Religion and Ritual in Rural India

Religion and Ritual in Rural India
Author: Tribhuwan Kapur
Publisher: Abhinav Publications
Total Pages: 238
Release: 1988
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 8170172381

This Study Presents A Radical Break-Through In Both Method And Analysis In Social Anthropology/Sociology. In Terms Of Method It Treats The Field As A Source Of Geographical Models Of The Village(S) Studied. Concerning Analysis It Amalgamates Strands From Various Disciplines Into An Integral Interpretative Instrument. Finally Data Is Gathered As Much By Being-In-Field As By Building From The Foundations Of Culture Traits. Thus The Methods Of Anthrography, Historiography, Psychography Are Used To Study Myths And Legends, Leading Systems, Ritual Sets All Of Which Function Under The Aegis Of The Religious Outlook. As Such This Study While Being Complete In Itself Provides Numerous Directions For Analysis. This Study Took Over Five Years To Complete Of Which About Two Were Field-Based In Remote Regions, Where Religion And Ritual Form The Deepest Concern Of Man Pitted Against A Hostile Ecology.

Religions of Tibet in Practice

Religions of Tibet in Practice
Author: Donald S. Lopez, Jr.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 435
Release: 2018-06-05
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0691188173

Originally published in 1997, Religions of Tibet in Practice is a landmark work--the first major anthology on the topic ever produced. This new edition--abridged to further facilitate course use--presents a stunning array of works that together offer an unparalleled view of the Tibetan religious landscape over the centuries. Organized thematically, the twenty-eight chapters are testimony to the vast scope of religious practice in the Tibetan world, past and present. Religions of Tibet in Practice remains a work of great value to scholars, students, and general readers.

Religions of India in Practice

Religions of India in Practice
Author: Donald S. Lopez, Jr.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 671
Release: 2020-07-21
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0691216266

The inaugural volume of Princeton Readings in Religions brings together the work of thirty scholars of the religions of India in a new anthology designed to reshape the ways in which the religious traditions of India are understood. The book contains translations of forty-five works, most of which have never before been available in a Western language. Many of these highlight types of discourse (especially ritual manuals, folktales, and oral narratives) and voices (vernacular, esoteric, domestic, and female) that have not been sufficiently represented in previous anthologies and standard accounts of Indian religions. The selections are drawn from ancient texts, medieval manuscripts, modern pamphlets, and contemporary fieldwork in rural and urban India. They represent every region in South Asia and include Hindu, Buddhist, Jain, Sikh, and Muslim materials. Some are written texts reflecting elite concerns, while others are transcriptions of oral narratives told by nonliterate peasants. Some texts are addressed to a public and pan-Indian audience, others to a limited coterie of initiates in an esoteric sect, and still others are intended for a few women gathered in the courtyard for a household ceremony. The editor has reinforced this diversity by arranging the selections within several overarching themes and categories of discourse (hymns, rituals, narratives, and religious interactions), and encourages us to make our own connections.

God

God
Author: John Bowker
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 161
Release: 2014
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0198708955

Who or what is God? In this Very Short Introduction John Bowker considers questions like these. Exploring how the major religions interpret the idea of God, and have established their own distinctive beliefs about his existence, Bowker shows how and why our understanding of God continues to evolve.

Reflections on Resemblance, Ritual, and Religion

Reflections on Resemblance, Ritual, and Religion
Author: Brian K. Smith
Publisher: Motilal Banarsidass Publishe
Total Pages: 284
Release: 1998
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9788120815322

The classical Vedic texts that deal with large-scale sacrificial ritual and those writings that deal with domestic ritual have traditionally been treated as unrelated. The former are devoted to the explication of rituals that are dominated by wealthy male elites; the latter concern humble private ceremonies more open to famale participation. Reflections on Resemblance, Ritual and Religion argues that there is in fact, a fundamental connection between these two large and important bodies of Indic religious literature.

Material Acts in Everyday Hindu Worlds

Material Acts in Everyday Hindu Worlds
Author: Joyce Burkhalter Flueckiger
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Total Pages: 208
Release: 2020-10-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 143848013X

In Material Acts in Everyday Hindu Worlds, Joyce Burkhalter Flueckiger analyzes the agency of materiality—the ability of materials to have an effect on both humans and deities—beyond human intentions. Using materials from three regions where Flueckiger conducted extensive fieldwork, she begins with Indian understandings of the agency of ornaments that have the desired effects of protecting women and making them more auspicious. Subsequent chapters bring in examples of materiality that are agentive beyond human intentions, from a south Indian goddess tradition where female guising transforms the aggressive masculinity of men who wear saris, braids, and breasts to the presence of cement images of Ravana in Chhattisgarh, which perform alternative theologies and ideologies to those of dominant textual traditions of the Ramayana epic. Deeply ethnographic and accessibly written, Material Acts in Everyday Hindu Worlds expands our understanding of material agency as well as the parameters of religion more broadly. This book is freely available in an open access edition thanks to the National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowships Open Book Program—a limited competition designed to make outstanding humanities books available to a wide audience. Learn more at the Fellowships Open Book Program at https://www.neh.gov/grants/odh/FOBP, and access the book online at the SUNY Open Access Repository at https://soar.suny.edu/handle/20.500.12648/8716.

Religious Experience in the Hindu Tradition

Religious Experience in the Hindu Tradition
Author: June McDaniel
Publisher: MDPI
Total Pages: 198
Release: 2019-07-31
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 3039210505

This book is a printed edition of the Special Issue Religious Experience in the Hindu Tradition that was published in Religions

Religious Practice and Democracy in India

Religious Practice and Democracy in India
Author: Pradeep K. Chhibber
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 217
Release: 2014-07-17
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1139952560

This book demonstrates the close relationship between religion and democracy in India. Religious practice creates ties among citizens that can generate positive and democratic political outcomes. In pursuing this line of inquiry the book questions a dominant strand in some contemporary social sciences - that a religious denomination (Catholic, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, and so on) is sufficient to explain the relationship between religion and politics or that religion and democracy are antithetical to each other. The book makes a strong case for studying religious practice and placing that practice in the panoply of other social practices and showing that religious practice is positively associated with democracy.

India in Early Modern English Travel Writings

India in Early Modern English Travel Writings
Author: Rita Banerjee
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 287
Release: 2021-07-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 9004448268

Comparing the variant ideologies of the representations of India in seventeenth-century European travelogues, India in Early Modern English Travel Narratives concerns a relatively neglected area of study and often overlooked writers. Relating the narratives to contemporary ideas and beliefs, Rita Banerjee argues that travel writers, many of them avid Protestants, seek to negativize India by constructing her in opposition to Europe, the supposed norm, by deliberately erasing affinities and indulging in the politics of disavowal. However, some travelogues show a neutral stance by dispassionate ethnographic reporting, indicating a growing empirical trend. Yet others, influenced by the Enlightenment ideas of diversity, demonstrate tolerance of alien practices and, occasionally, acceptance of the superior rationality of the other's customs.

Religion and Technology in India

Religion and Technology in India
Author: Knut A. Jacobsen
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 386
Release: 2019-01-15
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1351204777

Religion tends to flourish when technological developments create new possibilities for communication and representation, and simultaneously change as a consequence of these developments. This book explores intersections between religion and technology in India, at the present and in the colonial past, and how various forms of techno-religious intersections transform and open up for new religious practices, discourses, communities, and institutions. With focus on Indian contexts and religions, it discusses various empirical and theoretical aspects of how technological innovations create, alter, and negotiate religious spaces, practices and authorities. The book provides rich and multifaceted empirical examples of different ways in which technological practices relate to meanings, ideas, and practices of religions. The techno-religious intersections generate several questions about authority and power, the politics and poetics of identity, community and place, and how religious agency, information, and experience are mediated, commodified, and adjusted to new demands of societies. The chapters explore the Hindu, Jain, and Sikh traditions in relation to new technological developments and media, such as photography, new means of visualization, TV serials, mobile phones, and online communication. The book will be of interest to academics studying modern and contemporary India and South Asia, and especially the role of religion and technology.