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Ṣaṣṭhī Vow: Ritual of Hindu Bengali Women
The Ṣaṣṭhī vow is notably well-liked in Bengal. The well-being of the children and the family are the reasons behind the Ṣaṣṭhī vow. The goddess...
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The Role of Uttaramandrā-Gāthā in the Aśvamedha: Ancient Evidence of Music for Psychological Stress
Music in the Uttaramandrā-gāna or Gāthā-gāna is an integral part of the Aśvamedha rite. In the rite, the king transferred authority to a priest for a...
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The Nakedness of Prakṛti: A Sāṃkhya-Yoga Reading of Aubrey Menen’s The Space Within the Heart
In his autobiography The Space within the Heart (1970), the writer Aubrey Menen shares the experiment in self-inquiry he conducted in the 1960s in...
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Unveiling Abhijῆānaśākuntala: Exploring Kingship, Love, and Asceticism
Kālidāsa (4th – fifth century CE) has always been known for his exquisite poetic style and a deep sense of natural imageries. His works have been...
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The Yogavāsiṣṭha and the Philosophy of the Absurd: A Hindu Response to the Heart’s Cry
In this article, I call attention to the Yogavāsiṣṭha’s depiction of Rāma’s existential crisis and Vasiṣṭha’s various methods for resolving it....
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The Fall of the House of Daśaratha: Kingship in the Raghuvaṃśa
This article argues that Kālidāsa’s Raghuvaṃśa (The Lineage of Raghu) constitutes a novel rereading of Vālmīki’s Rāmāyaṇa , in which Kālidāsa...
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Non-dual Reality and Empirical Existence in Advaita Vedānta and Ghazālī’s Metaphysics of Unity
This essay explores the ways in which two distinct spiritual traditions, Ghazālī’s Ṣūfīsm and Śaṅkarian Advaita Vedānta, articulate an exclusive...
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Interwoven Concepts of Ascetic, God, and Relic: An Iconographical Innovation During Pre-Modern Period in South India
This research brings to light a paradoxical phenomenon of mummification and veneration of “whole-body relic” of the ascetic whose remains are...
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Non-duality as Yab Yum in Tibetan Great Perfection (rdzogs chen)
This article explores how a Tibetan Great Perfection ( rdzogs chen ) scripture uses the buddha couple ( yab yum ) as an interpretive structure that...
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Society with Indian Characteristics: Caste, Class, and Species in Contemporary Retellings of the Rāmāyaṇa
This paper analyzes the construction of Indian society in retellings of the Rāmāyaṇa published in India between 2010 and 2020. I focus on the...
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Sex, Gender, and Devotional Desire: Refiguring Bodily Identities in Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava Discourse
Many of the debates among theorists of the body in feminist and gender studies center on the gendered body and its relation to the sexed body, with...
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Divine Power and Fluid Bodies: Tirunaṅkais in Tamil Nadu
This article analyzes the complex ways in which religious practices influence the formation of identity and community among tirunaṅkai s,...
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Vedantam vs. Venus: Drag, Impersonation, and the Limitations of Gender Trouble
Drawing on the seminal work of feminist and queer theorist Judith Butler, this article compares the practice of gender impersonation in the South...
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Slender Waists and Severed Breasts: The Construction of Female Bodies and Feminine Subjectivities in Vaiṣṇava Bhakti Poetry
This article explores the ways in which the sexed body and its gendered subjectivity are constructed and expressed by Vaiṣṇava devotional poets of...