eJournal- reflective work for 16th of January.
As a result of our first lecture, of the society and lifestyle module, I have now understood religion from a different perspective. Having done higher Religious education in high school, I understand and know a fair amount about religion and how religions differ between one another. However, during this lecture, religion was taken from a completely different angle which was interesting.
I learned about the different theorists in religion. For example, Emile Durkheim, who was French and how he believes that religion has the ability to unite people together and can allow them to form a collective group. Due to this being new information, I am still not 100% sure on how to use this in an essay but I will practice and read more notes in order for me to consolidate this learning.
I also discovered that religion is divided into three separate parts: established religion, sects and cults. During this part of the lecture, we were shown a video about an awful mass suicide committed by a cult which was about a man called Jim Jones who created this cult. This helped me to understand this a bit better but I still feel I need to read over some notes from this lecture to fully understand it, in order to do well in the final exam.
I feel like I am struggling to understand some concepts, for example, functionalism, and how to incorporate this into an essay. I will continue to read over notes and materials from the lecture to help me understand it better.
