Edward B. Tyler (Substantive theories)
• Key figures in the institutionalization of modern discipline of anthropology. Created first university post in anthropology
• Study primitive societies to define religious practice
• Relied on European travelers, few of whom spoke languages and cultures of the peoples they described to provide accurate detailed accounts of religious belief.
• Depended upon descriptions of ritual that he attempt to infer a generalized idea of “primitive religion” that he argued was centered on “animism” the belief that human but also animals and even inanimate objects, have soul
• Defined religion as belief in supernatural beings
• Primitive people used dreams in which spirits seemed to appear as an indication that human mind could exist independent of a body. Explain life and death, and belief in after life