In an anthropological examination, prayer may afford a fertile lens through which to explore what matters in socially discrepant environments as they are practiced in the mundane world of ordinary men and women, as well as among zealous practitioners and religious virtuosi. Prayer, however understood, may present ways to explore and conceive of religiosity without privileging a specific definition of religion itself. Generally, prayer points us to what matters to people. It offers a lens through which to explore the various affective and emotional relationships that people craft, nurture, and sustain over time. This entry explores prayer as an inherently social phenomenon, taking its cue from the work of Marcel Mauss. Prayer, it is argued, can be seen as a token of the implicatedness of prayerful subjects in their social world. Accordingly, in anthropological terms prayer may be seen as a way to act upon the world.