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Loving Paradoxes: A Feminist Reclamation of the Goddess Kali

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 March 2020

Vrinda Dalmiya
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Abstract

The feminist significance of the Goddess Kali lies in an indigenous worshipful attitude of “Kali-bhakti” rather than in the mere image of the Goddess. The peculiar mother-child motif at the core of the poet Ramprasad Sen's Kali-bhakti represents, I argue, not only a dramatic reconstruction of femininity but of selfhood in general. The spiritual goal of a devotee here involves a deconstruction of “master identity” necessary also for ethico-political struggles for justice.

Type
Research Article
Information
Hypatia , Volume 15 , Issue 1 , Winter 2000 , pp. 125 - 150
Copyright
Copyright © 2000 by Hypatia, Inc.

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