Blog #7

 In class last week we took a look at pluralism.  Pluralism is the policy of diversity of religious beliefs that co-exist in one society.  Another definition of pluralism is two different people of two different religions being able to live in the same neighbor hood.  We talked about pluralism in America and how people are either accepting of other people, tolerate them, or reject them.  One group that has to relate to pluralism in America is the Muslim people.  These people get judge just because of their religion.  Some Americans accept them as people and their religion doesn't matter while others desperately despise them because of their religion and automatically think they are bad people because they are Muslim.  These Americans are not accepting of them co-existing in one society.  

 

 

 

Below is an article that was published in the Chicago Tribune in 2013 talking about pluralism.  The articles main purpose is talking about getting Muslims more religious freedom.  The article also talks about how western countries should try harder to eliminate prejudice for religious minority's especially Muslims.  I found this article to be quite interesting and ironic that it talks about the same thing I did above.  I really encourage one to read it. 

 

 

 http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2013-12-31/news/sns-rt-religion-islamoic--interview-20131231_1_pope-francis-islamic-cooperation-ekmeleddin-ihsanoglu

 

Blog #6

In class last week we started talking about how religion can be a face to a groups identity.   Some of the connections religion can have to a group or person is race, geography, and nationality.  One identity that is most of the time associated with religion is race.  I feel like we also took a lot of time in class talking about race and the identity it has on once religion.  We covered three approaches that relate religion and race.  The first approach we covered was the Abramson Approach.  Here we looked at the video of the Amish people and what they did to their people for not living like their rules say.  There was also a group of Amish that started doing bad things to a group of non-Amish people which caused the whole Amish community to look bad.  The next approach we looked at was the Greeley Two-Way Flow approach.  This approach mainly talked about how religion is related to race.  Here for an example we looked at how when people usually thing about the US and religion they think mainly Christian.  The last approach we covered was the constellation of ethnology-religious relationships.  We covered that there can be certain things and events that can be related to different religions.  We used Easter and Christianity as an example for this.  And another thing is Christmas and Christianity.  

Below I have found an article that talks about religion identity and inter group conflict.  It is a very interesting article and I recommend that you read the article.  It covers some interesting topics that we can relate to what we talked about in class.    

http://jpr.sagepub.com/content/36/5/553.short

Blog #5

In class last week we talked about Rational Choice Theory.  From the article I posted below the definition of Rational choice theory, "also known as choice theory or rational action theory, is a framework for understanding and often formally modeling social and economic behavior".  In class we received the worksheet that asked us to write down our personal views on religion and politics.  We used these two views to try and understand how Rational Choice Theory was used and worked.  We also discussed how it worked and even used some classmates views as examples.  We talked about what costs and benefits there are to the choices we make.  Rational Choice Theory when used in the correct views can be helpful.  This was shown when we talked about peoples answers in class.  Each person viewed the costs and benefits differently and I think it would be interesting to see everyone's papers that we wrote at the end of class to see this. 



Below I have posted a scholar article about Rational Choice Theory.  This is a good article to read if you want to get a more in depth understanding of what Rational Choice Theory is.  It also gives some good examples of what, and how Rational Choice Theory is used and in which ways it can be used and not used. 
http://www.ppsw.rug.nl/~lindenb/documents/articles/1992_lindenberg_method_of_decreasing_abstraction.pdf

Soc. 395 Blog #4 10/7/14

Religion has been around since the beginning of the earth.  There are hundreds of different religions in the world today.  Some were started at the beginning some started as time went on.  No matter when a religion was started, that religion is still important to its people.  These days more and more people are diverting from the old traditional religions and leading towards the term "nones".  This term describes a group of Americans that do not choose to be associated with any religion.  This term was brought to us by the Pew Research Group, who conducted research on religion and the present day religions.  The research presented by the Pew showed us that there is an increase in this group of people who don’t believe or associate with a religion.  From the background I grew up in this is very eye opening to me as religion was a large part of my life and I always thought it was to everyone.  Not until college did I see or learn of this other side or “nones” way of life.  To me this is very interesting learning the other side of the view on religion.  The younger and younger these the generations get the less afficalated people are. 

Below I posted a link to a web page describing and talking about the Pew research.  There is a lot of interesting data presented here in the article.  There are a few graphs and tables that show the numbers of people who affiliate with a religion and those that don't.  The data really shows you the drastic change that is occurring in the US as of right now.  This article presents the data very well and is very helpful in understanding what is going on in the US regarding religion in this present day and age. 

http://www.pewforum.org/2012/10/09/nones-on-the-rise/