfeitor protagonista em seus cultos, no palco o maior crédito é atribuído ao poder sobrenatural de Deus mediado pelo apóstolo e líder da igreja, Valdemiro Santiago. A partir da etnografia realizada (2010-2012) em reuniões, encontros públicos e monitoramento de website e redes sociais, essa pesquisa objetiva compreender (1) as articulações internas e operações de síntese que os agentes religiosos elaboram em suas práticas quando aderem a essa modalidade de pentecostalismo, o que faremos por meio do recurso às categorias "experiência religiosa" e "testemunho". Interessa-nos compreender (2) a centralidade dos testemunhos, na qualidade de narrativas de si, que rotinizados revitalizam a experiência religiosa daqueles que frequentam a IMPD. A tese que apresentamos abordará em seus capítulos a relação entre experiência religiosa, estrutura e funcionamento da IMPD, a figura do apóstolo Valdemiro Santiago e a dimensão performativa e midiática da igreja / Abstract: The Worldwide Church of the Power of the God (Igreja Mundial do Poder de Deus) is a Christian church recognized as a Pentecostal church of third generation. In this church we identify elements from classic Pentecostalism, whose emphasis is on healing rituals similarly to the Pentecostal movement of the 1950s, and practices related to a kind of religiosity called "popular". The core practices that identify this church are: irreverence to the theological discourse, materiality of devotion, and the highlight on testimony during the public meetings. Although the devil is taken as the wrongdoer protagonist in the cults, on stage, the higher credit is attributed to the supernatural power of God mediated by the apostle and the leader of the church Valdemiro Santiago. According to the ethnography that took place between 2010-2012 in the meetings, public encounters, and the monitoring of websites and social networks, this research aims to understand (1) the inner joints and synthesis operations that the religious agents work out in their practices when they accept this modality of Pentecostalism, which we will do by resorting to the categories "religious experience" and "testimony". This thesis also tries to to understand (2) the centrality of testimony, as narratives of the self, which routinized revitalizes the religious experience of those who attend to IMPD. The thesis will approach in the chapters the relationship between religious experience, structure and functioning of the IMPD, the image of the apostle Valdemiro Santiago, as well the performative and mediatic the dimension of the church / Doutorado / Ciencias Sociais / Doutora em Ciências Sociais

This paper describes how everyday muslims with no formal (or weak) affiliation to sufi brotherhoods in Upper Egypt practice and relate to sufism as a grand scheme or larger islamic tradition. The thesis highlights the importance of islamic sainthood in everyday religion, whereby the saintly dead are regarded as acting intermediaries between the divine and the worldly realms. Saints, holy people and blessed places are given agency through divine blessings, thus allowing villagers to partake in a larger islamic tradition through the mediation of– or cult connected to saints. This paper intends to demonstrate that an islamic concept of sanctity in muslim environments does not only exist historically, but is central to the contemporary religious landscape of Upper Egypt.

Almost daily emotional worship pours from a warehouse-sized evangelical church in the small rural community of Santa Cruz, Costa Rica. Within twenty years an evangelical presence has gone from virtually non-existent to standing alongside the Catholic Church in the area’s religious landscape. Scenarios like this are going on throughout Latin America as evangelical faith has become firmly rooted in the region. In this thesis I provide another ethnographic research context to the growing body of literature focused on Pentecostalism/evangelicalism in Latin America. Like others addressing this dynamic, I explore the factors and motivations that lead people to become evangelical. I approach these questions with particular emphasis on the characteristics of evangelical faith as it is constructed and practiced during church services. Through participant observation during church services and interviews with practicing evangelicals in and around Santa Cruz, I highlight the relationship between the characteristics of an evangelical faith and the factors and motivations that lead people to seek it. To be religiously active in the manner of my informants requires deep commitment and is not a faith adopted and practiced lightly. Those who become evangelical and sustain the demanding practice are likely to seek it for spiritual solutions to difficult life situations.

This thesis is an historical and ethnographic account of the postcommunist reconstitution of Albanian Bektashi Sufi practices and community life in the aftermath of a state-based program of radical atheistic secularism. The study is based on 12 months of intensive anthropological fieldwork (9 months in 2007 and shorter research trips between 2005 and 2011) and archival research. The Bektashi Muslims were once closely associated with and supported by the Ottoman state. Since then they have suffered many reversals in fortune. The most severe attack on the Bektashi occurred in communist Albania. Public manifestations of religion and its institutions were entirely dismantled and many spiritual leaders killed or exiled. Nonetheless, survivors now claim that Bektashi devotees secretly believed in and revered the sacred shrines despite efforts by the authoritarian state to do away with all expressions of religious life. Providing both historical and cultural context, the thesis uses ethnographic fieldwork data based on observation, interviews and life histories collected from within the Bektashi community. These document and explore the group's various efforts at community building and regaining legitimacy. In particular, it describes the rebuilding of devastated Bektashi lodges (tekke), the configuration and management of sacred spaces, the ways of becoming Bektashi as reflected in conversion narratives, and the emergence of new saintly authority figures. The penultimate chapter is about religious observance, investigating in depth how the present community of leaders, followers, and guests interact within sacred spaces during pilgrimages, paying special attention to the ambiguities of spiritual authority in the postcommunist setting. The study of present-day religious observance and community building shows that despite their efforts, the Bektashi today are experiencing difficulty establishing order within their own ranks and in winning real support in Albanian society as a whole. The small gains in reclaiming lost authority and access to their now lost economic estates reflects the legacy of atheist secularism and corruption, which coincides with wide spread suspicion of authority figures, including religious authorities. Albanian postcommunist religiosity coincides with a more "Western European" pattern of secularism that is generally characterized by a much diminished level of religious observance. / 2017-01-01T00:00:00Z

Each year, four million Americans travel abroad as participants in short-term missions (STMs), the religious branch of the billion-dollar volunteer-tourism industry. Rooted in 13 months of multi-sited ethnographic research, this dissertation examines evangelical STMs in the Dominican Republic as vehicles for evangelization and voluntarism in the contexts of postcolonial tourism and the production of sugar for the global market. In doing so, it also examines STMs as important sites of religious socialization for American participants, particularly, socialization of moral ideologies. These moral ideologies, expressed and performed through the discursive practices, religious rituals, and routinized cross-cultural interactions that are characteristic of STMs, (re)create and justify unequal power relations between Americans and Dominicans. STMs expose American volunteers to striking socioeconomic and racial inequalities, which could powerfully (re)shape their worldviews by raising their awareness, for example, of the exploitative working and living conditions behind a ubiquitous commodity, sugar. However, STM leaders and volunteers conceptualize these inequalities in ways that are inconsistent or contradictory, disconnected from their understandings of inequality back home, and decontextualized from broader processes and systems, including colonialism and contemporary global capitalism. The personal narratives and the religious and economic discourses that are (re)produced during STMs shape American participants’ understandings of inequalities and cultivate a moral subjectivity in which they are divinely charged with the responsibility of ameliorating others’ poverty, lack of social welfare, and poor living conditions. STM discourses and practices thus legitimize forms of charitable giving that may actually contribute to poverty and inequality by concealing Americans’ pre-existing socioeconomic relations with Dominicans. Amid heightened efforts to dismantle social welfare in the US, it is increasingly important to deconstruct ideologies and practices of giving in order to understand why evangelical Christians prefer charity, which provides only partial and temporary relief at best, over other methods that could provide more sustainable and transformative solutions to poverty and inequality. The research presented in this dissertation reveals that, despite what participants believe to be their moral intentions and good works, STMs work in various ways to perpetuate inequalities between sending and receiving countries. / Anthropology

Esta pesquisa tem como objetivo analisar a crítica ateísta à religião no Brasil, mobilizando metodologicamente a discussão de Daniel Cefaï sobre dinâmicas coletivas em torno de problemas públicos. Assim, procuramos demonstrar a regularidade discursiva presente na formulação ateísta brasileira ao identificar seus usos em diferentes arenas. Utilizamos como material empírico, de um lado, os memes produzidos por essa comunidade e depoimentos destinados a ela, que narram a ruptura com um pertencimento religioso; e, de outro, a atuação da Associação Brasileira de Ateus e Agnósticos, seu ativismo jurídico engajado nas discussões a respeito da constitucionalidade da natureza confessional do ensino religioso público. Defendemos a existência de uma sensibilidade ateísta transversal a todas essas arenas, que se adapta por razões pragmáticas. / This research has as its objective to analyse the atheist criticism to religion in Brazil, by resorting to Daniel Cefaï\'s methodological discussions on collective dynamics surrounding public problems. Thereby, we intended to show the discoursive regularity in the Brazilian atheist formulation when identifying its usages in different arenas. As empirical material, we used, in one hand, memes produced by this community and depositions directed to it as well, narrating the rupture with certain religious belonging; on the other hand, the proceedings of the Brazilian Association for Atheists, it\'s \"juridical activism\", engaged in the discussion about the constitutionality of the confessional nature of the teaching of religion in public institutions. In addition, we advocate for the existence of a transversal atheist sensibility in all arenas, that adapts itself for pragmatic reasons.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-11T19:22:21Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2005-11-28Bitstream added on 2014-06-13T20:28:38Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 figueiredo_ra_me_mar.pdf: 292468 bytes, checksum: 26353fe385ea7de023712925c50a1568 (MD5) / O nosso trabalho apresenta o objetivo de realizar uma análise de duas das principais obras escritas por Pierre Fatumbi Verger (Notas sobre o culto aos Orixás e Voduns e Orixás). Em primeiro lugar, procuramos investigar como o autor consegue elaborar um panteão de deuses relativamente estruturado. Dito de outro modo, nosso primeiro objetivo foi compreender como Verger constrói o panteão do candomblé e, dessa forma, denunciar as profundas mudanças entre uma religião e outra, ou seja, questionar a tese central do livro Orixás, a qual postula uma congruência inalterada de dois corpos religiosos separados pelo Atlântico. Por último, propomos avaliar a apresentação da religião dos orixás no Novo Mundo, defendida pelo autor, que sugere uma religião tradicional preservada. Dessa forma, debater a questão, sustentada pelo etnógrafo, de uma pureza afriacana existente no Brasil. Por meio de nossas leituras e pesquisas realizadas, não temos o conhecimento de nenhum trabalho acadêmico analisando a obra de Verger sob essa perspectiva. Pretendemos, assim, proceder a uma análise crítica contribuindo não só para a literatura específica, mas compreender os pressupostos contidos em um autor que se tornou referência não só para os estudos afro-brasileiros mas também para os religiosos em geral. / Our task presents the goal of realizing analyses of two works written by Pierre Fatumbi Verger (Notes about cult for Orixás and Voduns and Orixás) First we investigate how the author can make a pantheon of gods relatively structured. In other words, our first goal was to understand how Verger builds the pantheon of candomblé. Second we look up to point tea main differences between religion of orixás and candomblé and this way report the deep changes between one religion an other one so to question about the central thesis of the book of Orixás, that assume an unchangeable congruence of two religion bodies separated by the Atlantic. Finally we propose evaluate the presentation of Orixás religion in the new world carried out by the author, the sugget a preserved tradicional religion. This way to debate the question supported by the ethnografer of an African purity existing in Brazil. Through our readings and researches carried out, we don't know any work analyzing the work of Verger under this perspective. We intend to proced an critic academic analyses contributing for specific literature and understand the contained presupposed in an author that became a reference to African brazilian studies and for religious people generally speaking.