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3 Anthropology and Religion Religions and Development Research Programme The Relationships Between Religion and Development: Views from Anthropology Tamsin Bradley Department for Applied Sociology London Metropolitan University Working Paper 5 - 2007 Religions and Development Research Programme The Religions and Development Research Programme Consortium is an international research partnership that is exploring the relationships between several major world religions, development in low-income countries and poverty reduction. The programme is comprised of a series of comparative research projects that are addressing the following questions: z How do religious values and beliefs drive the actions and interactions of individuals and faith-based organisations? z How do religious values and beliefs and religious organisations influence the relationships between states and societies? z In what ways do faith communities interact with development actors and what are the outcomes with respect to the achievement of development goals? The research aims to provide knowledge and tools to enable dialogue between development partners and contribute to the achievement of development goals. We believe that our role as researchers is not to make judgements about the truth or desirability of particular values or beliefs, nor is it to urge a greater or lesser role for religion in achieving development objectives. Instead, our aim is to produce systematic and reliable knowledge and better understanding of the social world. The research focuses on four countries (India, Pakistan, Nigeria and Tanzania), enabling the research team to study most of the major world religions: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism and African traditional belief systems. The research projects will compare two or more of the focus countries, regions within the countries, different religious traditions and selected development activities and policies. The consortium consists of six research partner organisations, each of which is working with other researchers in the four focus countries: z University of Birmingham, UK: International Development Department, Department of Theology and Religion, Centre for West African Studies, Centre for the Study of Global Ethics, Department of Political Science and International Relations z University of Bath, UK: Centre for Development Studies z Indian Institute of Dalit Studies, New Delhi. z Nigerian Institute of Social and Economic Research, Ibadan. z University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania z Pakistan In addition to the research partners, links have been forged with non-academic and non-government bodies, including Islamic Relief. http://www.rad.bham.ac.uk Contact: [email protected] Religions and Development Working Paper 5 The Relationships Between Religion and Development: Views from Anthropology Tamsin Bradley Department for Applied Sociology London Metropolitan University ISBN: 0 7044 2543 2 978 0 7044 2543 9 © International Development Department, University of Birmingham This document is an output from a programme funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) for the benefit of developing countries. The views expressed are not necessarily those of DFID. 2 Working Paper 5 The Relationships Between Religion and Development: Views from Anthropology 1 Contents 1. Introduction 1 2. Anthropological methods 2 2.1 What is anthropology? 2 2.2 How accurate is anthropological research? 3 2.3 Ethical considerations in anthropological research 5 2.4 How has anthropological method been applied to other disciplines and purposes? 5 3. Anthropology and religion 6 3.1 How does anthropology approach the study of religion? 6 3.2 The link between religion and culture 6 3.3 Approaches to studying the link between religion and culture 10 3.4 The main research topics studied by anthropologists of religion 11 3.5 Spirit possession, healing practices, shamanism and witchcraft 14 3.6 Politics and religious identity 22 3.7 Religious beliefs and social organisation 25 3.8 Violence, ethnicity and nationhood 29 3.9 Myths, texts and oral traditions 32 3.10 Rituals and rites of passage 35 3.11 Religion, culture and the environment 40 3.12 Gender, identity and personhood 41 4. Anthropology and development 48 4.1 The relevance of anthropological approaches to development 48 4.2 Anthropology as a critique of development 49 4.3 Anthropology’s contribution to participatory development approaches 50 4.4 Understanding social change in developing countries 51 4.5 A macro/micro focus 55 4.6 Anthropology, religion and/or faith and development 55 5. Conclusion: overall gaps 58 References 60 2 Working Paper 5 The Relationships Between Religion and Development: Views from Anthropology 1 1 Introduction Anthropologists are concerned to understand how people perceive their identity and the world around them. They also document processes of social change. Recent anthropological literature overlaps with the concerns of this research programme in three ways. These represent the main sections of this review. First, with respect to methodology, literature will be reviewed that examines how anthropologists conduct their research. This involves a focus on ethnographic techniques and the process of producing ethnography. The second concerns ethnographic research that focuses on religion. This research mainly focuses on understanding how religious beliefs and values impact on people’s lives in terms of structuring their identities, actions and wider social and cultural systems. The last level concerns work that seeks to apply anthropological method to the work of development. There is a small emerging literature that takes an anthropological approach to examining religion and development, specifically the work of faith-based NGOs. Much of this literature is in recently completed doctorates. It will be reviewed in the third part of this paper. The key themes of the programme will be referred to throughout: a. Values and beliefs, including conceptions of rights and duties, and how they affect actions; b. The posited relationships between values and beliefs, social change and religious organisations; c. How social groups function: in particular, the ways in which religious groups are constituted, understand themselves and act in the world; d. The adoption, implementation and outcomes of specific development policies and practices, tracing the relationships between these values and beliefs and the role of faith-based organisations. The specific questions/issues relevant to the research programme and that are addressed by the literature will be stated at the start of each section. I will also highlight the specific regional and faith focus of each piece of research reviewed, with particular emphasis on the main religions and regions with which the programme is concerned. The critical analysis of the literature will concentrate on the following: i. Commonly used theoretical frameworks, methodologies and the application of ethnographic techniques; ii. How religion is generally viewed and analysed by anthropologists; iii. Gaps in the literature will be identified throughout. In addition, a concluding section will offer a general overview of where research is lacking and offer reasons for some of these gaps. 2 Working Paper 5 2 Anthropological methods Comments about anthropological methods will be made throughout this review. However, in this part, the specific methodological concerns of anthropologists will be considered. The discussion includes a summary of how anthropologists go about conducting their research. The distinctiveness of anthropological research in comparison to other social science research methods will also be examined. A further three areas will be covered: the accuracy of anthropological research, the ethics of anthropological research and the applied methodologies of anthropology. Overall this section will argue that contemporary anthropological concerns have relevance to this research programme, as they aim to find accurate ways of documenting the heterogeneous nature of social change. The process of observing the dynamics of social groupings involves identifying the competing needs and concerns of individuals. Participatory development aims to apply techniques that allow for a community to identify its own needs. Ethnographic techniques can contribute to this venture and to the long-term setting and evaluation of development goals. 2.1 What is anthropology? Anthropology is, in essence, the study of human behaviour. The research methods used by anthropologists have evolved in order to allow accurate observations about individuals and communities. Ethnography is the term used to denote a piece of full scale anthropological research into a community or group. Ethnographic research is micro-focused. The distinctiveness of anthropology as a discipline is its complete reliance on ethnographic techniques. The process of producing an ethnography is lengthy and involves a sustained piece of fieldwork (often stretching to a year or more). The most favoured anthropological research method is Geertz’s ‘participant observation’, which involves the anthropologist attempting to blend as far as possible into the daily life of his/her research subjects, by participating in the events it is desired to document. The objective is to allow the anthropologist a close insight into the lives of his/her research subjects. The observations are recorded in a research diary, which forms a vital part of the research process. The ethnography is usually written up by the anthropologist following
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