Part 1 General introduction. Part 2 Theoretical background - insides, outsides and the scholar of religion: body ritual among the Nacirema, Horace Miner; etic and emic standpoints for the description of behaviour, Kenneth L. Pike; the epistemology of cultural materialism, Marvin Harris; is understanding religion compatible with believing Alisdair MacIntyre. Part 3 The autonomy of religious experience: the nature of religion, Friedrich Schleiermacher; the idea of the holy (chapters 1-111), Rudolph Otto; the meaning and task of the history of religions (Religionswissenschaft), Joachim Wach; a new humanism, Mircea Eliade; feminist anthropology and the gendering of religious studies, Rosalind Shaw; an anthropological approach to the study if religion, Raymond Shaw. Part 4 Reductionism in the study of religion: what is enlightenment, Emmanuel Kant; excerpts from the Natural History of Religion, David Hume; in defence of reductionism, Robert A. Segal; religious discourse and first person authority, Terry Godlove; religion, explanation, and the askesis of inquiry, Tony Edwards; reductionism and belief - an appraisal of recent attacks on the doctrine of irreducible religion, Daniel Pals. Part 5 Neutrality and methodological agnostocism: sociological and theological perspectives, Peter Berger; within and without religion, Ninian Smart; fessing up in theory - on professing and confessing in the religious studies classroom, Martin S. Jaffee; the study of religion - neutral? scientific? or neither?, Peter Byrne: does understanding religion require religious understanding?, Donald Wiebe; neutrality in religious studies, Peter Donovan.
