Reciting the Goddess

Author(s):  
Jessica Vantine Birkenholtz

This book presents a new perspective on the making of Hinduism in Nepal with the first book-length study of Nepal’s goddess Svasthānī and the popular Svasthānīvratakathā textual tradition. In the centuries following its origin as a short local legend in the sixteenth century, the Svasthānīvratakathā developed into a comprehensive Purana text that is still widely celebrated today among Nepal’s Hindus with an annual month-long recitation. This book interrogates the ways in which the Svasthānīvratakathā can be viewed as a medium through which the effects of important shifts in the political and cultural landscape that occurred among Nepal’s ruling elite were taken up by the general public and are evidenced within one decidedly local, lay tradition. Drawing on both archival and ethnographic research, the book begins with a detailed examination of Svasthānī (“the Goddess of One’s Own Place”) and the Svasthānīvratakathā within the shifting literary, linguistic, religious, cultural, and political contexts of medieval and modern Nepal from the sixteenth century to the present. It then widens its scope to explore the complementary and contentious dynamics between Nepal’s heterogeneous Newar Hindu and high-caste hill Hindu communities and those of Nepal as a Hindu kingdom vis-à-vis Hindu India. The Svasthānī tradition serves as a case study for a broader discussion of the making of Hindu religious identity and practice in Nepal and South Asia, and the role of religion in historical political change. This book brings to the fore a neglected vantage point on the master narratives of Hinduism on the Indian subcontinent.

Al-Ulum ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Abdullah

This paper focuses on examining the role of religion in improving the work ethic of fishing communities in Takalar Regency. The approach used in this research is the Socio-theological Approach (Social monotheism). The social theological approach is a method or method used to link the sociological level of religious or divine society in order to analyze and reveal data on the reality under study. The data acquisition technique is to use data collection methods in the form of observation, interviews and documentation. The results of this study indicate that religion (Islam) plays a role in building work ethic. Poverty can make a person disbelieve in his Lord. Islam teaches its adherents to share with those who are entitled in terms of the theological concept of zakat as poverty alleviation and as a means of realizing social welfare. Islam does not close the space for its adherents to achieve economic prosperity. The framework of monotheism in Islamic teachings has outlined social involvement for its followers to always care and help others.


2017 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 303
Author(s):  
Andreas Jonathan

This study attempts to discuss on how religious identities contribute to or was in conflict with the emerging national identities, with focusing issue on the struggle of Islam in its relation to Indonesian identity as a multi-religious nation and Pancasila state. Based on the critical analysis from the various literature, the result of the study showed that Islam did both contribute and was in conflict with the Indonesian national identity. The Islamist fights for the Islamic state, the nationalist defends Pancasila state. As long as Islam is the majority in Indonesia and as long as there is diversity in Islam, especially in the interpretation of Islam and the state, Indonesian national identity will always be in conflict between Pancasila state and Islamic state. Even though, the role of religion in society and nation change is very significant. The Islamist is always there, although it is not always permanent in certain organizations. In the past, NU and Muhammadiyah were considered as Islamist, but today they are nationalist. At the same time, new Islamist organizations and parties emerge to continue their Islamist spirit. Keywords: Islam, Religious identity, Pancasila, 


Author(s):  
Brian Walker

This article looks at the role of religion in politics. Northern Ireland provides not only a good case study for this issue but also an opportunity to see how the subject has been approached in academic literature over the last forty years. It is argued here that religion can be a modern day, independent factor of considerable influence in politics. This has been important not only in Northern Ireland but also elsewhere in Western Europe in the twentieth century. This reality has been largely ignored until recently, partly because the situation in Northern Ireland has often been studied in a limited comparative context, and partly because of restrictive intellectual assumptions about the role of religion in politics.


Author(s):  
Patrizia Accordino ◽  
Tindara Abbate ◽  
Daniela Rupo ◽  
Raffaella Coppolino ◽  
Elvira Tiziana La Rocca

The 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development intends to improve efforts of governments, societies, and companies to deal with major social and environmental problems affecting contemporary societies. From a business perspective, companies can find a propulsive boost of innovation looking at different models of production and use of services/products. This new perspective is radically changing the ways companies and consumers interact, and the role of companies in supporting the achievement of SDGs through service innovation is becoming pervasive. In addition, the emerging digital economy represents a great opportunity opening up to sustainability-oriented service innovation and firms are developing their competitive advantage based on the introduction of new digital business models. This chapter explores this issue through an explorative case study based on the MyTaxi business model. Implications for managers and researchers and opportunities for future research are highlighted.


2016 ◽  
Vol 67 (3) ◽  
pp. 207-218
Author(s):  
Anna Rácová

Abstract This study aims to demonstrate the roles that domestic and foreign languages have played and play as signs of national or religious identity and social prestige and as tools of political and economic power in multilingual Pakistan and Bangladesh. Before the countries gained independence from the British Empire in 1947 and before the formation of the Indian Union and Pakistan (which was divided into Pakistan and Bangladesh in 1971), the role of an official language, remote to the majority of population in Indian subcontinent, had been gradually played by Sanskrit, Persian, and English. After gaining independence, the new countries decided to replace English as the official language with domestic languages. Their efforts encountered many problems and resulted in various solutions. Urdu became the state language in Pakistan, which caused resistance in local ethnolinguistic groups because the language had been imported by refugees from India. This resistance was the strongest in East Pakistan, where a strong national and language awareness eventually contributed to the formation of an independent Bangladesh with Bengali as the state language. Despite struggle for the dominance of domestic languages, English has preserved its prestigious position both in Pakistan and Bangladesh, as a symbol of higher social position, a language of education and science, and a tool of economic and political power.


2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 1-31
Author(s):  
Angela Berlis

The contribution explores the question of how people react to situations and experiences of transition and radical change which have a major impact on their own lives. What kind of mindset do they develop in the process, who are their role models and how do they overcome spiritual hardship and marginalisation? The life and work of Charlotte Lady Blennerhassett, née Countess Leyden (1843–1917), serves as a case-study showing how learned liberal Catholics – in this case a lay noblewoman – dealt with their spiritual homelessness in the post-1870 ultramontanised Roman Catholic Church. Blennerhassett’s historical biographies reveal an interest in people in situations of threshold and transition. Through her writings on historical and cultural issues, Blennerhassett addressed topics as freedom, reconciliation of peoples and nations and ethical action. For her, the role of religion in this context was evident. The writings of Charlotte Blennerhassett, “the last European” (as she was described in obituaries), contributed to saving the non-ultramontane heritage from oblivion.


2002 ◽  
Vol 82 ◽  
pp. 157-196 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Gaimster ◽  
Maria Hayward ◽  
David Mitchell ◽  
Karen Parker

This paper combines a study of the typological, technological and constructional attributes of a sample of fifteen dress-hooks and cap-hooks, reported between 1998 and 2000 under the terms of the Treasure Act (1996), with a survey of contemporary pictorial sources, probate inventories and associated wills along with a trawl of ‘small wares’ in the records of the Goldsmiths' Company in order to assess the role of these accessories in vernacular dress of sixteenth-century England.Of particular interest are questions of manufacture and design, followed by the questions of how these objects functioned in relation to the closure and decoration of dress, their noteworthiness in contemporary accounts, their social status, their ranking in the output of contemporary goldsmiths and whether there was a gender bias in terms of their ownership. This cross-examination of excavated finds with contemporary iconographie and documentary sources represents an interdisciplinary case study in historical archaeology.


2012 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 611-628 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eleanor M. King ◽  
James E. Brady ◽  
Leslie C. Shaw ◽  
Allan B. Cobb ◽  
C. L. Kieffer ◽  
...  

AbstractContemporary research on prehispanic Maya landscapes has focused on caves as core features of the cultural geography. Investigations within a number of large caves have suggested that they served as the loci for important rituals, legitimized inhabitants’ claims to their territory, and helped establish the authority of a site’s ruling elite. The ubiquity and centrality of caves in the Maya worldview raises questions about what happened in regions where large caves did not naturally form. Recent investigations at the site of Maax Na in northern Belize suggest that small caves, despite their diminutive size, still functioned to establish legitimacy and uphold power. The results serve to demonstrate the pervasive power of key ideological concepts in shaping the cultural landscape and indicate the need to take these into account in documenting landmarks at Maya sites, as even the less imposing ones may have been important to their inhabitants.


Author(s):  
Nemanja Vukcevic ◽  

The subject of the research is the relationship between the phenomena of religion and migrations. The problem of their interaction has been inherent in human society since the ancient times; this problem is relevant one in nova days too. The consequences and prospects of development of this complex phenomenon in contemporary society are not sufficiently examined in science yet, especially in Sociology. In the paper, the role of religion in migration processes is studied based on the analysis of various sources, synthesis, induction, analogy, and abstraction. In course of research were analyzed numerous religious treatises, fiction works and classical sociological works, as well as works by foreign and Russian contemporary academic authors. The paper notes that the migration discourse has now shifted from the geographic and demographic to the socio-political domain. Religion has begun to play an important role at all stages of migration, both from the perspective of neoliberal and humanistic approaches. The paper aims to identify the role of the religious factor in the migration process and the role and logic of migration not only in inter-faith but also in intra-faith relations. It is shown that migration either serves as a catalyst for religious feelings and behavior or it strengthens the existing religious identity of migrants and enhances the quality of their religious feelings. The study highlights the need to improve the legislative framework of religious freedom, but also raises the question of how far religious communities can go in the process of advancing religious practice. In this regard, migrations often become a challenge for a secular state. Therefore, it is concluded that only an integrated approach would contribute to solving this problem.


Author(s):  
David Bowe

Poetry in Dialogue in the Duecento and Dante provides a new perspective on the highly networked literary landscape of thirteenth and fourteenth-century Italy. It demonstrates the fundamental role of dialogue between and within texts in the works of four poets who represent some of the major developments in early Italian literature: Guittone d’Arezzo, Guido Guinizzelli, Guido Cavalcanti, and Dante. Rather than reading the cultural landscape through the lens of Dante’s works, significant though they may be, the first part of this study reconstructs the rich network of literary, especially poetic dialogue that was at the heart of medieval writing in Italy before and contemporary with Dante. The second part of the book uses this reconstruction to demonstrated Dante’s engagement with and indebtedness to the dynamics of exchange that characterized the practice of medieval Italian poets. The overall argument of the book, for the centrality of dialogic processes to the emerging Italian literary tradition, is underpinned by a conceptualization of dialogue in relation to medieval and modern literary theory and philosophy of language. By triangulating between Brunetto Latini’s Rettorica, Mikhail Bakhtin’s ‘dialogism’, and as sense of ‘performative’ speech adapted from J. L. Austin, Poetry in Dialogue shows the openness of its corpus to new dialogues and interpretations, highlighting the instabilities of even the most apparently fixed, monumental texts (such as Dante’s Commedia).


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