{"id":14650,"date":"2016-01-05T12:56:26","date_gmt":"2016-01-05T17:56:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.cos.ucf.edu\/?p=14650"},"modified":"2016-12-01T12:33:49","modified_gmt":"2016-12-01T17:33:49","slug":"does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart\/","title":{"rendered":"Religion and Politics Led to Social Conflict, Then and Now"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_14654\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2016\/01\/Barber-200x300.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-14654\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-14654\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-14654\" src=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2016\/01\/Barber-200x300-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"Credit: UCF: Nick Russet\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2016\/01\/Barber-200x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2016\/01\/Barber-200x300-299x199.jpg 299w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-14654\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Credit: UCF: Nick Russet<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Humans haven\u2019t learned much in more than 2,000 years when it comes to religion and politics.<\/p>\n<p>Religion has led to social tension and conflict, not just in today\u2019s society, but dating back to 700 B.C.,\u00a0 according to a new study published today in\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/10.1086\/683998?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents\">Current Anthropology<\/a>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/anthropology.cos.ucf.edu\/people\/barber-sarah\/\">Sarah Barber, Ph.D.<\/a>, associate professor of anthropology at UCF, and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.colorado.edu\/anthropology\/gradstudy\/arthur-joyce\">Arthur A. Joyce<\/a>, anthropology professor at the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.colorado.edu\/\">University of Colorado<\/a>,\u00a0found evidence in several Mexican archaeological sites that contradict the long-held belief that religion acted to unite early state societies. It often had the opposite effect, the study says.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter if we today don\u2019t share particular religious beliefs, but when people in the past acted on their beliefs, those actions could have real, material consequences,\u201d Barber said about the team\u2019s findings. \u201cIt really behooves us to acknowledge religion when considering political processes.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Sounds like sage advice in today\u2019s world that has multiple examples of politics and religion intersecting and resulting in conflict.<\/p>\n<p>The team published its findings \u201cEnsoulment, Entrapment, and Political Centralization: A Comparative Study of Religion and Politics in Later Formative Oaxaca,\u201d after spending several years conducting field research in the lower R\u00edo Verde valley of Oaxaca, Mexico\u2019s Pacific coastal lowlands. They compared their results with data from the highland Valley of Oaxaca.<\/p>\n<p>Their study viewed archaeological evidence from 700 B.C. to A.D. 250, a period identified as a time of the emergence of states in the region. In the lower Verde, religious rituals involving offerings and the burial of people in cemeteries at smaller communities created strong ties to the local community that impeded the creation of state institutions.<\/p>\n<p>And in the Valley of Oaxaca, elites became central to mediating between their communities and the gods, which eventually triggered conflict with traditional community leaders. It culminated in the emergence of a regional state with its capital at the hilltop city of Monte Alb\u00e1n.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn both the Valley of\u00a0Oaxaca and the Lower R\u00edo Verde Valley, religion was important in the formation and history of early cities and states, but in vastly\u00a0different ways,\u201d said Joyce, lead author on the study.\u00a0\u201cGiven the role of religion in social life and politics today, that shouldn\u2019t be too surprising.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The conflict in the lower R\u00edo Verde valley is evident in rapid rise and fall of its state institutions. At R\u00edo Viejo, the capital of the lower Verde state, people had built massive temples by AD 100. Yet these impressive, labor-intensive buildings, along with many towns throughout the valley, were abandoned a little over a century later.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAn innovative aspect of our research is to view the\u00a0burials of ancestors and ceremonial offerings in the lower Verde\u00a0as\u00a0essential to these ancient communities,\u201d said Joyce, whose research focuses on both political life and ecology in ancient Mesoamerica. \u201cSuch a perspective is also more consistent with the worldviews of the Native Americans\u00a0that lived there.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Barber is an associate professor at UCF specializing in the archaeology of Mesoamerica. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Colorado Boulder in 2005 and joined the UCF faculty in 2007. The central goal of her research is to understand the various processes that enabled and constrained early political centralization. Her fieldwork has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the National Geographic Society, and the Religion and Innovation in Human Affairs program.<\/p>\n<p>Joyce, whose research has been funded by the NSF and the Religion and Innovation in Human Affairs Program, which is funded in part by the John Templeton Foundation, is the author of\u00a0Mixtecs, Zapotecs, and Chatinos: Ancient Peoples of Southern Mexico.<\/p>\n<p>To read original story on UCF Today, <a href=\"https:\/\/today.ucf.edu\/anthropological-evidence-relibion-politics-led-to-social-tension-conflict-then-and-now\/\">click here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Humans haven\u2019t learned much in more than 2,000 years when it comes to religion and politics. Religion has led to social tension and conflict, not just in today\u2019s society, but dating back to 700 B.C.,\u00a0 according to a new study published today in\u00a0Current Anthropology\u00a0. Sarah Barber, Ph.D., associate professor of anthropology at UCF, and Arthur [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":14654,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[32,38,39,13,25,28],"tags":[330,828,2117,2850,2964,3457,3473,3731,3782],"class_list":["post-14650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-anthropology","category-breaking-news","category-faculty-news","category-news","category-staff-news","category-top-news","tag-arthur-joyce","tag-current-anthropology","tag-lower-rio-verde-valley","tag-religion-and-politics","tag-sarah-barber","tag-ucf","tag-ucf-anthropology","tag-university-of-colorado-boulder","tag-valley-of-oaxaca"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Religion and Politics Led to Social Conflict, Then and Now - College of Sciences News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Religion and Politics Led to Social Conflict, Then and Now - College of Sciences News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Humans haven\u2019t learned much in more than 2,000 years when it comes to religion and politics. Religion has led to social tension and conflict, not just in today\u2019s society, but dating back to 700 B.C.,\u00a0 according to a new study published today in\u00a0Current Anthropology\u00a0. Sarah Barber, Ph.D., associate professor of anthropology at UCF, and Arthur [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"College of Sciences News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-01-05T17:56:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-12-01T17:33:49+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Judy Froehlich\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/sciences.ucf.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2016\/01\/Barber-200x300.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Judy Froehlich\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/sciences.ucf.edu\\\/news\\\/does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/sciences.ucf.edu\\\/news\\\/does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Judy Froehlich\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/sciences.ucf.edu\\\/news\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/d0a56f308c46b7b3e18f52d6ef199e82\"},\"headline\":\"Religion and Politics Led to Social Conflict, Then and Now\",\"datePublished\":\"2016-01-05T17:56:26+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-12-01T17:33:49+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/sciences.ucf.edu\\\/news\\\/does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":635,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/sciences.ucf.edu\\\/news\\\/does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/sciences.ucf.edu\\\/news\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/sites\\\/29\\\/2016\\\/01\\\/Barber-200x300.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Arthur Joyce\",\"Current Anthropology\",\"Lower Rio Verde Valley\",\"Religion and politics\",\"Sarah Barber\",\"UCF\",\"UCF Anthropology\",\"University of Colorado Boulder\",\"Valley of Oaxaca\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Anthropology\",\"COS News\",\"Faculty News\",\"News\",\"Staff News\",\"Top News\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/sciences.ucf.edu\\\/news\\\/does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/sciences.ucf.edu\\\/news\\\/does-religion-and-politics-bring-people-together-or-tear-them-apart\\\/\",\"name\":\"Religion and Politics Led to Social Conflict, Then and Now - 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