Page 286 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol IV

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“new religions” like mysticism, occultism, Theosophy, incorporated the spirits of American aboriginal leaders
paganism, and New Age. In the fine arts, the eclectic like Sitting Bull and Black Hawk into their rituals. The
aspects in postmodernism are abundantly apparent. most syncretic New World religion is perhaps Brazilian
Generally, the term “syncretism” has been positively Umbanda, which combines African deities with a form of
regarded by social scientists.Yet Stewart and Shaw report French spiritism attributed to Alan Kardec (1804–1869).
that there is growing uneasiness with the term among In Brazil, French spiritism is also known as Kardecism or
anthropologists who have been influenced by postmod- Kardecismo. Umbanda also incorporates local aboriginal
ernism. Other anthropologists have devoted their atten- spirits, African and Hindu deities, and North American
tions to showing that syncretism is not inevitable. It is aboriginal leaders.
possible, they contend, for two groups to live in close prox- Roger Bastide’s influential study The African Religions
imity and largely ignore each another. For this reason, of Brazil attempted to account for syncretism by stressing
scholars find it both necessary and informative to examine historical processes like conquest and migration. He
syncretism with respect to relations of power. In Syn- traced the various ways in which African, European, and
cretism and the Commerce of Symbols, Goren Aijmer dra- aboriginal religions have come together in what he
matically shifted the direction of research by asking,“Under termed an “interpenetration” of civilizations. Rather than
what specific conditions do people in any one group pay offering a psychological explanation, Bastide’s sociolog-
attention to the cultural symbols of another group?” ical approach focused on groups of people who were dif-
(1995, 27). Often, it seems that syncretism has been most ferentiated by sex, social class, and age. By contrast,
intense whenever inequality between cultures has been the Stephen D. Glazier’s research on of the Spiritual Baptists
most pronounced. Equally important, war, conquest, colo- in Trinidad focused on individual Baptist leaders and
nialism, trade, migration, and intermarriage bring syn- their practice of borrowing rituals from a variety of reli-
cretism to the forefront. Race, gender, age, and social class gious traditions but keeping these borrowed rituals sep-
are also factors. Scholars must examine the relationships arate in time and space. According to Glazier, one
between global and localized syncretisms. Are two or outcome of this process is a religion that is marked not
more religions influencing one another equally or is one so much by syncretism as by juxtaposition.
dominating the rest? How does syncretism relate to issues In South Africa, studies of syncretism have focused on
of entrepreneurship and to theories of modernization? independent churches. The earliest studies of African
In anthropology, the term “syncretism” is most closely Independent Churches (AICs) were conducted by Chris-
associated with Melville J. Herskovits, who is best known tian missionaries, and the term syncretism was used in
for his research on the survival of African cultural traits derogatory ways. Contemporary anthropologists—most
among blacks in the Americas. Herskovits advocated an notably J. Y. D. Peel—argued effectively that syncretism
appreciation of what he called “syncretized Africanisms” was not central to independent churches in South Africa
and focused on various types of “acculturation” in order because these churches represented reinterpretations of
to address more general issues of culture contact. Again, Christianity but never encouraged a mixture of Chris-
there is need to recognize that acculturation (and syn- tianity and tribal elements.
cretism) is not inevitable, and that all major world reli- It should be emphasized that authenticity and origi-
gions and cultures seem to be of composite origin. nality are not always dependent on the alleged purity and
Marked evidence of syncretism has been identified in uniqueness of religions and vice versa, and that many so-
New World religions such as Brazilian Candomble, Hait- called “original” religions—like the religions of Australian
ian vodun, and Cuban Santeria. These religions analo- aborigines—are actually the result of a unique syncretism
gized various Yoruba and other African gods and selected that has not occurred elsewhere. It is difficult to separate
Roman Catholic saints. Some Candomble leaders have religion from the rest of culture. Scholars studying