Your second paper assignment this semester is to write a three to four-page paper
in which you use Wallace’s ‘Anatomy of Religion’ to describe and analyze Haitian
Vodou. Select three of Wallace’s categories of religious behavior which you think
are particularly useful for analyzing Vodou belief and practice, and show how they
apply to the Vodou spiritual system. Draw on the readings by Murrell, Herskovits,
Wilentz, Peters-Golden, the Maya Deren film Divine Horsemen, and the Angels in the
Mirror audio recording for your evidence. Explain the meaning of the Wallace
categories you have selected, and show how they help to illuminate Vodou.
This assignment asks you to apply portions of Wallace’s anthropological
understanding of religion in general to Haitian Vodou in particular, as shown in
the course materials indicated above. The purpose of this assignment is to give you
an opportunity to explore Haitian Vodou from an anthropological perspective by
showing how Haitian Vodou fits within and fulfills Wallace’s framework.
