William S Sax
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195335866
- eISBN:
- 9780199868919
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195335866.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
This book deals with ritual healing in the Central Himalayas of north India. It focuses on the cult of Bhairav, a local deity who is associated with the lowest castes, the so-called Dalits, who are ...
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This book deals with ritual healing in the Central Himalayas of north India. It focuses on the cult of Bhairav, a local deity who is associated with the lowest castes, the so-called Dalits, who are frequently victims of social injustice. When powerless people are exploited or abused and have nowhere else to go, they often turn to Bhairav for justice, and he afflicts their oppressors with disease and misfortune. In order to end their suffering, they must make amends with their former victims and worship Bhairav with bloody sacrifices. Many acts of perceived injustice occur within the family, so that much of the book focuses on the tension between the high moral value placed on family unity on the one hand, and the inevitable conflicts within it on the other. Such conflicts can lead to ghost possession, cursing, and other forms of black magic, all of which are vividly described. The book includes a personal account of the author's own experiences in the field as well as descriptions of blood sacrifice, possession, exorcism, and cursing. The book begins with a straightforward description of the author' s fieldwork and goes on to describe the god Bhairav and his relationship to the weak and powerless. Subsequent chapters deal with the lives of local oracles and healers; the main rituals of the cult and the dramatic Himalayan landscape in which they are embedded; the moral, ritual, and therapeutic centrality of the family; the importance of ghosts and exorcism; and practices of cursing and counter-cursing. The final chapter examines the problematic relationship between ritual healing and modernity.Less
This book deals with ritual healing in the Central Himalayas of north India. It focuses on the cult of Bhairav, a local deity who is associated with the lowest castes, the so-called Dalits, who are frequently victims of social injustice. When powerless people are exploited or abused and have nowhere else to go, they often turn to Bhairav for justice, and he afflicts their oppressors with disease and misfortune. In order to end their suffering, they must make amends with their former victims and worship Bhairav with bloody sacrifices. Many acts of perceived injustice occur within the family, so that much of the book focuses on the tension between the high moral value placed on family unity on the one hand, and the inevitable conflicts within it on the other. Such conflicts can lead to ghost possession, cursing, and other forms of black magic, all of which are vividly described. The book includes a personal account of the author's own experiences in the field as well as descriptions of blood sacrifice, possession, exorcism, and cursing. The book begins with a straightforward description of the author' s fieldwork and goes on to describe the god Bhairav and his relationship to the weak and powerless. Subsequent chapters deal with the lives of local oracles and healers; the main rituals of the cult and the dramatic Himalayan landscape in which they are embedded; the moral, ritual, and therapeutic centrality of the family; the importance of ghosts and exorcism; and practices of cursing and counter-cursing. The final chapter examines the problematic relationship between ritual healing and modernity.
William S. Sax
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195335866
- eISBN:
- 9780199868919
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195335866.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
This chapter begins with a brief description of the oppression endured by the lowest castes, the Harijans, in Garhwal. It then introduces Bhairav, the deity to whom the Harijans turn when they are ...
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This chapter begins with a brief description of the oppression endured by the lowest castes, the Harijans, in Garhwal. It then introduces Bhairav, the deity to whom the Harijans turn when they are abused or exploited, or when they are the victims of injustice. The first appearance of Bhairav, the appearance of Bhairav as savior, the iconographic appearance of Bhairav, and Bhairav's appearance in the flesh are discussed.Less
This chapter begins with a brief description of the oppression endured by the lowest castes, the Harijans, in Garhwal. It then introduces Bhairav, the deity to whom the Harijans turn when they are abused or exploited, or when they are the victims of injustice. The first appearance of Bhairav, the appearance of Bhairav as savior, the iconographic appearance of Bhairav, and Bhairav's appearance in the flesh are discussed.
Ben Campbell
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- September 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780198078524
- eISBN:
- 9780199082278
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198078524.001.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Culture
The Himalayas have iconic status in the global biosphere, but how well understood are the relationships between Himalayan people and their environment? How can anthropological approaches to the ...
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The Himalayas have iconic status in the global biosphere, but how well understood are the relationships between Himalayan people and their environment? How can anthropological approaches to the environment help in understanding local people’s responses to nature protection? How does culture figure alongside nature in the modern cosmology of knowledge about the non-human world? Living between Juniper and Palm is an ethnographic study of the Tamang people of the Nepal Himalayas. In approaching issues of sustainability, ecology, and livelihood among the Tamang, the author locates people and environments in a relationship that does not depend upon a split between bio-physical reality and an overlay of cultural meaning. Drawing from various critical perspectives for analysing human–environment relations, including phenomenology and political ecology, the book documents indigenous environmental knowledge—about forests, pathways, animals, and ‘sameness’ and ‘difference’ between humans and non-humans. Modern conservation practices are contrasted to shamanic and Hindu cosmologies, providing a cultural analysis to the power dimensions of ‘participatory conservation’ affected by Nepal’s Maoist civil war. The approach of this book is to describe and analyse perspectives on environmental practices, politics, and narrative discourses in a community that has no idea of the environment as a totality, independent of human presence. For administrators, foresters, and biodiversity scientists, this is precisely what has to be rectified: people are seen as needing to be sectioned off from nature to prevent worsening states of forest, soil, and species loss. The book offers anthropologically informed alternatives for translating sustainability.Less
The Himalayas have iconic status in the global biosphere, but how well understood are the relationships between Himalayan people and their environment? How can anthropological approaches to the environment help in understanding local people’s responses to nature protection? How does culture figure alongside nature in the modern cosmology of knowledge about the non-human world? Living between Juniper and Palm is an ethnographic study of the Tamang people of the Nepal Himalayas. In approaching issues of sustainability, ecology, and livelihood among the Tamang, the author locates people and environments in a relationship that does not depend upon a split between bio-physical reality and an overlay of cultural meaning. Drawing from various critical perspectives for analysing human–environment relations, including phenomenology and political ecology, the book documents indigenous environmental knowledge—about forests, pathways, animals, and ‘sameness’ and ‘difference’ between humans and non-humans. Modern conservation practices are contrasted to shamanic and Hindu cosmologies, providing a cultural analysis to the power dimensions of ‘participatory conservation’ affected by Nepal’s Maoist civil war. The approach of this book is to describe and analyse perspectives on environmental practices, politics, and narrative discourses in a community that has no idea of the environment as a totality, independent of human presence. For administrators, foresters, and biodiversity scientists, this is precisely what has to be rectified: people are seen as needing to be sectioned off from nature to prevent worsening states of forest, soil, and species loss. The book offers anthropologically informed alternatives for translating sustainability.
Charles Ramble
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195154146
- eISBN:
- 9780199868513
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195154146.003.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Buddhism
The original aim of the research that led to this book was to explore the confrontation between Buddhism and Himalayan “pagan” religion, based on the sacrificial cult of territorial gods. It was ...
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The original aim of the research that led to this book was to explore the confrontation between Buddhism and Himalayan “pagan” religion, based on the sacrificial cult of territorial gods. It was hypothesised that such a study might shed light on the interaction between Buddhism and indigenous religion in early Tibet. When this hypothesis was found to be misleadingly simple, the inquiry shifted to the way in which both Buddhism and pagan religion were just two components of a complex “civil religion,” revealed by the history of the community, its social institutions, and the dialectical relationship between the individual and the collective. The theoretical position adopted here is essentially a Durkheimian perspective as modified by authors such as Berger and Luckmann. A discussion of the concept of civil religion and the main literature on the subject is followed by an outline of the book's chapters.Less
The original aim of the research that led to this book was to explore the confrontation between Buddhism and Himalayan “pagan” religion, based on the sacrificial cult of territorial gods. It was hypothesised that such a study might shed light on the interaction between Buddhism and indigenous religion in early Tibet. When this hypothesis was found to be misleadingly simple, the inquiry shifted to the way in which both Buddhism and pagan religion were just two components of a complex “civil religion,” revealed by the history of the community, its social institutions, and the dialectical relationship between the individual and the collective. The theoretical position adopted here is essentially a Durkheimian perspective as modified by authors such as Berger and Luckmann. A discussion of the concept of civil religion and the main literature on the subject is followed by an outline of the book's chapters.
Brian Greenberg and Margaret E. Greene
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- April 2004
- ISBN:
- 9780199270576
- eISBN:
- 9780191600883
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199270570.003.0017
- Subject:
- Economics and Finance, History of Economic Thought
The global scale of anthropogenic environmental change now challenges demography to rethink its methodologies and tacit values to assess the ways that human populations determine the population ...
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The global scale of anthropogenic environmental change now challenges demography to rethink its methodologies and tacit values to assess the ways that human populations determine the population profiles and survival prospects for non‐human species and nature as a whole. Critically reviews the disciplinary basis for human‐centredness in the assessment of environmental change, and the ways this Malthusian intellectual legacy now constrains demography's ability to comment on pressing environmental issues. By demonstrating that social relationships do not stop at the boundaries of society but extend to the relationships people establish with non‐human nature, the chapter illustrates how more ecologically inclusive analytic categories can provide significant insight into environmental change in the Western Himalayas. Redefining the familiar demographic categories of ‘household’ and ‘community’ to more closely reflect local cultural understandings, the chapter links household composition to livestock ecology, and agricultural production to the history of environmental transformation in the Himalayan region. In suggesting less anthropocentric and Western culture‐centric demographic analysis, the chapter argues for models of human communities more precisely situated in their environmental contexts, and demonstrates a potentially powerful extension of demographic techniques in the explanation of landscape and environmental change.Less
The global scale of anthropogenic environmental change now challenges demography to rethink its methodologies and tacit values to assess the ways that human populations determine the population profiles and survival prospects for non‐human species and nature as a whole. Critically reviews the disciplinary basis for human‐centredness in the assessment of environmental change, and the ways this Malthusian intellectual legacy now constrains demography's ability to comment on pressing environmental issues. By demonstrating that social relationships do not stop at the boundaries of society but extend to the relationships people establish with non‐human nature, the chapter illustrates how more ecologically inclusive analytic categories can provide significant insight into environmental change in the Western Himalayas. Redefining the familiar demographic categories of ‘household’ and ‘community’ to more closely reflect local cultural understandings, the chapter links household composition to livestock ecology, and agricultural production to the history of environmental transformation in the Himalayan region. In suggesting less anthropocentric and Western culture‐centric demographic analysis, the chapter argues for models of human communities more precisely situated in their environmental contexts, and demonstrates a potentially powerful extension of demographic techniques in the explanation of landscape and environmental change.
Keila Diehl
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520230439
- eISBN:
- 9780520936003
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520230439.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
This book uses music to understand the experiences of Tibetans living in Dharamsala, a town in the Indian Himalayas that for more than forty years has been home to Tibet's government-in-exile. The ...
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This book uses music to understand the experiences of Tibetans living in Dharamsala, a town in the Indian Himalayas that for more than forty years has been home to Tibet's government-in-exile. The Dalai Lama's presence lends Dharamsala's Tibetans a feeling of being “in place”, but at the same time they have physically and psychologically constructed Dharamsala as “not Tibet”, as a temporary resting place to which many are unable or unwilling to become attached. Not surprisingly, this community struggles with notions of home, displacement, ethnic identity, and assimilation. This ethnography explores the contradictory realities of cultural homogenization, hybridity, and concern about ethnic purity as they are negotiated in the everyday lives of individuals. In this way, the book complicates explanations of culture change provided by the popular idea of “global flow”. This narrative argues that the exiles' focus on cultural preservation, while crucial, has contributed to the development of essentialist ideas of what is truly “Tibetan”. As a result, “foreign” or “modern” practices that have gained deep relevance for Tibetan refugees have been devalued. The book scrutinizes this tension in the discussion of the refugees' enthusiasm for songs from blockbuster Hindi films, the popularity of Western rock and roll among Tibetan youth, and the emergence of a new genre of modern Tibetan music. The insights presented here into the soundscape of Dharamsala is enriched by personal experiences as the keyboard player for a Tibetan refugee rock group called the Yak Band.Less
This book uses music to understand the experiences of Tibetans living in Dharamsala, a town in the Indian Himalayas that for more than forty years has been home to Tibet's government-in-exile. The Dalai Lama's presence lends Dharamsala's Tibetans a feeling of being “in place”, but at the same time they have physically and psychologically constructed Dharamsala as “not Tibet”, as a temporary resting place to which many are unable or unwilling to become attached. Not surprisingly, this community struggles with notions of home, displacement, ethnic identity, and assimilation. This ethnography explores the contradictory realities of cultural homogenization, hybridity, and concern about ethnic purity as they are negotiated in the everyday lives of individuals. In this way, the book complicates explanations of culture change provided by the popular idea of “global flow”. This narrative argues that the exiles' focus on cultural preservation, while crucial, has contributed to the development of essentialist ideas of what is truly “Tibetan”. As a result, “foreign” or “modern” practices that have gained deep relevance for Tibetan refugees have been devalued. The book scrutinizes this tension in the discussion of the refugees' enthusiasm for songs from blockbuster Hindi films, the popularity of Western rock and roll among Tibetan youth, and the emergence of a new genre of modern Tibetan music. The insights presented here into the soundscape of Dharamsala is enriched by personal experiences as the keyboard player for a Tibetan refugee rock group called the Yak Band.
Sulmaan Khan
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781469621104
- eISBN:
- 9781469623252
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469621104.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
In 1959, the Dalai Lama fled Lhasa, leaving the People's Republic of China with a crisis on its Tibetan frontier. This book tells the story of the PRC's response to that crisis and, in doing so, ...
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In 1959, the Dalai Lama fled Lhasa, leaving the People's Republic of China with a crisis on its Tibetan frontier. This book tells the story of the PRC's response to that crisis and, in doing so, brings to life an extraordinary cast of characters: Chinese diplomats appalled by sky burials, Guomindang spies working with Tibetans in Nepal, traders carrying salt across the Himalayas, and Tibetan Muslims rioting in Lhasa. Moving from capital cities to far-flung mountain villages, from top diplomats to nomads crossing disputed boundaries in search of pasture, this book shows Cold War China as it has never been seen before and reveals the deep influence of the Tibetan crisis on the political fabric of present-day China.Less
In 1959, the Dalai Lama fled Lhasa, leaving the People's Republic of China with a crisis on its Tibetan frontier. This book tells the story of the PRC's response to that crisis and, in doing so, brings to life an extraordinary cast of characters: Chinese diplomats appalled by sky burials, Guomindang spies working with Tibetans in Nepal, traders carrying salt across the Himalayas, and Tibetan Muslims rioting in Lhasa. Moving from capital cities to far-flung mountain villages, from top diplomats to nomads crossing disputed boundaries in search of pasture, this book shows Cold War China as it has never been seen before and reveals the deep influence of the Tibetan crisis on the political fabric of present-day China.
Stefan Fiol
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780252041204
- eISBN:
- 9780252099786
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5622/illinois/9780252041204.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
The concept of folk (or lok in North Indian languages) has become an essential part of public discourse in contemporary India that is used to mark social identity and an authentic relationship to ...
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The concept of folk (or lok in North Indian languages) has become an essential part of public discourse in contemporary India that is used to mark social identity and an authentic relationship to place. This musical ethnography explores the contours and consequences of the contemporary folk music boom in Uttarakhand while tracing the influences of colonial, nationalist, and post-colonial ideologies on current conceptualizations of folk music and on various approaches to “folklorizing” musical practice. Like the better-documented process of classicization, folklorization necessarily entails the silencing and purging of undesirable, polluting, low-status bodies and musical elements from particular performance traditions. Recasting Folk documents the ways in which reformers have sought to create value for folk traditions by turning to processes of codification, adaptation, and exclusion. The book also illuminates the lives of artists whose opportunities to succeed in the vernacular music industry have varied on the basis of their caste, class, and gender positions. By moving beyond the village to examine interconnected contexts of production in recording studios, state festivals, and literary texts, this text challenges long-entrenched understandings of the folk concept in South Asia.
Less
The concept of folk (or lok in North Indian languages) has become an essential part of public discourse in contemporary India that is used to mark social identity and an authentic relationship to place. This musical ethnography explores the contours and consequences of the contemporary folk music boom in Uttarakhand while tracing the influences of colonial, nationalist, and post-colonial ideologies on current conceptualizations of folk music and on various approaches to “folklorizing” musical practice. Like the better-documented process of classicization, folklorization necessarily entails the silencing and purging of undesirable, polluting, low-status bodies and musical elements from particular performance traditions. Recasting Folk documents the ways in which reformers have sought to create value for folk traditions by turning to processes of codification, adaptation, and exclusion. The book also illuminates the lives of artists whose opportunities to succeed in the vernacular music industry have varied on the basis of their caste, class, and gender positions. By moving beyond the village to examine interconnected contexts of production in recording studios, state festivals, and literary texts, this text challenges long-entrenched understandings of the folk concept in South Asia.
Bernard Debarbieux, Gilles Rudaz, and Martin F. Price
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780226031118
- eISBN:
- 9780226031255
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226031255.003.0007
- Subject:
- Earth Sciences and Geography, Cultural and Historical Geography
Chapter 6 focuses on the place of "mountains" in the colonial project. In the first place, the colonial power optimized its occupation and control of the territories it had claimed by identifying and ...
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Chapter 6 focuses on the place of "mountains" in the colonial project. In the first place, the colonial power optimized its occupation and control of the territories it had claimed by identifying and mapping all the landforms that served as natural ramparts and obstacles to free movement. Second, it circumscribed populations judged singular from the start, using the mountain environment as a social indicator and as a vehicle for naturalizing the peoples encountered there. The category of “the mountaineer” proved, once again, to be useful for this purpose, for qualifying both local people living in the mountains and mostly Western mountain climbers who were to promote oropolitics in the Himalayas, the Caucasus and the Andes.Less
Chapter 6 focuses on the place of "mountains" in the colonial project. In the first place, the colonial power optimized its occupation and control of the territories it had claimed by identifying and mapping all the landforms that served as natural ramparts and obstacles to free movement. Second, it circumscribed populations judged singular from the start, using the mountain environment as a social indicator and as a vehicle for naturalizing the peoples encountered there. The category of “the mountaineer” proved, once again, to be useful for this purpose, for qualifying both local people living in the mountains and mostly Western mountain climbers who were to promote oropolitics in the Himalayas, the Caucasus and the Andes.
Mark Elmore
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780520290532
- eISBN:
- 9780520964648
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520290532.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
Religion is often viewed as a universally ancient element of the human inheritance, but in the Western Himalayas the community of Himachal Pradesh discovered its religion only after India became an ...
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Religion is often viewed as a universally ancient element of the human inheritance, but in the Western Himalayas the community of Himachal Pradesh discovered its religion only after India became an independent secular state. Based on extensive ethnographic and archival work, this book tells the story of this discovery and how it transformed a community's relations to its past and to its members, as well as to those outside the community. And, as the book demonstrates, Himachali religion offers a unique opportunity to reimagine relations between religion and secularity. The book shows that modern secularity is not so much the eradication of religion as the very condition for its development. Showing us that to become a modern, ethical subject is to become religious, this book creatively augments our understanding of both religion and modernity.Less
Religion is often viewed as a universally ancient element of the human inheritance, but in the Western Himalayas the community of Himachal Pradesh discovered its religion only after India became an independent secular state. Based on extensive ethnographic and archival work, this book tells the story of this discovery and how it transformed a community's relations to its past and to its members, as well as to those outside the community. And, as the book demonstrates, Himachali religion offers a unique opportunity to reimagine relations between religion and secularity. The book shows that modern secularity is not so much the eradication of religion as the very condition for its development. Showing us that to become a modern, ethical subject is to become religious, this book creatively augments our understanding of both religion and modernity.
Kirin Narayan
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780226407425
- eISBN:
- 9780226407739
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226407739.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
This book's author's imagination was captured the very first time that, as a girl visiting the Himalayas, she heard Kangra women join their voices together in song. Returning as an anthropologist, ...
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This book's author's imagination was captured the very first time that, as a girl visiting the Himalayas, she heard Kangra women join their voices together in song. Returning as an anthropologist, she became fascinated by how they spoke of singing as a form of enrichment, bringing feelings of accomplishment, companionship, happiness, and even good health—all benefits of the “everyday creativity” are explored in this book. Part ethnography, part musical discovery, part poetry, part memoir, and part unforgettable portraits of creative individuals, this work brings this remote region in North India alive in sight and sound while celebrating the incredible powers of music in our lives. The text portrays Kangra songs about difficulties on the lives of goddesses and female saints as a path to well-being. Like the intricate geometries of mandalu patterns drawn in courtyards or the subtle balance of flavors in a meal, well-crafted songs offer a variety of deeply meaningful benefits: as a way of making something of value, as a means of establishing a community of shared pleasure and skill, as a path through hardships and limitations, and as an arena of renewed possibility.Less
This book's author's imagination was captured the very first time that, as a girl visiting the Himalayas, she heard Kangra women join their voices together in song. Returning as an anthropologist, she became fascinated by how they spoke of singing as a form of enrichment, bringing feelings of accomplishment, companionship, happiness, and even good health—all benefits of the “everyday creativity” are explored in this book. Part ethnography, part musical discovery, part poetry, part memoir, and part unforgettable portraits of creative individuals, this work brings this remote region in North India alive in sight and sound while celebrating the incredible powers of music in our lives. The text portrays Kangra songs about difficulties on the lives of goddesses and female saints as a path to well-being. Like the intricate geometries of mandalu patterns drawn in courtyards or the subtle balance of flavors in a meal, well-crafted songs offer a variety of deeply meaningful benefits: as a way of making something of value, as a means of establishing a community of shared pleasure and skill, as a path through hardships and limitations, and as an arena of renewed possibility.
Radhika Govindrajan
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780226559841
- eISBN:
- 9780226560045
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226560045.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
What does it mean to live a life that is knotted with other lives for better or worse? This ethnography of everyday multispecies relationships in the mountain villages of India’s Central Himalayan ...
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What does it mean to live a life that is knotted with other lives for better or worse? This ethnography of everyday multispecies relationships in the mountain villages of India’s Central Himalayan region traces how human pasts, presents, and futures come to be bound up with those of the many nonhuman animals who share this world with them, creating ties of relatedness between them that trouble the “naturalness” of categories such as human and animal, nature and culture, kinship and biology. This multispecies relatedness does not erase the differences and hierarchies that exist between different animals in the social world of the Central Himalayas, but leads individuals to constantly and carefully negotiate their difference from one another through shifting turns to love, care, neglect, avoidance, and violence. Questions of interspecies ethics and justice, the book argues, are not imagined as transcendental, but are situated in this complicated world of everyday relatedness across difference. The book traces how such everyday forms of relatedness are shaped by and engage the broader political, religious, and environmental currents at work in contemporary India. At a time when people’s relationships with animals have become the subject of strident political and cultural debate in India, this book demonstrates how through their everyday encounters, people and animals create intense knots of relatedness that complicate and enrich our understandings of the nature of mutuality, ethics, and love.Less
What does it mean to live a life that is knotted with other lives for better or worse? This ethnography of everyday multispecies relationships in the mountain villages of India’s Central Himalayan region traces how human pasts, presents, and futures come to be bound up with those of the many nonhuman animals who share this world with them, creating ties of relatedness between them that trouble the “naturalness” of categories such as human and animal, nature and culture, kinship and biology. This multispecies relatedness does not erase the differences and hierarchies that exist between different animals in the social world of the Central Himalayas, but leads individuals to constantly and carefully negotiate their difference from one another through shifting turns to love, care, neglect, avoidance, and violence. Questions of interspecies ethics and justice, the book argues, are not imagined as transcendental, but are situated in this complicated world of everyday relatedness across difference. The book traces how such everyday forms of relatedness are shaped by and engage the broader political, religious, and environmental currents at work in contemporary India. At a time when people’s relationships with animals have become the subject of strident political and cultural debate in India, this book demonstrates how through their everyday encounters, people and animals create intense knots of relatedness that complicate and enrich our understandings of the nature of mutuality, ethics, and love.
Alka Hingorani
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824835255
- eISBN:
- 9780824871345
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824835255.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
Taberam Soni, Labh Singh, Amar Singh, and other artists live and work in the hill-villages of the lower Himalayas in Himachal Pradesh, India. There they fashion face-images of deities (mohras) out of ...
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Taberam Soni, Labh Singh, Amar Singh, and other artists live and work in the hill-villages of the lower Himalayas in Himachal Pradesh, India. There they fashion face-images of deities (mohras) out of thin sheets of precious metal. Commissioned by upper-caste patrons, the objects are cultural embodiments of divine and earthly kinship. As the artists make the images, they also cross caste boundaries in a part of India where such differences still determine rules of contact and correspondence, proximity and association. Once a mohrahas been completed and consecrated, its maker is not permitted to touch it or enter the temple in which it is housed; yet during its creation the artist is sovereign, treated deferentially as he shares living quarters with the high-caste patrons. This book tells the story of these god-makers, the gods they make, and the communities that participate in the creative process and its accompanying rituals. For the author, the process of learning about Himachal, its art and artists, the people who make their home there, involved pursuing itinerant artists across difficult mountainous terrain with few, if any, means of communication between the thinly populated, high-altitude villages. The book evokes this world in rich visual and descriptive detail as it explores the ways in which both object and artisan are received and their identities transformed during a period of artistic endeavor.Less
Taberam Soni, Labh Singh, Amar Singh, and other artists live and work in the hill-villages of the lower Himalayas in Himachal Pradesh, India. There they fashion face-images of deities (mohras) out of thin sheets of precious metal. Commissioned by upper-caste patrons, the objects are cultural embodiments of divine and earthly kinship. As the artists make the images, they also cross caste boundaries in a part of India where such differences still determine rules of contact and correspondence, proximity and association. Once a mohrahas been completed and consecrated, its maker is not permitted to touch it or enter the temple in which it is housed; yet during its creation the artist is sovereign, treated deferentially as he shares living quarters with the high-caste patrons. This book tells the story of these god-makers, the gods they make, and the communities that participate in the creative process and its accompanying rituals. For the author, the process of learning about Himachal, its art and artists, the people who make their home there, involved pursuing itinerant artists across difficult mountainous terrain with few, if any, means of communication between the thinly populated, high-altitude villages. The book evokes this world in rich visual and descriptive detail as it explores the ways in which both object and artisan are received and their identities transformed during a period of artistic endeavor.
Jana Fortier
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833220
- eISBN:
- 9780824870089
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833220.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
In today's world hunter-gatherer societies struggle with seemingly insurmountable problems: deforestation and encroachment, language loss, political domination by surrounding communities. Will they ...
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In today's world hunter-gatherer societies struggle with seemingly insurmountable problems: deforestation and encroachment, language loss, political domination by surrounding communities. Will they manage to survive? This book is about one such society living in the monsoon rainforests of western Nepal: the Raute. It explores how this elusive ethnic group, the last hunter-gatherers of the Himalayas, maintains its traditional way of life amidst increasing pressure to assimilate. The book examines Raute social strategies of survival as they roam the lower Himalayas gathering wild yams and hunting monkeys. Hunting is part of a symbiotic relationship with local Hindu farmers, who find their livelihoods threatened by the monkeys' raids on their crops. Raute hunting helps the Hindus, who consider the monkeys sacred and are reluctant to kill the animals themselves. The book explores Raute beliefs about living in the forest and the central importance of foraging in their lives. The book discusses Raute identity formation, nomadism, trade relations, and religious beliefs, all of which turn on the foragers' belief in the moral goodness of their unique way of life. It concludes with a review of issues that have long been important to anthropologists—among them, biocultural diversity and the shift from an evolutionary focus on the ideal hunter-gatherer to an interest in hunter-gatherer diversity.Less
In today's world hunter-gatherer societies struggle with seemingly insurmountable problems: deforestation and encroachment, language loss, political domination by surrounding communities. Will they manage to survive? This book is about one such society living in the monsoon rainforests of western Nepal: the Raute. It explores how this elusive ethnic group, the last hunter-gatherers of the Himalayas, maintains its traditional way of life amidst increasing pressure to assimilate. The book examines Raute social strategies of survival as they roam the lower Himalayas gathering wild yams and hunting monkeys. Hunting is part of a symbiotic relationship with local Hindu farmers, who find their livelihoods threatened by the monkeys' raids on their crops. Raute hunting helps the Hindus, who consider the monkeys sacred and are reluctant to kill the animals themselves. The book explores Raute beliefs about living in the forest and the central importance of foraging in their lives. The book discusses Raute identity formation, nomadism, trade relations, and religious beliefs, all of which turn on the foragers' belief in the moral goodness of their unique way of life. It concludes with a review of issues that have long been important to anthropologists—among them, biocultural diversity and the shift from an evolutionary focus on the ideal hunter-gatherer to an interest in hunter-gatherer diversity.
R.S. Sharma
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- October 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780195687859
- eISBN:
- 9780199080366
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195687859.003.0004
- Subject:
- History, Ancient History / Archaeology
The Indian subcontinent emerged as a separate geographical unit. This subcontinent is divided into India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, and Pakistan. It is largely situated in the tropical zone. The ...
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The Indian subcontinent emerged as a separate geographical unit. This subcontinent is divided into India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, and Pakistan. It is largely situated in the tropical zone. The monsoon has played an important role in India’s history. India is bounded by the Himalayas on the north and seas on the other three sides. The Himalayas protect the country against the cold arctic winds blowing from Siberia through Central Asia. The heart of historical India is formed by its important rivers which are swollen by the tropical monsoon rains. In ancient times, despite the difficulties of communications, people moved from north to south, and vice versa. This led to a give and take in culture and language. The exploitation of the natural resources of India has an important bearing on its history. All kinds of stones, copper and iron ores are accessible in India.Less
The Indian subcontinent emerged as a separate geographical unit. This subcontinent is divided into India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, and Pakistan. It is largely situated in the tropical zone. The monsoon has played an important role in India’s history. India is bounded by the Himalayas on the north and seas on the other three sides. The Himalayas protect the country against the cold arctic winds blowing from Siberia through Central Asia. The heart of historical India is formed by its important rivers which are swollen by the tropical monsoon rains. In ancient times, despite the difficulties of communications, people moved from north to south, and vice versa. This led to a give and take in culture and language. The exploitation of the natural resources of India has an important bearing on its history. All kinds of stones, copper and iron ores are accessible in India.
Ben Campbell
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- September 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780198078524
- eISBN:
- 9780199082278
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198078524.003.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Culture
For most natural scientists the environment is indisputably both an independent reality, and a threatened domain in need of safeguarding by systems of national parks and protected areas. For ...
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For most natural scientists the environment is indisputably both an independent reality, and a threatened domain in need of safeguarding by systems of national parks and protected areas. For bureaucrats the environment is a natural capital asset to be managed and protected for the interests of national development. For people like the Tamang-speaking villagers, the local environment is a place in which livelihoods, identities, and relationships of power are actively made between people, other species, and presences not visible to the human eye. Yet, they do not know it as ‘an environment’. More socially inclusive approaches to environmental protection came from community forestry policies and participatory conservation. What difference does it make to look at contexts of environmental protection ethnographically, as compared to the array of concepts and assumptions about the environment, and human agency, interest, and knowledge that protection regimes are based on?Less
For most natural scientists the environment is indisputably both an independent reality, and a threatened domain in need of safeguarding by systems of national parks and protected areas. For bureaucrats the environment is a natural capital asset to be managed and protected for the interests of national development. For people like the Tamang-speaking villagers, the local environment is a place in which livelihoods, identities, and relationships of power are actively made between people, other species, and presences not visible to the human eye. Yet, they do not know it as ‘an environment’. More socially inclusive approaches to environmental protection came from community forestry policies and participatory conservation. What difference does it make to look at contexts of environmental protection ethnographically, as compared to the array of concepts and assumptions about the environment, and human agency, interest, and knowledge that protection regimes are based on?
Todd Lewis and Christoph Emmrich
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199860265
- eISBN:
- 9780199979929
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199860265.003.0015
- Subject:
- Religion, Buddhism
Before they reach puberty, girls from most Buddhist families of the Newar community in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal undergo a ritual called ihi, literally “wedding,” at the center of which stands ...
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Before they reach puberty, girls from most Buddhist families of the Newar community in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal undergo a ritual called ihi, literally “wedding,” at the center of which stands the liturgical handling of a citrus fruit. Both the religious identity of the fruit and the social, political, and doctrinal modalities, origins, and effects of the performance have produced a variety of ways to make sense of this ritual and illuminate how Buddhist Newars understand childhood in its preparation of and development toward ritual competence, social maturity, and political agency. Taking one singular late twentieth-century performance as its starting point, this chapter analyzes the ways Newar Buddhist practitioners, literati, and those who once as children were themselves at the center of the event weave a dense tapestry of myths, soteriologies, reformist agendas, and personal recollections in which the expectations of and toward the emerging woman are enmeshed with the hopes and projections of a renewed Buddhist life.Less
Before they reach puberty, girls from most Buddhist families of the Newar community in the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal undergo a ritual called ihi, literally “wedding,” at the center of which stands the liturgical handling of a citrus fruit. Both the religious identity of the fruit and the social, political, and doctrinal modalities, origins, and effects of the performance have produced a variety of ways to make sense of this ritual and illuminate how Buddhist Newars understand childhood in its preparation of and development toward ritual competence, social maturity, and political agency. Taking one singular late twentieth-century performance as its starting point, this chapter analyzes the ways Newar Buddhist practitioners, literati, and those who once as children were themselves at the center of the event weave a dense tapestry of myths, soteriologies, reformist agendas, and personal recollections in which the expectations of and toward the emerging woman are enmeshed with the hopes and projections of a renewed Buddhist life.
Nagraj Adve
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- December 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780199498734
- eISBN:
- 9780199098408
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780199498734.003.0004
- Subject:
- Political Science, Indian Politics
This chapter uses ethnographic and documentary material to provide glimpses of how people experience, talk about, and negotiate climate change and increased variability in different parts of India. ...
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This chapter uses ethnographic and documentary material to provide glimpses of how people experience, talk about, and negotiate climate change and increased variability in different parts of India. Using this approach, it aims to provide a qualitative narrative of some key, current impacts of global warming from below. What people say, combined with evidence from the scientific literature, increasingly indicates that its effects are already severely impacting ecosystems and lives, particularly the underclasses and others least responsible. Four key impacts are presented here: sea-level rise in the Sunderbans; shifts in the location of other species; effects across the Himalayan range; and the Uttarakhand disaster of 2013 in which several thousand people were killed. It is deeply concerning that these, and numerous other impacts currently experienced in different parts of India, are observed at 0.8°C of average warming. Much greater urgency in dealing with global warming is clearly warranted.Less
This chapter uses ethnographic and documentary material to provide glimpses of how people experience, talk about, and negotiate climate change and increased variability in different parts of India. Using this approach, it aims to provide a qualitative narrative of some key, current impacts of global warming from below. What people say, combined with evidence from the scientific literature, increasingly indicates that its effects are already severely impacting ecosystems and lives, particularly the underclasses and others least responsible. Four key impacts are presented here: sea-level rise in the Sunderbans; shifts in the location of other species; effects across the Himalayan range; and the Uttarakhand disaster of 2013 in which several thousand people were killed. It is deeply concerning that these, and numerous other impacts currently experienced in different parts of India, are observed at 0.8°C of average warming. Much greater urgency in dealing with global warming is clearly warranted.
Veena Srinivasan
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- December 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780199498734
- eISBN:
- 9780199098408
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780199498734.003.0027
- Subject:
- Political Science, Indian Politics
Climate change is likely to affect both the short-term variability of water resources through increased frequency and intensity of droughts and floods, and long-term changes in mean renewable water ...
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Climate change is likely to affect both the short-term variability of water resources through increased frequency and intensity of droughts and floods, and long-term changes in mean renewable water supply. Both models and historical data suggest that temperatures have increased in most parts of India, affecting the hydrologic cycle through decreased Himalayan snowpack, increased evaporation, and evapotranspirative demand by vegetation. In contrast, there are uncertainties about the climate–rainfall relationship. While most climate models predict intensification of the Indian monsoon, past rainfall trends suggest a weakening and a regional redistribution, perhaps due to local factors such as aerosols, land use change, and sea surface temperatures. Translating these uncertain projections to water availability is complicated by sparse hydrologic records and human modifications of catchments. Empirical research suggests that climate change is not the only stressor. As climate and socio-economic futures are interlinked, this requires participatory, adaptive management and mainstreaming of adaptation across agencies.Less
Climate change is likely to affect both the short-term variability of water resources through increased frequency and intensity of droughts and floods, and long-term changes in mean renewable water supply. Both models and historical data suggest that temperatures have increased in most parts of India, affecting the hydrologic cycle through decreased Himalayan snowpack, increased evaporation, and evapotranspirative demand by vegetation. In contrast, there are uncertainties about the climate–rainfall relationship. While most climate models predict intensification of the Indian monsoon, past rainfall trends suggest a weakening and a regional redistribution, perhaps due to local factors such as aerosols, land use change, and sea surface temperatures. Translating these uncertain projections to water availability is complicated by sparse hydrologic records and human modifications of catchments. Empirical research suggests that climate change is not the only stressor. As climate and socio-economic futures are interlinked, this requires participatory, adaptive management and mainstreaming of adaptation across agencies.
Roderick MacFarquhar
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780192149978
- eISBN:
- 9780191670084
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780192149978.003.0014
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines the impact of the war in the Himalayas and the crisis in the Caribbean region on the government policy of Chinese leader Mao Zedong. It suggests that the dual of Kang Sheng in ...
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This chapter examines the impact of the war in the Himalayas and the crisis in the Caribbean region on the government policy of Chinese leader Mao Zedong. It suggests that the dual of Kang Sheng in Mao's campaign against revisionism at home and abroad symbolized the close relationship between Chinese domestic and foreign policy. It contends that Mao considered the Chinese revolution to be part of a worldwide series of events, and that he was particularly concerned about the implications of Soviet revisionism for Chinese domestic politics.Less
This chapter examines the impact of the war in the Himalayas and the crisis in the Caribbean region on the government policy of Chinese leader Mao Zedong. It suggests that the dual of Kang Sheng in Mao's campaign against revisionism at home and abroad symbolized the close relationship between Chinese domestic and foreign policy. It contends that Mao considered the Chinese revolution to be part of a worldwide series of events, and that he was particularly concerned about the implications of Soviet revisionism for Chinese domestic politics.
