Diffusion of Religion and Language Chapter Notes | AP Human Geography - Grade 9 PDF Download

Introduction

This chapter notes explores the roles of language and religion in shaping cultural identity and facilitating cultural diffusion. It examines language families, subfamilies, and dialects, as well as the spread of major religions through various diffusion processes. The chapter also discusses ethnicity, gender roles, and the impact of interfaith and intrafaith boundaries, highlighting their influence on global cultural landscapes.

Language

• Languages serve to unite, spread, evolve, and sometimes divide populations. A language family consists of languages that share a common ancestral language, known as a protolanguage, which is reconstructed from historical linguistic evidence. 
• The Indo-European language family is the most widespread, encompassing languages spoken in Europe, parts of Asia, and adopted in the Americas.

Language Sub-families

• Subfamilies are smaller divisions within a language family, characterized by more specific shared traits and a more recent common origin. 
• The Indo-European languages have spread through both expansion and relocation diffusion, with an estimated 2.5 to 3.5 billion speakers worldwide. 
• Two theories explain the origin of the Indo-European language family:
  • The Anatolian dispersion theory suggests that the language spread through agricultural practices as sedentary farmers migrated.
  • The Kurgan Hypothesis proposes that the language disseminated through conquest by nomadic warriors. Branches of the Indo-European family include Germanic, Baltic-Slavic, Romance, Celtic, and Indo-Iranian, among others. 
• Languages can diverge, leading to variations, or converge, forming a new language from two distinct ones.
  • Germanic languages, such as German, English, and Swedish, reflect the westward and southward expansion of peoples from Northern Europe.
  • Romance languages, including French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese, are spoken in regions formerly under Roman Empire control. Language divergence occurs when a single language splits into distinct variants, like Spanish and Portuguese, while convergence happens when two languages merge, as seen in Maltese, formed from Maltese and English.
  • The Sino-Tibetan language family, the second largest, originated and spread across Asian regions and territories.

Common and Mixed Languages

• Lingua francas are widely adopted languages used for trade and business, such as English, Spanish, and Chinese. Creole languages emerge from the blending of two languages and become the native tongue of a community, often seen in the Caribbean where slavery and colonization mixed cultures, as exemplified by Haitian Creole.
• A pidgin language develops when speakers of different languages interact in a region, typically due to trade, combining elements of their languages, such as Swahili, which merges Bantu dialects with Arabic. When a pidgin evolves into a primary language of a region, it becomes a creole language.

Dialects

• Dialects are regional variations in speech, differing in vocabulary, pronunciation, or accent. In the United States, English dialects vary, with southern speakers pronouncing words differently from those in northern regions due to distinct linguistic characteristics.
• An isogloss is a geographic boundary separating the use of one word or pronunciation from another within a language.

Bilingualism

• Bilingualism refers to the ability to speak two or more languages fluently. It offers advantages over monolingualism, such as fostering cultural diversity, strengthening political alliances, enhancing communication, boosting tourism and economic benefits, promoting syncretism, and creating a sense of belonging among speakers of minority languages within cultural landscapes.
• However, bilingualism can also lead to challenges, including cultural tensions, discrimination, higher costs for multilingual education, and the need to provide resources and documents in multiple languages. Many countries mandate a single official language, such as Spanish in Argentina, Portuguese in Brazil, French in France, and German in Germany.
• The United States has no official language. Africa is the continent with the greatest linguistic diversity, and many Africans are bilingual.
• Through hierarchical diffusion, English spread in India during British colonial rule. The British Raj introduced an administrative system requiring officials to learn English, which then spread from the ruling class to the broader population.

Religions

Common Terms

• Universalizing religions are open to all, aiming to attract a global following, and are spread by missionaries seeking converts. These religions, including Christianity, Buddhism, and Islam, embrace diverse worshippers from various ethnic backgrounds.
• Ethnic religions are tied to specific ethnic or political groups, requiring members to be born into the group or join through marriage. Examples include Judaism and Hinduism. These religions are typically found near their cultural hearths but spread through relocation diffusion. Judaism, for instance, spread globally after the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD, dispersing Jewish communities worldwide. Ethnic religions often remain limited in spread due to the dominance of universalizing religions.
• Tribal religions are practiced by small cultural groups, blending ethnic beliefs with animism or diffused religious practices, such as Shamanism.
• Syncretism is the blending of multiple religious beliefs and practices.
• Animism is the belief that spirits inhabit objects, as seen in Shinto, Japan’s traditional religion, which is deeply animistic.
• A branch is a major division within a religion, followed by denominations, which are organized groups of congregations under a single administrative body, and sects, smaller groups that break away from established denominations.
• Monotheism involves belief in a single supreme deity, while polytheism involves belief in multiple deities. Polytheistic religions today include Hinduism and Shintoism.
• Pagans are adherents of ancient polytheistic religions.
• Proselytic religions are universalizing religions that actively seek converts.
• Fundamentalism refers to a strict, literal interpretation of a religion’s core principles.
• Theocracies are governments governed by religious laws. Most theocracies in the Western Hemisphere ended during the Enlightenment, though they persist in countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Christianity

• Christianity is a monotheistic universalizing religion that spread across Europe primarily through hierarchical and expansion diffusion and reached the Americas via relocation diffusion. 
• It is the largest universalizing religion, founded on the teachings of Jesus, who is considered the Son of God within a Trinitarian concept of God. Its three main branches are Roman Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant. 
• Roman Catholics are prominent in Latin America and Southwest Europe, Protestants in Northwest Europe and North America, and Orthodox Christians in Eastern Europe.
• Eastern Orthodoxy is the dominant faith in Greece, Cyprus, and Russia.

Protestantism

• Protestantism encompasses Christian churches in Western Christendom that broke away from the Roman Catholic Church during the Reformation. 
• Lutherans follow the teachings of Martin Luther, Baptists practice believer’s baptism by immersion and often adhere to Calvinistic doctrine, and Mormonism refers to the religious and cultural aspects of the Latter Day Saint movement.
• Protestant missionaries spread their beliefs in Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. The British Empire facilitated the diffusion of Protestantism to South Asia, East Asia, and the Pacific Islands, though strong ethnic beliefs in countries like China, India, and Japan resisted this spread. Churches serve as sacred spaces in Christianity.

Islam

• Islam, the second-largest universalizing religion, is based on the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad, who followed in the tradition of Abraham, Moses, and David. Muslims, meaning “those who surrender to God” in Arabic, adhere to Islam, which translates to “submitting to God’s will.”
• The Quran is the sacred text of Islam, and Muslims strictly follow its teachings. The Five Pillars of Islam include reciting the Muslim creed, praying five times daily, fasting during Ramadan, giving alms, and making a pilgrimage to Mecca before death.
• Islam’s two branches, Sunni and Shiite, diverged due to a dispute over leadership following Muhammad’s death in 632 CE, with Sunnis forming the majority. Through expansion diffusion, Islam spread across Southwest Asia and into India after Muhammad’s death, briefly ruling Spain. It also spread through trade and migration (relocation diffusion) to Southeast Asia, the Western Hemisphere, and Sub-Saharan Africa.
• Islam is the dominant religion in the Middle East, from North Africa to Central Asia, with over half of the world’s Muslims living in Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India. Mosques are sacred spaces in Islam.

Buddhism

• Buddhism is a religion or philosophy that does not worship gods but seeks truth and self-awareness through the teachings of the Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama), aiming for enlightenment or Nirvana. 
• Nirvana is achieved through the Eightfold Path, emphasizing right belief, resolve, speech, action, livelihood, effort, thought, and meditation. Originating in present-day Nepal in the 6th century BCE, Buddhism’s core belief is reincarnation.
• Buddhism has two branches: Theravada, the oldest, practiced in Southeast Asia and Sri Lanka, and Mahayana, emphasizing universal salvation, found in East Asia. 
  • Contagious diffusion facilitated its spread in India, where it competed with Islam in the north. Missionaries and syncretism with Hinduism further spread Buddhism across Asia. Pagodas, common in Buddhism and Shinto, are built to house sacred religious artifacts.

Hinduism

• Hinduism originated in the Indus River Valley in Pakistan and spread through contagious diffusion to the Indian Subcontinent. Traders carried Hinduism to Southeast Asia and Bali, and relocation diffusion occurred as Hindus migrated for better opportunities.
• Approximately 80% of Hindus live in India. As a polytheistic religion, Hinduism venerates numerous gods, with reincarnation as a central belief, closely aligned with India’s caste system. 
• Temples in Hinduism are constructed within homes or communities, featuring a central room for a spirit, ritual spaces, and outer purifying pools.
• The Ganges River, known as Ganga in Hindi, is India’s holiest river, where many Hindus scatter the ashes of the deceased after cremation. Hinduism’s ancient scriptures are called the Vedas.

Judaism

• Judaism is a monotheistic ethnic religion of the Jewish people, rooted in the Torah and Talmud, emerging in the Mesopotamian cultural hearth. Jerusalem is a sacred city, shared with Christianity and Islam, and the Western Wall is a key holy site.
• The Jewish Diaspora occurred due to religious persecution, scattering Jews globally. Israel is considered the Jewish homeland. Christianity and Islam trace some roots to Judaism, recognizing Abraham as a patriarch. Judaism’s three branches are Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform. 
• It is distributed across parts of the Middle East, North Africa, the United States, Russia, and Europe. Synagogues are sacred spaces. Zionism is a movement advocating for the return of Jews to their ancestral homeland, though being a Zionist does not necessarily mean supporting Israel’s policies.

Interfaith Boundaries

• Interfaith boundaries exist between major world religions. For example, Pakistan, predominantly Muslim, separated from India, largely Hindu, in 1947, leading to conflicts over Kashmir. Other examples include the Palestinian conflict between Judaism and Islam and the former Yugoslavia conflict between Christianity and Islam.
• Intrafaith boundaries occur within a single religion. For instance, in Iraq, Sunnis and Shiites compete for political control. Another example is the violent conflict between Protestant Christians and Roman Catholics in Northern Ireland.

Secularism

• Secularism involves the rejection of religious beliefs and systems, gaining popularity in Europe. Autonomous religions, like Islam, prioritize unity through faith rather than rigid organizational structures. 
• Sikhism, a monotheistic universalizing religion with origins in the Indian Subcontinent, is another example.

Confucianism

Confucianism, originating in China from the teachings of Confucius, is a system of ethics and family values emphasizing public service and social harmony.

Taoism

Taoism, also known as Daoism, is a Chinese philosophical or religious tradition that emphasizes living in harmony with the Tao, focusing on mystical and spiritual aspects of life. Indonesia exemplifies a multilayered cultural landscape influenced by such traditions.

Six Major Religions to Know: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Sikhism

Ethnicity

• An ethnic group comprises individuals sharing a common nationality, language, culture, religion, or other traits. Unlike race, which is based on shared biological ancestry, ethnicity focuses on cultural identity. 
• Ethnic groups have migrated for centuries, establishing cultural societies in specific regions, known as charter groups.
• Ethnic enclaves are urban areas where minority cultural groups reside, sometimes forming ghettos due to persecution, as seen with Jewish communities in Venice, or through voluntary isolation based on shared cultural traits.

Gender Roles

• In less developed regions, such as Sub-Saharan Africa, traditional gender roles assign women responsibilities like childcare, cooking, cleaning, and agriculture, while men dominate labor-intensive roles providing economic stability.
• In more developed regions, women enjoy greater freedom to participate in the workforce and contribute to family income. 
• Industrialization and societal modernization have transformed traditional gender roles, with women increasingly valued for their contributions in professional and educational settings.