This volume explores the inherent pluralism of Hinduism through ethnographic and philosophical evidence as presented in the Journal of Anthropological Society of Bombay. The essays dated 1886-1936, represent a period that marked the emergence of a European-educated native intelligentsia with a rationalist outlook. The essays cover a wide range of topics from Tree Worship in Mohenjo Daro, the origin of the Hindu Trimurti, interpretation of Avestic and Vedic Texts; to a second set of more localized papers that cover the Muhammadan (...) Castes of Bengal, the Tenets and Practices of a Certain Class of Faqirs in Bengal, the Theoretical History of the Goddess Yellamma, and much more. Written during a particular historical as well as intellectual period that reflected certain key patterns - a period just following the Bengal Renaissance of the nineteenth century that ushered in the ideologies of a reformative Hinduism - this volume highlights how religions of all denominations have influenced each other and appear to have mingled beliefs and practices from multiple sources. It shows how tolerance and inclusiveness along with syncretism have been part of India's religious and social history. This book will be of interest to students and researchers of religions, history, anthropology, sociology, political science, and sociology of religion. It will also be useful to those interested in inter-religious dialogues and civil society. (shrink)

Diogenes, Ahead of Print. Western intellectual sources have dominated the social sciences to an extent that most definitions originate from a Eurocentric meaning system; words like urban, wild, nature, and culture being no exception. This paper interrogates and makes a critical assessment of what urban may mean in a non-western context, taking Delhi, the capital of India, as an example. It demonstrates that the meaning of a phrase, ‘being urban’, can only be understood in its historical, social/cultural, and political context; (...) that the notion of a civil society, and meaning of terms such as public and private may be contextualized in varying moral universes and value systems to mean quite different things in different contexts. Overall the paper seeks to illuminate the futility of monolithic and reductionist constructs and value of situational and ethnographically constructed meanings of social and cultural phenomena. It demonstrates that even dichotomies like urban/non-urban are fuzzy and fluid, given the actual situation of real cities and their population; that a city is not defined by structure alone but by the people who live in it. (shrink)

Diogenes, Ahead of Print. Western intellectual sources have dominated the social sciences to an extent that most definitions originate from a Eurocentric meaning system; words like urban, wild, nature, and culture being no exception. This paper interrogates and makes a critical assessment of what urban may mean in a non-western context, taking Delhi, the capital of India, as an example. It demonstrates that the meaning of a phrase, ‘being urban’, can only be understood in its historical, social/cultural, and political context; (...) that the notion of a civil society, and meaning of terms such as public and private may be contextualized in varying moral universes and value systems to mean quite different things in different contexts. Overall the paper seeks to illuminate the futility of monolithic and reductionist constructs and value of situational and ethnographically constructed meanings of social and cultural phenomena. It demonstrates that even dichotomies like urban/non-urban are fuzzy and fluid, given the actual situation of real cities and their population; that a city is not defined by structure alone but by the people who live in it. (shrink)

Diogenes, Ahead of Print. Western intellectual sources have dominated the social sciences to an extent that most definitions originate from a Eurocentric meaning system; words like urban, wild, nature, and culture being no exception. This paper interrogates and makes a critical assessment of what urban may mean in a non-western context, taking Delhi, the capital of India, as an example. It demonstrates that the meaning of a phrase, ‘being urban’, can only be understood in its historical, social/cultural, and political context; (...) that the notion of a civil society, and meaning of terms such as public and private may be contextualized in varying moral universes and value systems to mean quite different things in different contexts. Overall the paper seeks to illuminate the futility of monolithic and reductionist constructs and value of situational and ethnographically constructed meanings of social and cultural phenomena. It demonstrates that even dichotomies like urban/non-urban are fuzzy and fluid, given the actual situation of real cities and their population; that a city is not defined by structure alone but by the people who live in it. (shrink)

Compilation of textual references from Vedic and Jaina religious literature on religious, philosophical and cultural aspects of non-violence (Ahimsa); Prakrit and Sanskrit text with Hindi translation.

Background: The current study intends to enrich the content of the relationship between personality, subjective well-being, and narcissism. Previous studies have shown that extroverted individuals have higher subjective well-being. Methodology: In order to study the relationship between personality, subjective well-being, and narcissistic behavior of college students, a convenient sampling method was used to select college students; they were tested by Eysenck personality questionnaire, total well-being scale, and overt narcissism questionnaire. The collected data were analyzed by t-test and correlation analysis. Results: (...) The findings suggest that there is a positive correlation between College Students' personality type and subjective well-being. College students with extraversion personalities have high subjective well-being, while college students with introversion personalities have low subjective well-being. There is a positive correlation between College Students' personality type and narcissistic behavior. College students with extraverted personalities are more narcissistic, and college students with introverted personalities are less likely to be narcissistic. There is a positive correlation between College Students' subjective well-being and narcissistic behavior. College students with high subjective well-being are more narcissistic, and college students with low subjective well-being are less likely to be narcissistic. Contributions of the study: This study provides an important basis and Enlightenment for discussing the relationship between College Students' personalities, subjective well-being, and narcissistic behavior. College students with different personality types will feel different levels of well-being and narcissistic behavior. There is also a close relationship between College Students' overall well-being and narcissistic behavior. (shrink)

Short overview of the From Small Beginnings Project and its relevance for resisting eugenics in contemporary society.

The present article offers a translation of the Sa?yukta-?gama parallel to the Channa-sutta of the Sa?yutta-nik?ya, which describes the events surrounding the suicide of a monk who might have been an arahant.

The present investigation was undertaken to investigate the acute toxicity of cadmium, a heavy metal widely detected in the aquatic environment due to natural effects and anthropogenic activities, in freshwater teleost, Channa punctata (Bloch). The experiments for the bioassay were performed in semi-static test condition according to the standard guidelines. The behavioural changes in the fish were observed for all tested concentrations of the metal. The data obtained for bioassay were analyzed for median lethal concentrations (LC ) of the (...) metal by SPSS computer software. The LC 50 50 values, estimated by SPSS, with 95% confidence level were found to be:20.589 (18.326-23.221), 17.133 (14.840- 19.734), 11.815 (9.696 – 13.850) mg/L and 9.908 (7.635-12381) mg/L for cadmium chloride at 24, 48, 72 and 96 h exposure, respectively. (shrink)

The break necessary to establish a rigorous science of cultural works is something more and something else than a simple methodological reversal.1 It implies a true conversion of the ordinary way of thinking and living the intellectual enterprise. It is a matter of breaking the narcissistic relationship inscribed in the representation of intellectual work as a “creation” and which excludes as the expression par excellence of “reductionist sociology” the effort to subject the artist and the work of art to a (...) way of thinking that is doubly objectionable since it is both genetic and generic.It would be easy to show what the most different kinds of analysis of the work of art owe to the norms that require treating works in and for themselves, with no reference to the social conditions of their production. Thus in the now-classic Theory of Literature, René Wellek and Austin Warren seem to advocate “an explanation in terms of the personality and the life of the writer.” In fact, because they accept the ideology of the “man of genius” they are committed, in their own terms, to “one of the oldest and best-established methods of literary study”—which seeks the explanatory principle of a work in the author taken in isolation .2 In fact, this explanatory principle resides in the relationship between the “space” of works in which each particular work is taken and the “space” of authors in which each cultural enterprise is constituted. Similarly, when Sartre takes on the project of specifying the meditations through which society determined Flaubert, the individual, he attributes to those factors that can be perceived from that point of view—that is, to social class as refracted through a family structure—what are instead the effects of generic factors influencing every writer in an artistic field that is itself in a subordinate position in the field of power and also the effects specific to all writers who occupy the same position as Flaubert within the artistic field. 1. See Pierre Bourdieu, “Intellectual Field and Creative Project,” trans. Sian France, Social Science Information 8 : 89-119; originally published as “Champ intellectual et projet créateur,” Les Temps moderns no. 246 : 865-906. See also Bourdieu, “Champ du pouvoir, champ intellectual et habitus de classe,” Scolies 1 : 7-26, and Bourdieu, “The Genesis of the Concepts of Habitus and Field,” trans. Channa Newman, Sociocriticism no. 2 : 11-24.2. René Welleck and Austin Warren, Theory of Literature p. 69. Pierre Bourdieu holds the chair of sociology at the Collège de France and is director of the Centre de Sociologie européenne at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales. Among his most recent works are Distinction , Homo Academicus , and Choses Dites. (shrink)

Xenophanes claimed that God is a ball, which means that he is a perfect body. This idea is well developed in Jagannatha worship, who is a central Deity in Orissa, India. It’s a round form of Krishna, who is usually depicted in a human like form. Jagannatha, his brother Baladeva and sister Subhadra are justified as round forms because of their specific manifestation of ecstasy, that, according to aesthetical theory (rasa tattva) happened to them. Yet there are many other (...) explanations of the Jagannatha’s roundness. Round form personifies unity and diversity principle in Jagannatha worship, whose image was dear in Orissa duringlong historical period to different religious groups: Vaishnavas, Shaivaites, Jains, Buddhists and even some Muslims. Orissa also has a blending of different cultures, sub-cultures and traditions. Even now, it has 62 distinct tribal groups, that makes a largest collection of diverse tribes in a single state. As the legend goes, Jagannatha made His first appearance in the tribe of Savaras thousands of years ago. Up until now, there are cooks in the Jagannatha kitchen that are called sauviras. In worship of Jagannatha we find the model of axiological globalism, when the difference in the vision of the reality does not obscure the interior mood of wholeness, unity. (shrink)

Since time immemorial, Lord Jagannātha has been regarded as the principal deity of Odisha. The land of Odisha (former Kaliṅga) was a meeting place of the Hindus, Buddhists and Jainas. The Buddhists, Jainas, Vaiṣṇavas, the worshippers of Gaṇpati and others came to Purī and found the presence of their own lord in Jagannātha. However, of all religious creeds, Buddhism played an important role in the socio-cultural history of Odisha. During the period of emperor Aśoka, the Śabaras (a tribal people) of (...) Odisha were converted to Buddhism. Buddhist pillars were built in Purī, and Buddhist symbols were carved into it. Later on, the Śabaras started worshipping the Triratna as the three principal deities of the Jagannātha temple. In course of time, the three deities of the temple, viz. Jagannātha, Baḷabhadra and Subhadrā, have been accepted by the people of Odisha as the symbols of Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, respectively. As stated by Donaldson (Iconography of the Buddhist sculpture of Orissa, Abhinav Publications, Buldana, 2001), the eighteenth century Buddhist works such as “Jñānasidhi” and “Prajñodaya-Viniścaya-Siddhi,” the Buddha was named as Lord Jagannātha. By the twelfth century A.D., there had already developed a new culture in Odisha with Jagannātha as the center and the Lord came to be conceived as Ādi Buddha and Buddha as the ninth incarnation of Viṣṇu-Jagannātha. The place of Purī has been regarded as a place of Tāntric worship and Jagannātha as the Lord of the Tāntric cult. The Gundichā temple (where the Lord resided for 10 days during the Car festival) has been regarded as a Buddha Vihāra. The Buddhist principle of nonviolence and universal brotherhood found its best expression in the Jagannātha cult. (shrink)