The Netra Tantra is an important text that gained prominence in the early medieval (post-Gupta) period. These readings will focus on chapter seven, the sukṣma-dhyāna, using the oldest surviving manuscript from Nepal and making reference to the KSTS edition.
Archives: Lectures
Readings in Phenomenology: Week Six (TT19)
This term we will be reading Thiemo Breyer’s On the Topology of Cultural Memory: Different Modalities of Inscription and Transmission (Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2007).
In the wake of the large literature now developed on memory and particularly cultural memory, this book creates a topology of cultural memory, linking anthropological work with phenomenological reflection. Breyer looks at cultural memory, memory as occupying an inter-personal realm, memory in oral and literate cultures, and the philosophical implications of empirical study. I can photocopy relevant chapters.
Readings in Vedānta: Rāmānuja’s Vedārtha-saṅgraha: Week Seven (TT19)
These reading sessions are intended for students who have an intermediate knowledge of Sanskrit and are interested in Vedānta texts. This term we will be reading the Vedārtha-saṅgraha (“A Summary of the Meaning of the Veda”) of Rāmānuja, the most influential teacher of Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta. The Vedārtha-saṅgraha functions as an accessible introduction to his thought.
The Rise and Fall of a Monastic Network in Colonial Bengal (TT19)
Combining textual analysis and site-specific field study, this paper explores the extension into southwestern Bengal of the Dasnami Sampraday in the early 17th century, mapping the emplacement of a network of satellite monastic sites in relation to a new principal “seat” (gaddi) at Tarakeshwar, and charting the rapid deterioration of these sites beginning in the late colonial period.
Brian A. Hatcher is Professor and Packard Chair of Theology at Tufts University. His research focuses on religious and intellectual transformations in colonial and contemporary South Asia, with a special interest in early colonial Bengal. His publications explore issues of vernacular modernity, translation, the life histories of Sanskrit scholars under colonialism, and the modalities of religious eclecticism and scriptural reform among a wide range of Calcutta-based intellectuals. His most recent book-length project, Religion before India, is a comparison of the emergence of the Swaminanarayan Sampraday in Gujarat and the Brahmo Samaj in Bengal as two religious polities that come to be scripted in terms of an emergent “empire of reform” after the 1830s. At present, he is conducting research toward a new book entitled Mapping a Monastic Mandala, which explores the networking and emplacement of Shaiva monastic complexes in southwestern Bengal from the eighteenth to the twentieth century under the leadership of the Dasnami Sampraday.
Readings in the Netra Tantra: Week Seven (TT19)
The Netra Tantra is an important text that gained prominence in the early medieval (post-Gupta) period. These readings will focus on chapter seven, the sukṣma-dhyāna, using the oldest surviving manuscript from Nepal and making reference to the KSTS edition.
Readings in Phenomenology: Week Seven (TT19)
This term we will be reading Thiemo Breyer’s On the Topology of Cultural Memory: Different Modalities of Inscription and Transmission (Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2007).
In the wake of the large literature now developed on memory and particularly cultural memory, this book creates a topology of cultural memory, linking anthropological work with phenomenological reflection. Breyer looks at cultural memory, memory as occupying an inter-personal realm, memory in oral and literate cultures, and the philosophical implications of empirical study. I can photocopy relevant chapters.
Śākta Traditions Symposium III (TT19)
Hinduism cannot be understood without the Goddess (Devī/Śakti) and the goddess-oriented Śākta traditions. The Goddess pervades Hinduism at all levels, from aniconic village deities to high-caste pan-Hindu goddesses to esoteric, tantric goddesses. Nevertheless, these highly influential forms of South Asian religion have only recently begun to draw a more broad scholarly attention. Taken together, they form ‘Śāktism’, which is by many considered one of the major branches of Hinduism next to Śaivism and Vaiṣṇavism. Śāktism is, however, less clearly defined than the other major branches and sometimes surprisingly difficult to discern from Śaivism in its tantric forms. These sometimes very complex and challenging forms of South Asian religion provide a test case for our understanding of Hinduism and raise important theoretical and methodological questions with regard to the study of religious traditions in South Asia as well as to the more general and comparative study of religion.
This Śākta symposium is a contribution by leading scholars in the field as well as research students to the Śākta Traditions project and its endeavor in tracing developments in the history of goddess worship among the orthoprax brahmans, among the tantric traditions and at village level in South Asia. Thus, the symposium acts as a historical exploration of distinctive Indian ways of imagining God as Goddess (and goddesses) and aims at presenting an interdisciplinary state-of-the-art survey of Śākta history, practice and doctrine in its diversity as well as to convey something of the fascinating Śākta religious imaginaire and ritual practice that is distinctive and sets ‘Śāktism’ apart from other South Asian religious traditions. Any headway in this field will be of great value for the future study of religion in South Asia.
Webpage: saktatraditions.org
Monday 17 June 2019, OCHS Library (10.00-13.00) and Campion Hall (14.30-18.00)
Convener: Dr Bjarne Wernicke-Olesen
Programme
10-13.15 Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies (13-15 Magdalen Street, Oxford)
10.00-10.15 Welcome by Professor Gavin Flood (Oxford)
10.15-10.45 Dr Bjarne Wernicke-Olesen (Oxford): On the State of the Art and Research Challenges in the Study of Hindu ‘Śāktism’
10.45-11.00 Tea and biscuits
11.00-12.00 Professor Mandakranta Bose (British Columbia): Correlating Divinity and Femininity in the Hindu Tradition
12.00-12.30 PhD Fellow Silje Lyngar Einarsen (Oslo and Aarhus): Navarātri in Benares: Narrative Structures and Social Realities
12.30-13.00 Prema Goet, MA (SOAS): The Path of Śakti (Exhibition)
13.00 Opening reception with short introduction by Professor Chris Dorsett (Oxford)
13.15-14.30 Lunch break
14.30-18.00 Campion Hall (Brewer Street, Oxford)
14.30-14.45 Campion Hall tour with Professor Gavin Flood
14.45-15.45 Dr Bihani Sarkar (Oxford): Taking over Skanda: Religious appropriation and political transformation in the worship of Durgā (c. 7th century CE).
15.45-16.00 Tea and biscuits
16.00-17.00 Dr Silvia Schwarz Linder (Leipzig): The Concept of jīvanmukti in the Non-Dualistic Śākta Perspective of the Tripurārahasya
17.00-18.00 PhD Fellow Janaki Nair (Northumbria): Intertwining Hands: Tāntric Mudrās and Kathākali Theatre
The Path of Shakti (TT19)
Photographic portraits by Prema Goet, Documentary researcher and photographer,
Opening reception with a short introduction by Professor Chris Dorsett on 17 June 2019 13.00pm
Readings in Vedānta: Rāmānuja’s Vedārtha-saṅgraha: Week Eigh (TT19)
These reading sessions are intended for students who have an intermediate knowledge of Sanskrit and are interested in Vedānta texts. This term we will be reading the Vedārtha-saṅgraha (“A Summary of the Meaning of the Veda”) of Rāmānuja, the most influential teacher of Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta. The Vedārtha-saṅgraha functions as an accessible introduction to his thought.
Readings in the Netra Tantra: Week Eight (TT19)
The Netra Tantra is an important text that gained prominence in the early medieval (post-Gupta) period. These readings will focus on chapter seven, the sukṣma-dhyāna, using the oldest surviving manuscript from Nepal and making reference to the KSTS edition.