hey guys, you may have noticed I changed my title from "Listen to your friend Billy Zane" to "thick description" let me explain...
and no, this couldn't possibly be a procrastination technique... if you're wondering...
So I am actually studying for finals, for my religion final right now. And I'm comparing/contrasting/I sound like an essay question, these seven theories of religion. And one guy, Clifford Geertz, uses the term "thick description". Prior to this, people two many different approaches to religion (well, they still do). One is anthropological (Evans-Pritchard, Frazer, Geertz himself), others are social (Durkheim, Marx to some extent), psychological (Freud), whatever this is not class this is a blog. So, Geertz goes both anthropological and sociological, because he says that simply describing a religious tradition is insufficient, and seeking the purpose of the action is also incomplete. "Thick Description" means describing what physically happened, and interpreting it.
He uses the example of a wink... let's say I wink at you. I might be making a move on you, but I might have dust or something in my eye. And, if you're brave enough, it's up to you to figure that out. And I think Geertz is just brilliant in this distinction. Because he describes how people buried their dead in certain places, and he argues that you can't compare this to a similar tradition in another culture. You have to interpret it first, find the meaning behind it, then you can compare. So yeah, very interesting, I know... you're like, "get back to the two guys who want you but not really!"
So in the best sense I could explain what's going on in my life and also explain what it means to me. But given constraints of time and my own laziness, that may be wishful thinking. I have to study now.
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after studying more, i detest the term. i thought it was cool, until i wrote a practice essay on it. don't be surprised if the title's changed before too long.
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