Blog 3- Curated Book Exhibit

Religion as a Determinant of Social Groups

The tendency to form social groups is a behavioral characteristic of humans that possibly stems from the evolutionary benefit of being part of a tight group to increase rates of survival in individuals. In this post, I will demonstrate that religion has a functional role of determining both inclusionary and exclusionary criteria for these social groups. Additionally, religion can be used to strengthen the connection of those within distinct social groups, and often is accompanied by the bestowing of superiority or inferiority on different groups.

Governing Gender and Sexuality in Colonial India: the Hijra

“The British viewed Hijras as a source of disorder, as ‘matter out of place’, which threatened the colonial moral, social and political order”

-Ch. 2

This book describes the ostracization of the Hijra people in Colonial India. The Hijra was a community of people who fell outside of “normal” dichotomies of gender and sexuality, and included groups such as eunuchs, transgender people (especially with feminine gender embodiment), and intersex people. Society’s rejection of the physical aesthetics of their bodies was accompanied by the assumption that Hijra’s were immoral, obscene, and a “pollution” on society. Tools such as medicine and religion were used to attempt to justify this assumption of immorality of the Hijra people. The Hijra were socially marginalized through “moral outrage”, violence, and legal barriers.

The main argument of this text is that the British government considered the Hijra to be “fundamentally ungovernable”, and therefore needed to be socially marginalized to solidify the government’s control over the region.

This book demonstrates the function of religion as a creator of social groups, as religion was one of many tools that were used to make the Hijra into an ‘out-group’. The colonial state in India desired for the Indian population to be “legible”, that is visible and knowable, and therefore easier to control (Ch. 2). The Hijra community was impossible to define or understand, and so threatened their control. The denunciation of “sinful” acts (such as sodomy, “buggery”) associated with this group was a tool to justify contempt and prejudice against actions associated with this community (Ch. 2). This contempt led to the designation of the Hijra people as a value-violating ‘out-group’ compared to ‘respectable’ society.

“By decrying the Hijra community, middle-class men performed the new notions of respectability that defined their identity in relation to other social groups.”

Ch. 2

The ‘out-groupness’ of the Hijra people served two purposes. First, mediating their threat to the British government. Secondly, it implied an inherent morality of those not part of this population in comparison, and created an ‘in-group’ of ‘respectable society’ based on the possession of these moral values. The morality of ‘respectable society’ made it the ‘superior’ group to be part of. Members of inferior groups were unable to advance economically in society, and often had to resort to unfavorable jobs, like prostitution (Ch. 1). This ranking of groups fits the Marxist idea of the use of religion to create structures in society for the material benefit of the upper class at the expense of the lower class. Marx would say that this case is an example of how religion is an ideology that provides excuses for oppressors to stay on top while the majority stay below.

Pious Fashion: How Muslim Women Dress

“More than just a veil, this is pious fashion from head to toe, which engages with a range of aesthetic values related to moral authority, consumption, and selfhood.“

-Abstract

This book focuses on the “pious fashion” of Muslim women, including the Hijab in Tehran, the Jilbab in Yogyakarta, and the Tesettür in Istanbul. This book demonstrates that the choice to wear “pious fashion” reflects the desire to meet the expectations of one’s society rather than as a result of religious oppression. This is evident by the persistence of the ability to express individuality through personal choice of fabric, framing, color, brand-names, and the existence of a multi-million dollar industry dollar industry centered around it. Even with this autonomy, personal choices are still usually based on trends of what the group deems “acceptable and attractive” (Abstract).

“Hijab—as worn on the head or other parts of a woman’s body or called by another name—is open to limitless interpretations and is bound by meanings that are socially constructed and sufficiently fluid for further evolution”

-Debra Majeed, Journal of the American Academy of Religion

The main argument of this text is that pious clothing is more reflective of local moral and aesthetic values, rather than religious oppression.

This book provides an example of the function of religion to form social groups by showing how religion can influence people’s ideas of what it means to be within a social group. Religion can influence a population not only to share similar moral values, but also similar traditions and similar aesthetic preferences. The existence of the “ever-changing social practice of pious fashion” is just one example of how religion can provide things such visible identifiers that can make one feel more accepted within their society, strengthening the bond of members within the ‘in-group’, (Abstract). Looking at religion in this way echoes Durkheim’s philosophy of viewing every human enterprise through the lens of their social dimension.

“Real Good and Sincere Catholics”: White Catholicism and Massive Resistance to Desegregation in Chicago, 1965–1968

“I don’t know if white Christians hate Negros or not, but I know that we have a Christian church which is white and a Christian church which is Black. I know, as Malcolm X once put it, that the most segregated hour in American life is high noon on Sunday.”

– James Baldwin, interview on The Dick Cavett Show (1968)

This book describes a substantial group of white Catholics’ opposition to desegregation in the United States in the late 1960’s. This population vehemently opposed integration on the basis of the “moral values” of their religion. They were outraged by acts such as the decision of Brown v Board of Education, and resisted the shift to integration with demonstrations of contempt, like enraged letters to newspapers/congressmembers which are highlighted in this text. Letter writers referred to themselves as “real good and sincere Catholics” , and did not consider black Christians to be as moral or righteous as they were (Section III).

The main argument of this text is that these segregationists were unable to separate their “whiteness” from their “Catholicness”, and this religio-racial formation created a new identity in and of itself, separate from either “white” or “Catholic”.

This text highlights the function of religion as a creator of social groups. In this case, religion can be influenced by other aspects of identity (like race) to make groups within groups, such as white Christians being different than black Christians. This further distinguishes groups from each other by increasing the selection criteria to be considered ‘in-group’. Examples from letters highlighted in this text demonstrate instances of people using their religion to justify these distinctions. For example, a white Catholic said, “God made the black man black and the white man white, and who are we to change this? Are we greater than God?” (Section I). Similarly to the case of the Hijra, the distinction of these social groups also carries assumptions of superiority. In this book, there are examples of white Catholics attempting to “deify” white supremacy. In Section I, it lists an example of a woman saying, “all men are equal in God’s eyes,” she added that “each one of us must earn the respect of our fellow man. This, Cardinal, the vast majority of negroes have not done.” This sense of superiority is clearly an integral part of the religio-racial formation of their identity.

The fact that members of this group were unable to separate these dimensions of their identity is evidence for Durkeim’s philosophy that religion and society are inseparable. They cannot be studied independently, as they are indispensable to one another. For this population of white Catholics, the context of their time, past experiences, prejudices, morality, and more all came together to form a unique identity that was a blend of their social situation and religion.

All together

All of these books show examples of religion as a tool for the creation of social groups. This effect is not constrained to one population, one time, one geographic region, or even one religion, but is observed in multiple examples. Religion serves the purpose of creating the selection criteria for membership within a group or obstruction from the group. For any one group to exist, there must be others left outside the group. Religion is used as a tool to distinguish these differences, and usually also carries assumptions of superiority to classify those groups not only as distinct, but as either superior or inferior to each other. These texts together are evidence for both Durkeim’s views on the sociology of religion, and the Marxist philosophy of the use of religion to justify the oppression of those in lower social groups.