Francis X. Clooney
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- April 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780195170375
- eISBN:
- 9780199835379
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195170377.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
Analyzing six Hindu and Christian hymns, Clooney asks questions such as: How have Hindu theologians made room for a feminine divine alongside the masculine, and why? How has Christian thinking about ...
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Analyzing six Hindu and Christian hymns, Clooney asks questions such as: How have Hindu theologians made room for a feminine divine alongside the masculine, and why? How has Christian thinking about divine gender differed from Hindu thinking? What might contemporary feminists, including goddess worshippers and experts in the field of thealogy, learn from the goddess traditions of India? It begins by looking at three specific goddesses as they are presented and addressed in religiously and theologically rich hymns from the Sanskrit and Tamil traditions: Sri Laksmi, the eternal consort of Lord Visnu and life-giver to Him and all the world, praised in the Sri Guna Ratna Kosa (“Treasury of the Jewels That Are Sri’s Qualities”) by Parasara Bhattar (61 verses; 12th century); the great Goddess Devi, in whom the world and gods too exist and flourish, praised in the Saundarya Lahari (“Wave of Beauty”) attributed to Sankara (100 verses; c. 10th century or before); the lovely Tamil Goddess Apirami, who illumines the innermost mind and heart, praised in the Apirami Antati (“Linked Verses for Apirami [the Beautiful One]”) by Apirami Bhattar (100 verses; 18th century). Set alongside the Hindu hymns are three Marian hymns, the ancient Orthodox Christian Akathistos hymn to the Mother of God (6th century); the Stabat Mater, picturing Mary standing by the cross of her son (13th century); the Mataracamman Antati (“Linked Verses in Honor of the Queen among Women, the Goddess [of Mylapore]),” a Tamil hymn praising Mary as the (new and real) mother of Mylapore, a center of Hindu orthodoxy in south India (19th century). Clooney shows how Goddess traditions can be drawn into fruitful conversation with Christian tradition, taking a fresh look at the veneration and theology of Mary, the Mother of Jesus and Mother of God, as displayed in three famous Marian hymns from the Greek, Latin, and Tamil traditions. The further question thus arises, How might the study of Hindu goddesses affect Christian thinking about God and Mary? This is a book to read for its insights into the nature of gender and the divine, for the power of the hymns themselves, and for the sake of a religious adventure, an encounter with three Goddess traditions and Mary seen in a new light.Less
Analyzing six Hindu and Christian hymns, Clooney asks questions such as: How have Hindu theologians made room for a feminine divine alongside the masculine, and why? How has Christian thinking about divine gender differed from Hindu thinking? What might contemporary feminists, including goddess worshippers and experts in the field of thealogy, learn from the goddess traditions of India? It begins by looking at three specific goddesses as they are presented and addressed in religiously and theologically rich hymns from the Sanskrit and Tamil traditions: Sri Laksmi, the eternal consort of Lord Visnu and life-giver to Him and all the world, praised in the Sri Guna Ratna Kosa (“Treasury of the Jewels That Are Sri’s Qualities”) by Parasara Bhattar (61 verses; 12th century); the great Goddess Devi, in whom the world and gods too exist and flourish, praised in the Saundarya Lahari (“Wave of Beauty”) attributed to Sankara (100 verses; c. 10th century or before); the lovely Tamil Goddess Apirami, who illumines the innermost mind and heart, praised in the Apirami Antati (“Linked Verses for Apirami [the Beautiful One]”) by Apirami Bhattar (100 verses; 18th century). Set alongside the Hindu hymns are three Marian hymns, the ancient Orthodox Christian Akathistos hymn to the Mother of God (6th century); the Stabat Mater, picturing Mary standing by the cross of her son (13th century); the Mataracamman Antati (“Linked Verses in Honor of the Queen among Women, the Goddess [of Mylapore]),” a Tamil hymn praising Mary as the (new and real) mother of Mylapore, a center of Hindu orthodoxy in south India (19th century). Clooney shows how Goddess traditions can be drawn into fruitful conversation with Christian tradition, taking a fresh look at the veneration and theology of Mary, the Mother of Jesus and Mother of God, as displayed in three famous Marian hymns from the Greek, Latin, and Tamil traditions. The further question thus arises, How might the study of Hindu goddesses affect Christian thinking about God and Mary? This is a book to read for its insights into the nature of gender and the divine, for the power of the hymns themselves, and for the sake of a religious adventure, an encounter with three Goddess traditions and Mary seen in a new light.
Torkel Brekke
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- January 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780199252367
- eISBN:
- 9780191602047
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019925236X.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
This book presents three case studies on the construction and politics of religious identity in the Indian regions during the 19th century. It explores the leadership of three religions: the Hindus ...
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This book presents three case studies on the construction and politics of religious identity in the Indian regions during the 19th century. It explores the leadership of three religions: the Hindus of Bengal, the Buddhists of Sri Lanka, and the Svetambara Jains of western India. Part 1 presents a discussion on Hinduism and focuses on Swami Vivekananda. Part 2 presents a discussion on Buddhism and focuses on Anagarika Dharmapala. Part 3 presents a discussion on Jainism and the history, archaeology, and politics of religion.Less
This book presents three case studies on the construction and politics of religious identity in the Indian regions during the 19th century. It explores the leadership of three religions: the Hindus of Bengal, the Buddhists of Sri Lanka, and the Svetambara Jains of western India. Part 1 presents a discussion on Hinduism and focuses on Swami Vivekananda. Part 2 presents a discussion on Buddhism and focuses on Anagarika Dharmapala. Part 3 presents a discussion on Jainism and the history, archaeology, and politics of religion.
Diego Gambetta
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- January 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199276998
- eISBN:
- 9780191707735
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199276998.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics
This book attempts to shed light on suicide missions and provide answers to the questions we all ask. Are these the actions of aggressive religious zealots and unbridled, irrational radicals or is ...
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This book attempts to shed light on suicide missions and provide answers to the questions we all ask. Are these the actions of aggressive religious zealots and unbridled, irrational radicals or is there a logic driving those behind them? Are their motivations religious or has Islam provided a language to express essentially political causes? How can the perpetrators remain so lucidly effective in the face of certain death? And do these disparate attacks have something like a common cause? It focuses on four main instances: the Kamikaze, missions carried out by the Tamil Tigers in the civil war in Sri Lanka, the Lebanese and Palestinian groups in the Middle East, and the al-Qaeda 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. For more than two years, the authors have pursued an unprejudiced inquiry, investigating organizers and perpetrators alike of this extraordinary social phenomenon. Close comparisons between a whole range of cases raise challenging further questions: If suicide missions are so effective, why are they not more common? If killing is what matters, why not stick to ‘ordinary’ violent means? Or, if dying is what matters, why kill in the process?Less
This book attempts to shed light on suicide missions and provide answers to the questions we all ask. Are these the actions of aggressive religious zealots and unbridled, irrational radicals or is there a logic driving those behind them? Are their motivations religious or has Islam provided a language to express essentially political causes? How can the perpetrators remain so lucidly effective in the face of certain death? And do these disparate attacks have something like a common cause? It focuses on four main instances: the Kamikaze, missions carried out by the Tamil Tigers in the civil war in Sri Lanka, the Lebanese and Palestinian groups in the Middle East, and the al-Qaeda 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. For more than two years, the authors have pursued an unprejudiced inquiry, investigating organizers and perpetrators alike of this extraordinary social phenomenon. Close comparisons between a whole range of cases raise challenging further questions: If suicide missions are so effective, why are they not more common? If killing is what matters, why not stick to ‘ordinary’ violent means? Or, if dying is what matters, why kill in the process?
Stephen Hopgood
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- January 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199276998
- eISBN:
- 9780191707735
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199276998.003.0002
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) have been fighting a war for the national liberation of Tamils living in the north and east of Sri Lanka since the early 1970s. This chapter addresses a ...
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The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) have been fighting a war for the national liberation of Tamils living in the north and east of Sri Lanka since the early 1970s. This chapter addresses a series of questions concerning both organizational and individual motivations. Why were the Black Tigers formed? How and why have they been deployed? Why did the intensity of their use Xuctuate? Who becomes a Black Tiger? Why have they acquired such a powerful reputation? The first section gives a brief history of the conflict. The second looks at the Black Tigers in the context of the LTTE, the third at the Black Tigers as a unit, and the fourth at what little can be said about personal motivations. The chapter concludes with some conjectures about the Black Tigers at both the organizational and personal levels.Less
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) have been fighting a war for the national liberation of Tamils living in the north and east of Sri Lanka since the early 1970s. This chapter addresses a series of questions concerning both organizational and individual motivations. Why were the Black Tigers formed? How and why have they been deployed? Why did the intensity of their use Xuctuate? Who becomes a Black Tiger? Why have they acquired such a powerful reputation? The first section gives a brief history of the conflict. The second looks at the Black Tigers in the context of the LTTE, the third at the Black Tigers as a unit, and the fourth at what little can be said about personal motivations. The chapter concludes with some conjectures about the Black Tigers at both the organizational and personal levels.
Rohan Edrisinha
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780199277629
- eISBN:
- 9780191603303
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199277621.003.0011
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Theory
One of the biggest challenges facing Sri Lanka is managing relations between its two largest ethnic groups: the (predominantly Buddhist) Sinhalese majority, and the (predominantly Hindu) Ceylon Tamil ...
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One of the biggest challenges facing Sri Lanka is managing relations between its two largest ethnic groups: the (predominantly Buddhist) Sinhalese majority, and the (predominantly Hindu) Ceylon Tamil minority. The problem in Sri Lanka has been characterized as the strong commitment of the Sinhalese majority to the ideal of a unitary nation-state, and the equally strong commitment of the Tamil minority to the ideal of national self-determination. This chapter explores the factors that either promote or inhibit the acceptance of multination federalism, and how this ideal challenges some of the inherited ideals and discourses that have historically dominated Sri Lankan political life.Less
One of the biggest challenges facing Sri Lanka is managing relations between its two largest ethnic groups: the (predominantly Buddhist) Sinhalese majority, and the (predominantly Hindu) Ceylon Tamil minority. The problem in Sri Lanka has been characterized as the strong commitment of the Sinhalese majority to the ideal of a unitary nation-state, and the equally strong commitment of the Tamil minority to the ideal of national self-determination. This chapter explores the factors that either promote or inhibit the acceptance of multination federalism, and how this ideal challenges some of the inherited ideals and discourses that have historically dominated Sri Lankan political life.
Wolfgang‐Peter Zingel
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780199249589
- eISBN:
- 9780191600029
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019924958X.003.0031
- Subject:
- Political Science, Reference
Includes all relevant information on national elections and referendums held in Sri Lanka since its independence in 1947. Part I gives a comprehensive overview of Sri Lanka's political history, ...
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Includes all relevant information on national elections and referendums held in Sri Lanka since its independence in 1947. Part I gives a comprehensive overview of Sri Lanka's political history, outlines the evolution of electoral provisions, and presents the current electoral legislation in a standardized manner (suffrage, elected institutions, nomination of candidates, electoral system, organizational context of elections). Part II includes exhaustive electoral statistics in systematic tables (numbers of registered voters, votes cast, the votes for candidates and/or parties in parliamentary and presidential elections and referendums at both the national and constituency level, the electoral participation of political parties, the distribution of parliamentary seats, etc.).Less
Includes all relevant information on national elections and referendums held in Sri Lanka since its independence in 1947. Part I gives a comprehensive overview of Sri Lanka's political history, outlines the evolution of electoral provisions, and presents the current electoral legislation in a standardized manner (suffrage, elected institutions, nomination of candidates, electoral system, organizational context of elections). Part II includes exhaustive electoral statistics in systematic tables (numbers of registered voters, votes cast, the votes for candidates and/or parties in parliamentary and presidential elections and referendums at both the national and constituency level, the electoral participation of political parties, the distribution of parliamentary seats, etc.).
P. R. Kumaraswamy
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198295518
- eISBN:
- 9780191599217
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198295510.003.0009
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics
Looks at the different levels of change in the countries of South Asia (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka) since the end of the cold war, and attempts to determine how, and to ...
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Looks at the different levels of change in the countries of South Asia (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka) since the end of the cold war, and attempts to determine how, and to what extent, the end of the cold war has been a long‐term determinant in defining the region's foreign and domestic policies. The different sections of the chapter address: the security dimension (including consideration of the effect of Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan); democratization; and economic liberalization and regional cooperation.Less
Looks at the different levels of change in the countries of South Asia (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka) since the end of the cold war, and attempts to determine how, and to what extent, the end of the cold war has been a long‐term determinant in defining the region's foreign and domestic policies. The different sections of the chapter address: the security dimension (including consideration of the effect of Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan); democratization; and economic liberalization and regional cooperation.
Alexandra Barahona de Brito
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198280385
- eISBN:
- 9780191598852
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198280386.003.0002
- Subject:
- Political Science, Democratization
This is the first of two ‘stage-setting’ chapters in Part I of the book (Problems of Transitional Truth and Justice in Comparative Perspective, and Human Rights’ Violations under Military rule in ...
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This is the first of two ‘stage-setting’ chapters in Part I of the book (Problems of Transitional Truth and Justice in Comparative Perspective, and Human Rights’ Violations under Military rule in Uruguay and Chile). It places the Uruguayan and Chilean cases in a wider context by examining various experiences of truth and justice for past abuses in Latin America and elsewhere. After an introduction, the chapter has two main sections. The first, Truth and Justice in Transitional Periods: An Overview, looks at the cases of France, Germany and Japan at the end of World War II, the collapse of the Salazarismo in Portugal in 1974, the collapse of the Somocismo in Nicaragua in 1979, the collapses of the communist regimes of Eastern Europe (Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Poland, Romania), and the cases of the former Yugoslavia, Bolivia, Spain, the Philippines, Namibia, Uganda, Ethiopia, Sri Lanka, Rwanda, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Argentina, Greece, Paraguay, South Africa. The second section of the chapter, Semi-Restricted, Peaceful Transitions to Democratic Rule: The Cases of Uruguay and Chile, introduces democratization in Uruguay and Chile.Less
This is the first of two ‘stage-setting’ chapters in Part I of the book (Problems of Transitional Truth and Justice in Comparative Perspective, and Human Rights’ Violations under Military rule in Uruguay and Chile). It places the Uruguayan and Chilean cases in a wider context by examining various experiences of truth and justice for past abuses in Latin America and elsewhere. After an introduction, the chapter has two main sections. The first, Truth and Justice in Transitional Periods: An Overview, looks at the cases of France, Germany and Japan at the end of World War II, the collapse of the Salazarismo in Portugal in 1974, the collapse of the Somocismo in Nicaragua in 1979, the collapses of the communist regimes of Eastern Europe (Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Poland, Romania), and the cases of the former Yugoslavia, Bolivia, Spain, the Philippines, Namibia, Uganda, Ethiopia, Sri Lanka, Rwanda, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Argentina, Greece, Paraguay, South Africa. The second section of the chapter, Semi-Restricted, Peaceful Transitions to Democratic Rule: The Cases of Uruguay and Chile, introduces democratization in Uruguay and Chile.
Aditya Malik
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195150193
- eISBN:
- 9780199784653
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195150198.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
This chapter examines the related discourses on time and history that the narrative deals with. The materials for this are primarily provided by the oral telling of the narrative, recited by Śri ...
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This chapter examines the related discourses on time and history that the narrative deals with. The materials for this are primarily provided by the oral telling of the narrative, recited by Śri Hukamārām Bhopā, along with the opening passages of a recently printed version of the narrative, told by another singer, Śri Anandārām. In addition, there is also a reference to a shorter orally told story that, like the printed text, also deals with the “origins” of Devnārāyan's main devotees, the Gujars.Less
This chapter examines the related discourses on time and history that the narrative deals with. The materials for this are primarily provided by the oral telling of the narrative, recited by Śri Hukamārām Bhopā, along with the opening passages of a recently printed version of the narrative, told by another singer, Śri Anandārām. In addition, there is also a reference to a shorter orally told story that, like the printed text, also deals with the “origins” of Devnārāyan's main devotees, the Gujars.
Vasudha Narayanan
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195145380
- eISBN:
- 9780199849963
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195145380.003.0007
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
This chapter discusses the lives and messages of two popular female gurus, Ma Jaya Sati Bhagavati and Karunamayi Ma, who is also known as Sri Sri Sri Vijayes Wari Devi. They are both portrayed as ...
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This chapter discusses the lives and messages of two popular female gurus, Ma Jaya Sati Bhagavati and Karunamayi Ma, who is also known as Sri Sri Sri Vijayes Wari Devi. They are both portrayed as deriving their teaching from Hindu sources but being ecletic in their teaching. Kali is predominant in Ma Jaya's worship but she also worships other Hindu deities and it is important to note that her first vision was that of Christ. Karunamayi Ma speaks constantly about the equality of religions. She does not frequently evoke the names of Christ or Mary in her talks like Ma Jaya, but is forthright about her view of other religions.Less
This chapter discusses the lives and messages of two popular female gurus, Ma Jaya Sati Bhagavati and Karunamayi Ma, who is also known as Sri Sri Sri Vijayes Wari Devi. They are both portrayed as deriving their teaching from Hindu sources but being ecletic in their teaching. Kali is predominant in Ma Jaya's worship but she also worships other Hindu deities and it is important to note that her first vision was that of Christ. Karunamayi Ma speaks constantly about the equality of religions. She does not frequently evoke the names of Christ or Mary in her talks like Ma Jaya, but is forthright about her view of other religions.
Nicholas P. Money
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195189711
- eISBN:
- 9780199790265
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195189711.003.0003
- Subject:
- Biology, Microbiology
This chapter describes the history and continuing impact of the rust fungus, Hemileia vastatrix, on coffee crops. In the 19th century, this pathogen wiped-out coffee crops in Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and ...
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This chapter describes the history and continuing impact of the rust fungus, Hemileia vastatrix, on coffee crops. In the 19th century, this pathogen wiped-out coffee crops in Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and transformed the country into a tea-producing island. The scientist Harry Marshall Ward played a key role in the story of coffee rust, and was posted to Ceylon in 1880 to identify the cause of the epidemic. Coffee rust remains an exceedingly important agricultural problem in the developing world. A diversity of stories about the biology and sociology of this fungal disease of international importance is presented.Less
This chapter describes the history and continuing impact of the rust fungus, Hemileia vastatrix, on coffee crops. In the 19th century, this pathogen wiped-out coffee crops in Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and transformed the country into a tea-producing island. The scientist Harry Marshall Ward played a key role in the story of coffee rust, and was posted to Ceylon in 1880 to identify the cause of the epidemic. Coffee rust remains an exceedingly important agricultural problem in the developing world. A diversity of stories about the biology and sociology of this fungal disease of international importance is presented.
Kristin Scheible
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780231171380
- eISBN:
- 9780231542609
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231171380.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Buddhism
Vamsa is a dynamic genre of Buddhist history filled with otherworldly characters and the exploits of real-life heroes. These narratives collapse the temporal distance between Buddha and the reader, ...
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Vamsa is a dynamic genre of Buddhist history filled with otherworldly characters and the exploits of real-life heroes. These narratives collapse the temporal distance between Buddha and the reader, building an emotionally resonant connection with an outsized religious figure and a longed-for past. The fifth-century Pali text Mahāvamsa is a particularly effective example, using metaphor and other rhetorical devices to ethically transform readers, to stimulate and then to calm them.
Reading the Mahāvamsa advocates a new, literary approach to this text by revealing its embedded reading advice (to experience samvega and pasada) and affective work of metaphors (the Buddha's dharma as light) and salient characters (nagas). Kristin Scheible argues that the Mahāvamsa requires a particular kind of reading. In the text’s proem, special instructions draw readers to the metaphor of light and the nagas, or salient snake-beings, of the first chapter. Nagas are both model worshippers and unworthy hoarders of Buddha’s relics. As nonhuman agents, they challenge political and historicist readings of the text. Scheible sees these slippery characters and the narrative’s potent and playful metaphors as techniques for refocusing the reader’s attention on the text’s emotional aims. Her work explains the Mahāvamsa’s central motivational role in contemporary Sri Lankan Buddhist and nationalist circles. It also speaks broadly to strategies of reading religious texts and to the internal and external cues that give such works lives beyond the page.Less
Vamsa is a dynamic genre of Buddhist history filled with otherworldly characters and the exploits of real-life heroes. These narratives collapse the temporal distance between Buddha and the reader, building an emotionally resonant connection with an outsized religious figure and a longed-for past. The fifth-century Pali text Mahāvamsa is a particularly effective example, using metaphor and other rhetorical devices to ethically transform readers, to stimulate and then to calm them.
Reading the Mahāvamsa advocates a new, literary approach to this text by revealing its embedded reading advice (to experience samvega and pasada) and affective work of metaphors (the Buddha's dharma as light) and salient characters (nagas). Kristin Scheible argues that the Mahāvamsa requires a particular kind of reading. In the text’s proem, special instructions draw readers to the metaphor of light and the nagas, or salient snake-beings, of the first chapter. Nagas are both model worshippers and unworthy hoarders of Buddha’s relics. As nonhuman agents, they challenge political and historicist readings of the text. Scheible sees these slippery characters and the narrative’s potent and playful metaphors as techniques for refocusing the reader’s attention on the text’s emotional aims. Her work explains the Mahāvamsa’s central motivational role in contemporary Sri Lankan Buddhist and nationalist circles. It also speaks broadly to strategies of reading religious texts and to the internal and external cues that give such works lives beyond the page.
Josephine Khu
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520223400
- eISBN:
- 9780520924918
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520223400.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This is an anthology of autobiographical essays of the Chinese diaspora. Written by ethnic Chinese who were born or raised outside of China, these pieces, full of the details of everyday life, ...
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This is an anthology of autobiographical essays of the Chinese diaspora. Written by ethnic Chinese who were born or raised outside of China, these pieces, full of the details of everyday life, describe the experience of growing up as a visible minority and the subsequent journey each author made to China. The authors—whose diverse backgrounds in countries such as New Zealand, Denmark, Sri Lanka, England, Indonesia, and the United States mirror the complex global scope of the Chinese diaspora—describe in particular how their journey to the country of their ancestors transformed their sense of what it means to be Chinese. The collection as a whole provides important insights into what ethnic identity has come to mean in our transnational era. Among the pieces is Brad Wong's discussion of his visit to his grandfather's poverty-stricken village in China's southern Guangdong province. Wong describes working with a few of the peasants tilling vegetables and compares life in the village with his middle-class upbringing in a San Francisco suburb. In another essay, Milan Lin-Rodrigo tells of her life in Sri Lanka and of the trip she made to China as an adult. She describes the difficult and sometimes humorous cultural differences she experienced when she met her Chinese half-sister and her father's first wife. Josephine Khu's afterword provides background information on the Chinese diaspora and gives a theoretical framework for understanding the issues raised in the essays.Less
This is an anthology of autobiographical essays of the Chinese diaspora. Written by ethnic Chinese who were born or raised outside of China, these pieces, full of the details of everyday life, describe the experience of growing up as a visible minority and the subsequent journey each author made to China. The authors—whose diverse backgrounds in countries such as New Zealand, Denmark, Sri Lanka, England, Indonesia, and the United States mirror the complex global scope of the Chinese diaspora—describe in particular how their journey to the country of their ancestors transformed their sense of what it means to be Chinese. The collection as a whole provides important insights into what ethnic identity has come to mean in our transnational era. Among the pieces is Brad Wong's discussion of his visit to his grandfather's poverty-stricken village in China's southern Guangdong province. Wong describes working with a few of the peasants tilling vegetables and compares life in the village with his middle-class upbringing in a San Francisco suburb. In another essay, Milan Lin-Rodrigo tells of her life in Sri Lanka and of the trip she made to China as an adult. She describes the difficult and sometimes humorous cultural differences she experienced when she met her Chinese half-sister and her father's first wife. Josephine Khu's afterword provides background information on the Chinese diaspora and gives a theoretical framework for understanding the issues raised in the essays.
Sujit Sivasundaram
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780197265413
- eISBN:
- 9780191760464
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197265413.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, World Modern History
This chapter studies a particular moment in the emergence of the idea of the ‘native’ in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. By considering the role played by Pacific islanders, ...
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This chapter studies a particular moment in the emergence of the idea of the ‘native’ in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. By considering the role played by Pacific islanders, Asians, and Africans in defining territorial identities, bonds of attachment to rulers, and patterns of settlement prior to contact with colonists, it argues that the ‘native’ emerged partly out of extant traditions. The British empire recontextualized mutating extant senses of culture in global maps of heritage and thus minted a new sense of the ‘native’. Throughout this process, what appears is not an unproblematic concept of the ‘native’ or ‘indigenous’, but a notion of how claims of a separate heritage arose in contexts of hybridity and creolization.Less
This chapter studies a particular moment in the emergence of the idea of the ‘native’ in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. By considering the role played by Pacific islanders, Asians, and Africans in defining territorial identities, bonds of attachment to rulers, and patterns of settlement prior to contact with colonists, it argues that the ‘native’ emerged partly out of extant traditions. The British empire recontextualized mutating extant senses of culture in global maps of heritage and thus minted a new sense of the ‘native’. Throughout this process, what appears is not an unproblematic concept of the ‘native’ or ‘indigenous’, but a notion of how claims of a separate heritage arose in contexts of hybridity and creolization.
Jean Drèze and Amartya Sen
- Published in print:
- 1991
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198283652
- eISBN:
- 9780191596193
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198283652.003.0012
- Subject:
- Economics and Finance, Development, Growth, and Environmental
The strategy of support‐led security is examined, reflected in the experiences of some selected countries, in particular, Sri Lanka, Chile, and Costa Rica. This strategy is distinguished by the use ...
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The strategy of support‐led security is examined, reflected in the experiences of some selected countries, in particular, Sri Lanka, Chile, and Costa Rica. This strategy is distinguished by the use of public support (such as public health services, educational facilities, food subsides) to raise the standard of living without waiting for the country in question to achieve prosperity through sustained economic growth.Less
The strategy of support‐led security is examined, reflected in the experiences of some selected countries, in particular, Sri Lanka, Chile, and Costa Rica. This strategy is distinguished by the use of public support (such as public health services, educational facilities, food subsides) to raise the standard of living without waiting for the country in question to achieve prosperity through sustained economic growth.
Paul Younger
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195140446
- eISBN:
- 9780199834907
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195140443.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
In the South Indian religious tradition, there are grand ten‐day festivals held each year in the streets around the temples, mosques, and churches. This tradition is found not only inTamil Nadu and ...
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In the South Indian religious tradition, there are grand ten‐day festivals held each year in the streets around the temples, mosques, and churches. This tradition is found not only inTamil Nadu and Kerala but also in Sri Lanka and in a variety of diaspora settings as well. These festivities remind one in certain ways of the earthy, lower class ”carnival” activities of medieval Europe, around which the Soviet scholar, M.M. Bakhtin, built some of his theories, except that the South Indian festivals are intensely religious and still very popular. Festivals that go back to ancient times often reflect issues in hunting tribal society, those dating from the medieval period reflect the concerns of complex agricultural societies (with landlords, kings, and priests, prominent), and others that started more recently are concerned with dealing with specific changes in the immediate social setting.Most of the festivals are held near Hindu temples and involve the worship of a number of deities. Many center on the worship of a particular Goddess, or a Goddess linked to either Visnu or Sivan (Siva) in some interesting way. Subplots about Muslim saints or warriors are commonly woven into the celebration, and a few of the most prominent festivals center on Buddhist or Christian figures, even though the patterns of worship are very similar to the more Hindu‐oriented festivals.Festivals with ancient roots usually include dramatic ascetic practices such as “fire walking”, where practitioners walk across beds of burning coals, and “hook swinging”, where a person is swung from a scaffold by ropes attached to a hook in the flesh of his back. In Goddess festivals, many worshipers go into a trance and become possessed by the Goddess so that they are enabled to perform healings and exorcisms for others. Animal sacrifice was also central to traditional Goddess festivals, but it is now discouraged in India and is found primarily in diaspora settings where South Indians went as indentured laborers in the nineteenth century.The crowds for the best‐known festivals can be in the hundreds of thousands, but whatever the size, the community that attends the festival considers itself a sanctified version of its everyday self, and it takes great delight in “playing host” to its favorite deities. This rich religious tradition seems to have roots in the earliest periods of South Indian history, but it is still a vibrant religious form that South Indians seem to be using with new enthusiasm as they face the social changes of the present generation.Less
In the South Indian religious tradition, there are grand ten‐day festivals held each year in the streets around the temples, mosques, and churches. This tradition is found not only inTamil Nadu and Kerala but also in Sri Lanka and in a variety of diaspora settings as well. These festivities remind one in certain ways of the earthy, lower class ”carnival” activities of medieval Europe, around which the Soviet scholar, M.M. Bakhtin, built some of his theories, except that the South Indian festivals are intensely religious and still very popular. Festivals that go back to ancient times often reflect issues in hunting tribal society, those dating from the medieval period reflect the concerns of complex agricultural societies (with landlords, kings, and priests, prominent), and others that started more recently are concerned with dealing with specific changes in the immediate social setting.
Most of the festivals are held near Hindu temples and involve the worship of a number of deities. Many center on the worship of a particular Goddess, or a Goddess linked to either Visnu or Sivan (Siva) in some interesting way. Subplots about Muslim saints or warriors are commonly woven into the celebration, and a few of the most prominent festivals center on Buddhist or Christian figures, even though the patterns of worship are very similar to the more Hindu‐oriented festivals.
Festivals with ancient roots usually include dramatic ascetic practices such as “fire walking”, where practitioners walk across beds of burning coals, and “hook swinging”, where a person is swung from a scaffold by ropes attached to a hook in the flesh of his back. In Goddess festivals, many worshipers go into a trance and become possessed by the Goddess so that they are enabled to perform healings and exorcisms for others. Animal sacrifice was also central to traditional Goddess festivals, but it is now discouraged in India and is found primarily in diaspora settings where South Indians went as indentured laborers in the nineteenth century.
The crowds for the best‐known festivals can be in the hundreds of thousands, but whatever the size, the community that attends the festival considers itself a sanctified version of its everyday self, and it takes great delight in “playing host” to its favorite deities. This rich religious tradition seems to have roots in the earliest periods of South Indian history, but it is still a vibrant religious form that South Indians seem to be using with new enthusiasm as they face the social changes of the present generation.
Corinne G. Dempsey
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195187298
- eISBN:
- 9780199784547
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195187296.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
This book is a portrayal of a flourishing Hindu temple in the town of Rush, New York, dedicated to the great south Indian goddess Rājarājeśwarī. Guided by an exuberant Sri Lankan guru known as Aiya, ...
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This book is a portrayal of a flourishing Hindu temple in the town of Rush, New York, dedicated to the great south Indian goddess Rājarājeśwarī. Guided by an exuberant Sri Lankan guru known as Aiya, temple practitioners embrace yet definitively break with tradition. Known for its ritual precision and extravagance, the temple and its guru defy convention by training and encouraging non-brahmans and women to publicly perform priestly roles, and by teaching the secrets of Śrīvidyā, a highly exclusive Tantric tradition. Weaving together traditional South Asian tales, temple miracle accounts, and devotional testimonials, the book is organized into three parts reflecting various intersecting worldviews, traditions, and landscapes with which temple practices and participants contend. The book’s first part explores the temple’s emphasis on ritual performance and potency, and the resulting collisions between miraculous and mundane worldviews as experienced and understood by Aiya, temple participants, and the ethnographer-author. Part two explores how Aiya and his students deftly balance convention with non-convention, breaking rules of orthodoxy that make room for leadership and learning, and providing possibilities otherwise unavailable in traditional temple settings. Part three explores the diaspora condition as experienced within the Rush temple context. It chronicles the joys and challenges of negotiating domestic and foreign traditions, and the effects this has on human and divine participants, temple rituals, and the temple terrain itself. In sum, the book argues that in a setting where science illuminates the sacred, where traditional religious practices allow for breaking with the same, and where foreign terrain becomes home turf, the Goddess not only lives, she thrives.Less
This book is a portrayal of a flourishing Hindu temple in the town of Rush, New York, dedicated to the great south Indian goddess Rājarājeśwarī. Guided by an exuberant Sri Lankan guru known as Aiya, temple practitioners embrace yet definitively break with tradition. Known for its ritual precision and extravagance, the temple and its guru defy convention by training and encouraging non-brahmans and women to publicly perform priestly roles, and by teaching the secrets of Śrīvidyā, a highly exclusive Tantric tradition. Weaving together traditional South Asian tales, temple miracle accounts, and devotional testimonials, the book is organized into three parts reflecting various intersecting worldviews, traditions, and landscapes with which temple practices and participants contend. The book’s first part explores the temple’s emphasis on ritual performance and potency, and the resulting collisions between miraculous and mundane worldviews as experienced and understood by Aiya, temple participants, and the ethnographer-author. Part two explores how Aiya and his students deftly balance convention with non-convention, breaking rules of orthodoxy that make room for leadership and learning, and providing possibilities otherwise unavailable in traditional temple settings. Part three explores the diaspora condition as experienced within the Rush temple context. It chronicles the joys and challenges of negotiating domestic and foreign traditions, and the effects this has on human and divine participants, temple rituals, and the temple terrain itself. In sum, the book argues that in a setting where science illuminates the sacred, where traditional religious practices allow for breaking with the same, and where foreign terrain becomes home turf, the Goddess not only lives, she thrives.
Anne E. Monius
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195139990
- eISBN:
- 9780199834501
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195139992.003.0004
- Subject:
- Religion, Buddhism
The community of Buddhists imagined within the narrative world of the Maṇimēkalai itself is considered – a community whose locus is not the geographical region of Tamil‐speaking southern India in the ...
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The community of Buddhists imagined within the narrative world of the Maṇimēkalai itself is considered – a community whose locus is not the geographical region of Tamil‐speaking southern India in the narrative present, as might be expected, but rather that of all India and the far‐flung reaches of South‐east Asia in the era of the future Buddha's earthly birth. Focusing on the central role played by the begging bowl that never empties if used in service to the poor, it is argued that the bowl itself signals the coming of the future Buddha and embodies those moral values that will enable the Maṇimēkalai's audience to participate in that glorious community to come. Attention to the central locations of the narrative similarly reveals the text's expansive vision of Buddhist community that involves not only the subcontinent but also an island kingdom somewhere in South‐east Asia. Through reference to other Buddhist literature of this early medieval period, it is argued that the Maṇimēkalai participates in larger Asian patterns of redrawing the Buddhist world, relocating its centers away from the cities of northern India associated with Gautama Buddha and toward new foci of Buddhist activity in South India, Sri Lanka, China, and South‐east Asia.Less
The community of Buddhists imagined within the narrative world of the Maṇimēkalai itself is considered – a community whose locus is not the geographical region of Tamil‐speaking southern India in the narrative present, as might be expected, but rather that of all India and the far‐flung reaches of South‐east Asia in the era of the future Buddha's earthly birth. Focusing on the central role played by the begging bowl that never empties if used in service to the poor, it is argued that the bowl itself signals the coming of the future Buddha and embodies those moral values that will enable the Maṇimēkalai's audience to participate in that glorious community to come. Attention to the central locations of the narrative similarly reveals the text's expansive vision of Buddhist community that involves not only the subcontinent but also an island kingdom somewhere in South‐east Asia. Through reference to other Buddhist literature of this early medieval period, it is argued that the Maṇimēkalai participates in larger Asian patterns of redrawing the Buddhist world, relocating its centers away from the cities of northern India associated with Gautama Buddha and toward new foci of Buddhist activity in South India, Sri Lanka, China, and South‐east Asia.
Susan A. Reed
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195331370
- eISBN:
- 9780199868087
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195331370.003.0002
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
Women and girl dancers are ubiquitous in Sri Lanka, performing in a variety of sites, from school concerts and government ceremonials to religious processions and Buddhist temples. This chapter ...
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Women and girl dancers are ubiquitous in Sri Lanka, performing in a variety of sites, from school concerts and government ceremonials to religious processions and Buddhist temples. This chapter examines how the ideal of Sinhala feminine respectability, which emphasizes modesty and domesticity, has shaped women's Kandyan dance practices. Because Kandyan dance derives from the Kohomba kankariya, an all-male religious ritual, dancers and choreographers have been challenged to feminize the dance while retaining its aesthetic integrity. In the process, transmission practices and the aesthetic concepts of lasya and tandava, employed throughout South Asia, have been altered and redefined. The chapter concludes by exploring new directions in women and girls' dancing, such as the sexualization of dance, and the use of dance for fitness and the marriage market.Less
Women and girl dancers are ubiquitous in Sri Lanka, performing in a variety of sites, from school concerts and government ceremonials to religious processions and Buddhist temples. This chapter examines how the ideal of Sinhala feminine respectability, which emphasizes modesty and domesticity, has shaped women's Kandyan dance practices. Because Kandyan dance derives from the Kohomba kankariya, an all-male religious ritual, dancers and choreographers have been challenged to feminize the dance while retaining its aesthetic integrity. In the process, transmission practices and the aesthetic concepts of lasya and tandava, employed throughout South Asia, have been altered and redefined. The chapter concludes by exploring new directions in women and girls' dancing, such as the sexualization of dance, and the use of dance for fitness and the marriage market.
Paul Younger
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195140446
- eISBN:
- 9780199834907
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195140443.003.0015
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
A second wave in the Hindu diaspora occurred in the second half of the twentieth century when individual professionals and others settled in Europe and North America and began to build very elaborate ...
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A second wave in the Hindu diaspora occurred in the second half of the twentieth century when individual professionals and others settled in Europe and North America and began to build very elaborate temples. One of the most elaborate of these temples is the Ganesh Temple of Toronto, which was built on a model laid out by the Sankaracarya of Kancipuram with separate shrines for different Vaisnava and Saiva deities within one building. The temple management has tried to emulate exactly the Indian celebration of the Vision of Grace festival for Sivan Natarajan in the month of Markali. The celebration is an elegant bath or abhiseka and includes an otuvar singer adopting the persona of the saint Manikkavacakar so that he can sing the hymns to Sivan Natarajan. While in India the tuvar singers are boys who learn from childhood and virtually all come from one caste, in Sri Lanka, where most of the Canadian worshipers are from, women are often the best‐trained singers. In the end, the Toronto festival was a compromise with an elderly male tuvar perfoming the ritual and a Sri Lankan lady doing most of the singing.Less
A second wave in the Hindu diaspora occurred in the second half of the twentieth century when individual professionals and others settled in Europe and North America and began to build very elaborate temples. One of the most elaborate of these temples is the Ganesh Temple of Toronto, which was built on a model laid out by the Sankaracarya of Kancipuram with separate shrines for different Vaisnava and Saiva deities within one building. The temple management has tried to emulate exactly the Indian celebration of the Vision of Grace festival for Sivan Natarajan in the month of Markali. The celebration is an elegant bath or abhiseka and includes an otuvar singer adopting the persona of the saint Manikkavacakar so that he can sing the hymns to Sivan Natarajan. While in India the tuvar singers are boys who learn from childhood and virtually all come from one caste, in Sri Lanka, where most of the Canadian worshipers are from, women are often the best‐trained singers. In the end, the Toronto festival was a compromise with an elderly male tuvar perfoming the ritual and a Sri Lankan lady doing most of the singing.
