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Political Economy and the Routinization of Religious Movements: A View from the Eastern Woodlands
Author(s) -
Beck Jr. Robin A.,
Brown James A.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
archeological papers of the american anthropological association
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.783
H-Index - 30
eISSN - 1551-8248
pISSN - 1551-823X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1551-8248.2012.01038.x
Subject(s) - woodland , politics , focus (optics) , sociology , epistemology , history , political science , philosophy , law , ecology , physics , optics , biology
Max Weber's concept of routinization offers a useful framework for understanding the relationship between political economy and the organization of religious movements. Here, we apply this concept to a comparison of Hopewell and Mississippian, two of the most important religious movements in the precolonial Eastern Woodlands. We focus on two archaeological contexts in particular—Mound 25 at the Hopewell site and Mound C at Etowah—to illustrate how Weber's concept allows for a more nuanced comparison than concepts associated with a more traditional neoevolutionary logic.