Robert N. McCauley
Rethinking Religion:
Connecting Cognition and Culture


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Rethinking Religion: Connecting Cognition and Culture

First (1990) Hardcover Edition


Rethinking Religion: Connecting Cognition and Culture

1993 Paperback Edition

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction  
I.    Declarations and debts
 
1
II.    Loans and pursuits of an interdisciplinary sort
 
8
1. Interpretation and explanation: problems and promise
      in the study of religion
 
 
I.    Introduction
 
12
II.    Explanation and Interpretation: three accounts
 
14
  Exclusivism 15
  Inclusivism 18
  Interactionism
 
22
2. Three theories of religion
 
 
I.    Introduction
 
32
II.    Intellectualism
 
33
III.    Symbolism
 
37
IV.    Structuralism
 
41
V.    Conclusion
 
43
3. Ritual as language
 
 
I.    Introduction
 
45
II.    Ritual as performative utterance
 
51
III.    Ritual as the communication of information
 
54
IV.    Ritual as formal system
 
56
4. A cognitive approach to symbolic-cultural systems
 
 
I.    Introduction
 
60
II.    On the status of linguistic theory
 
61
III.    A cognitive approach to cultural materials
 
68
IV.    In defense of a cognitive approach to religious ritual acts
 
77
5. Outline of a theory of religious ritual systems  
I.    Introduction
 
84
II.    Action elements and formation rules
 
87
III.    Applications and illustrations
 
95
  Two complications 96
  The object agency filter 98
  Ritual alterations of objects 102
  Ritual implication of the superhuman 110
  A further illustration
 
113
IV.    Universal principles of religious ritual structure
 
121
  Substantive and formal universals 122
  Functional universals
 
123
6. Semantics and ritual systems  
I.    Introduction
 
137
II.    Semiotic ghosts and reflexive holism in semantics
 
138
III.    Holism with multiple models
 
148
IV.    Comments on the semantics of religious ritual systems
 
157
V.    Staal and ritualization
 
166
7. Connecting the cognitive and the cultural  
I.    Introduction
 
170
II.    The theory of religious ritual systems and explanation
 
172
III.    Structural explanation
 
177
IV.    An integrated approach to cognitive and cultural systems
 
180
References
 
185
Index
 
  191

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Copyright © 2003-2009, Robert N. McCauley
Robert N. McCauley