Syncretism
When we talk about the spread of world religions, like Christianity or Islam, we tend to assume a one-way process: the world religions simply replace indigenous religions. In fact, the process is often more interesting. Indigenous people often respond to the introduction of a world religion by blending indigenous beliefs with the beliefs of the world religion. This is what anthropologists call “syncretism”.
Copyright 2013 Nicholas Herriman / La Trobe University, all rights reserved. Please contact for permissions.
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