- agnosticism
- the belief that God or the divine is unknowable and therefore skepticism is appropriate.
- animism
- a worldview in which there is believed to be spiritual agency in all things, including natural elements such as rocks and trees.
- atheism
- the lack of belief in a god or gods.
- binary opposition
- two opposing concepts, commonly found in institutions such as kinship and in myth.
- communitas
- a cohort of individuals participating in a rite of passage who share a strong sense of equality and social bonding among themselves.
- deity
- a god, usually named, with individual personalities and interests.
- divination
- a practice or test to discern knowledge about a certain event or situation.
- doctrine
- a set of formal and usually rigid principles or teachings of a religious organization.
- earth-diver myths
- creation myths in which a creator deity sends an agent, usually an animal, into deep waters to find mud that the deity will use to create dry land and humans.
- exorcism
- the removal of an adverse supernatural spirit from a person.
- goddesses
- female deities.
- gods
- deities; often, specifically male deities.
- hierophany
- the manifestation of the sacred or divine.
- law of contagion
- the belief that things that have once been in contact with each other remain connected always; a theory of magic.
- law of similarity
- the belief that things that are alike exert a force on each other; a theory of magic.
- liminality
- a state in which an individual is viewed as being in a transition from one social stage to another.
- magic
- a supposed system of natural law, the practice of which causes a transformation to occur.
- mana
- an impersonal force that can adhere to people or animate and inanimate objects to make them sacred.
- metaphor
- a symbol that is not naturally connected to what it represents.
- metonym
- a symbol in which a part stands for the whole.
- monotheistic religion
- a religion that centers on a single named god or goddess.
- multivocal
- describes symbols that have more than one meaning.
- myth
- a well-known story that teaches primary principles, beliefs, and values outside of chronological time.
- mythemes
- the stripped-down minimal and portable units that form the structure of a myth.
- none
- a person with no religious affiliation.
- pilgrimage
- a sacred journey to a shrine or other holy place.
- place
- a location that has sociocultural meaning attached to it.
- polytheistic religion
- a religion that centers on a group of gods and/or goddesses, each devoted to a specific action or behavior.
- priests
- full-time religious leaders who manage and administer at a high level within the religious bureaucracy.
- primary messages
- the meaning of a myth, which can be applied universally.
- prophet
- an individual associated with religious change who calls for a renewal of beliefs or a restructuring of the status quo. A prophet’s leadership is usually temporary or indirect.
- proselytization
- a recruitment practice in which members actively seek converts to the group.
- religion
- a shared system of beliefs and practices that are highly regarded in society. Most often, religion is focused on the interaction of natural and supernatural phenomena.
- rite of affliction
- a ritual invoked to seek some sort of redress, remedy, or compensation for an individual by means of supernatural intervention.
- rite of intensification
- a ritual performed by a religious group to affirm, strengthen, and maintain bonds of solidarity.
- rite of passage
- a ritual in which an individual or group marks a social transformation.
- rituals
- performative acts by which people carry out religious beliefs, both public and private; also called rites.
- secular religion
- a system of beliefs held by a society that elevates social ideas, qualities, or commodities to a metaphysical, semidivine status.
- shaman
- a part-time religious figure who works to connect with deities on behalf of others.
- shamanism
- a practice of healing and divination that involves soul travel to connect natural and supernatural realms in nonlinear time.
- sorcery
- a practice involving the use of material elements to cause a change in circumstances to another person.
- space
- an unmarked physical field; a place with no specific cultural meaning.
- spirit
- supernatural being associated with specific activities, such as an earth spirit or guardian spirit (or angel).
- spirituality
- a loose structure of beliefs and feelings about relationships between the natural and supernatural worlds.
- state religion
- a formal religious institution with full-time administrators, a set doctrine of beliefs and regulations, and a policy of seeking growth by conversion of new practitioners.
- structuralism
- a theory and method focused on identifying patterns in culture; also includes mythic analysis.
- superstition
- a belief or practice that is believed to have no credible evidence for its efficacy.
- symbol
- something that stands arbitrarily for something else and has no natural connection to its referent.
- syncretism
- an integration or use of more than one religious system.
- witchcraft
- a practice involving the use of intangible means to cause a change in circumstances to another person.
- worldview
- a specific outlook or orientation that an individual or group of individuals holds on the nature of the world.