"If religion is about social cohesion and the coordination of meaning, values, and motivations of a community or society, how do communities meaningfully navigate the religious domain in an environment of multiple religious possibilities? Within the range of socio-cultural responses to such conditions, this dissertation empirically explores 'multiple religious belonging,' a concept referring to individuals or groups whose religious identity, commitments, or activities may extend beyond a single coherent religious tradition. The project evaluates expressions of this phenomenon in the eastern Cuban city of Santiago de Cuba with focused attention on practitioners of Regla Ocha/Ifa, Palo Monte, Espiritismo Cruzado, and Muerteria, four organic religious traditions historically evolved from the efforts of African descendants on the island. With concern for identifying patterns, limits, and variety of expression of multiple religious belonging, I employed qualitative research methods to explore how distinctions and relationships between religious traditions are articulated, navigated, and practiced. These methods included directed formal and informal personal interviews and participant observations of ritual spaces, events, and community gatherings in the four traditions. I demonstrate that religious practitioners in Santiago manage diverse religious options through multiple religious belonging and that practitioners have strategies for expressing their multiple religious belonging. The diverse expressions involve characteristics of centered and un-centered models of multiple religious belonging, as well as attributes of shared reality and complementarity between religious traditions. The research contributes to a more critical understanding of the complexities of eastern Cuban religious expressions and religious traditions of the African Diaspora. Moreover, the project aims to enhance the conceptual literature around multiple religious belonging with data from the Caribbean island of Cuba."--Pages ii-iii.
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