Tantric Visual Culture

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Tantric Visual Culture

Sthaneshwar Timalsina
Tantric Visual Culture Book PDF

Author : Sthaneshwar Timalsina
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 178 pages
File Size : 47,5 Mb
Release : 2015-11-19
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781317606338

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Tantric Visual Culture by Sthaneshwar Timalsina Pdf

Indian culture relies greatly on visual expression, and this book uses both classical Indian and contemporary Western philosophies and current studies on cognitive sciences, and applies them to contextualize Tantric visual culture. The work selects aspects of Tantric language and the practice of visualization, with the central premise to engage cognitive theories while studying images. It utilizes the contemporary theories of metaphor and cognitive blend, the theory of metonymy, and a holographic theory of epistemology with a focus on concept formation and its application to the study of myths and images. In addition, it applies the classical aesthetic theory of rasa to unravel the meaning of opaque images. This philosophical and cognitive analysis allows materials from Indian culture to be understood in a new light, while engaging contemporary theories of cognitive science and semantics. The book demonstrates how the domains of meaning and philosophy can be addressed within any culture without reducing their intrinsic cultural significance. By addressing these key aspects of Tantric traditions through this approach, this book initiates a much-needed dialogue between Indian and Western theories, while encouraging introspection within the Indic traditions themselves. It will be of interest to those studying and researching Religion, Philosophy and South Asian Culture.

Language of Images

Sthaneshwar Timalsina
Language of Images Book PDF

Author : Sthaneshwar Timalsina
Publisher : Peter Lang Incorporated, International Academic Publishers
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 52,8 Mb
Release : 2015
Category : Idols and images
ISBN : 1433125560

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Language of Images by Sthaneshwar Timalsina Pdf

While Indian visual culture and Tantric images have drawn wide attention, the culture of images, particularly that of the divine images, is broadly misunderstood. This book is the first to systematically address the hermeneutic and philosophical aspects of visualizing images in Tantric practices. While examining the issues of embodiment and emotion, this volume initiates a discourse on image-consciousness, imagination, memory, and recall. The main objective of this book is to explore the meaning of the opaque Tantric forms, and with this, the text aims to introduce visual language to discourse. Language of Images is the result of a long and sustained engagement with Tantric practitioners and philosophical and exegetical texts. Due to its synthetic approach of utilizing multiple ways to read cultural artifacts, this work stands alone in its attempt to unravel the esoteric domains of Tantric practice by means of addressing the culture of visualization.

Buddhist Practice and Visual Culture

Julie Gifford
Buddhist Practice and Visual Culture Book PDF

Author : Julie Gifford
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 266 pages
File Size : 50,8 Mb
Release : 2011-03-16
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781136817953

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Buddhist Practice and Visual Culture by Julie Gifford Pdf

Providing an overall interpretation of the Buddhist monument Borobudur in Indonesia, this book looks at Mahayana Buddhist religious ideas and practices that could have informed Borobudur, including both the narrative reliefs and the Buddha images. The author explores a version of the classical Mahayana that foregrounds the importance of the visual in relation to Buddhist philosophy, meditation, devotion, and ritual. The book goes on to show that the architects of Borobudur designed a visual world in which the Buddha appeared in a variety of forms and could be interpreted in three ways: by realizing the true nature of his teaching, through visionary experience, and by encountering his numinous presence in images. Furthermore, the book analyses a particularly comprehensive and programmatic expression of Mahayana Buddhist visual culture so as to enrich the theoretical discussion of the monument. It argues that the relief panels of Borobudur do not passively illustrate, but rather creatively "picture" selected passages from texts. Presenting new material, the book contributes immensely to a new and better understanding of the significance of the Borobudur for the field of Buddhist and Religious Studies.

Tantric Buddhist Practice in India

Anthony Tribe
Tantric Buddhist Practice in India Book PDF

Author : Anthony Tribe
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 432 pages
File Size : 40,7 Mb
Release : 2016-06-03
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781317230854

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Tantric Buddhist Practice in India by Anthony Tribe Pdf

Using a commentary on the influential text, the Mañjuśrī-nāmasaṃgīti, ‘The Chanting of the Names of Mañjuśrī’, this book deals with Buddhist tantric meditation practice and its doctrinal context in early-medieval India. The commentary was written by the 8th-9th century Indian tantric scholar Vilāsavajra, and the book contains a translation of the first five chapters. The translation is extensively annotated, and accompanied by introductions as well as a critical edition of the Sanskrit text based on eight Sanskrit manuscripts and two blockprint editions of the commentary’s Tibetan translation. The commentary interprets its root text within an elaborate framework of tantric visualisation and meditation that is based on an expanded form of the Buddhist Yoga Tantra mandala, the Vajradhātu-maṇḍala. At its heart is the figure of Mañjuśrī, no longer the familiar bodhisattva of wisdom, but now the embodiment of the awakened non-dual gnosis that underlies all Buddhas as well their activity in the cosmos. The book contributes to our understanding of the history of Indian tantric Buddhism in a period of significant change and innovation. With its extensively annotated translation and lengthy introductions the book is designed to appeal not only to professional scholars and research students but also to contemporary Buddhists.

Goddess Traditions in Tantric Hinduism

Bjarne Wernicke Olesen
Goddess Traditions in Tantric Hinduism Book PDF

Author : Bjarne Wernicke Olesen
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 186 pages
File Size : 55,8 Mb
Release : 2015-09-16
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781317585220

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Goddess Traditions in Tantric Hinduism by Bjarne Wernicke Olesen Pdf

Hinduism cannot be understood without the Great Goddess and the goddess-orientated Śākta traditions. The Goddess pervades Hinduism at all levels, from aniconic village deities to high-caste pan-Hindu goddesses to esoteric, tantric goddesses. Nevertheless, the highly influential tantric forms of South Asian goddess worship have only recently begun to draw scholarly attention. This book addresses the increasing interest in the Great Goddess and the tantric traditions of India by exploring the history, doctrine and practices of the Śākta tantric traditions. The highly influential tantric forms of South Asian goddess worship form a major part of what is known as ‘Śāktism’, and is often considered one of the major branches of Hinduism next to Śaivism, Vaiṣṇavism and Smārtism. Śāktism is, however, less clearly defined than the other major branches, and the book looks at the texts of the Śākta traditions that constitute the primary sources for gaining insights into the Śākta religious imaginative, ritual practices and history. It provides an historical exploration of distinctive Indian ways of imagining God as Goddess, and surveys the important origins and developments within Śākta history, practice and doctrine in its diversity. Bringing together contributions from some of the foremost scholars in the field of tantric studies, the book provides a platform for the continued research into Hindu goddesses, yoga, and tantra for those interested in understanding the religion and culture in South Asia.

An Indian Tantric Tradition and Its Modern Global Revival

D.E. Osto
An Indian Tantric Tradition and Its Modern Global Revival Book PDF

Author : D.E. Osto
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 326 pages
File Size : 45,9 Mb
Release : 2020-03-06
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781000049299

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An Indian Tantric Tradition and Its Modern Global Revival by D.E. Osto Pdf

This book analyzes the contemporary global revival of Nondual Śaivism, a thousand-year-old medieval Hindu religious philosophy. Providing a historical overview of the seminal people and groups responsible for the revival, the book compares the tradition’s medieval Indian origins to modern forms, which are situated within distinctively contemporary religious, economic and technological contexts. The author bridges the current gap in the literature between "insider" (emic) and "outsider” (etic) perspectives by examining modern Nondual Śaivism from multiple standpoints as both a critical scholar of religion and an empathetic participant-observer. The book explores modern Nondual Śaivism in relation to recent scholarly debates concerning the legitimacy of New Age consumptive spirituality, the global spiritual marketplace and the contemporary culture of narcissism. It also analyzes the dark side of the revived tradition, and investigates contemporary teachers accused of sexual abuse and illegal financial activities in relation to unique features of Nondual Śaivism’s theosophy and modern scholarship on new religious movements (NRMs) and cults. This book shows that, although Kashmir Śaivism has been adopted by certain teachers and groups to market their own brand of "High Tantra," some contemporary practitioners have remained true to the system’s fundamental tenets and teach authentic (albeit modern) forms of Nondual Śaivism. This book will be of interest to academics in the fields of religion and Asian philosophies, especially South Asian, tantric, neo-tantric and yoga philosophies, alternative and New Age spiritualities, religion and consumerism, and NRMs and cults. Winner of the inaugural 2021 New Zealand Asia Society Book Award, second prize.

Studies on Tantra in Bengal and Eastern India

Madhu Khanna
Studies on Tantra in Bengal and Eastern India Book PDF

Author : Madhu Khanna
Publisher : Springer Nature
Page : 192 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2023-02-20
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9789811930225

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Studies on Tantra in Bengal and Eastern India by Madhu Khanna Pdf

This book explores the tantric concept of Shakti, or the principal female cosmic entity and her pilgrimage sites. It offers a first-hand view of the multidimensional ways in which Shakti asserted its supremacy over existing Vaishnava and orthodox Brahmanical traditions in post mediaeval Bengal and India. The interdisciplinary chapters pave the way to understanding the intra-textual relationships between philosophical and conceptual ideas in literary texts and their oral transmission. Divided into three thematic sections: Cult Inclusiveness, Śakti Pithas, and the Śākta Philosophy, the book invites readers to explore a contested area of scholarship from unique perspectives, offering rich insights into the nature of negotiations between diverse religious streams. It also urges readers to examine the many innovative approaches and theoretical models on the goddess culture of East India. The book is of interest to students and scholars of religious textual studies, anthropology, pilgrimage studies, comparative religion, Sanskrit and Bengali languages, regional studies, South Asian cultures, goddess traditions and cultural history of mediaeval Bengal.

Teaching South and Southeast Asian Art

Bokyung Kim,Kyunghee Pyun
Teaching South and Southeast Asian Art Book PDF

Author : Bokyung Kim,Kyunghee Pyun
Publisher : Springer Nature
Page : 306 pages
File Size : 53,6 Mb
Release : 2023-04-10
Category : Education
ISBN : 9783031225161

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Teaching South and Southeast Asian Art by Bokyung Kim,Kyunghee Pyun Pdf

This volume challenges existing notions of what is “Indian,” “Southeast Asian,” and/or “South Asian” art to help educators present a more contextualized understanding of art in a globalized world. In doing so, it (re)examines how South or Southeast Asian art is being made, exhibited, circulated and experienced in new ways in the United States or in regions under its cultural hegemony. The essays presented in this book examine both historical and contemporary transformations or lived experiences of monuments and regional styles (sites) from South or Southeast Asian art in art making, subsequent usage, and exhibition-making under the rubric of “Indian,” “South Asian,” “or “Southeast Asian” Art.

The Rādhā Tantra

Mans Broo
The R dh Tantra Book PDF

Author : Mans Broo
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
Page : 350 pages
File Size : 55,7 Mb
Release : 2016-10-26
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781317485179

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The Rādhā Tantra by Mans Broo Pdf

The Rādhā Tantra is an anonymous 17th century tantric text from Bengal. The text offers a lively picture of the meeting of different religious traditions in 17th century Bengal, since it presents a Śākta version of the famous Vaiṣṇava story of Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa. This book presents a critically edited text of the Rādhā Tantra, based on manuscripts in India, Nepal and Bangladesh, as well as an annotated translation It is prefaced by an introduction that situates the text in its social and historical context and discusses its significance. The introduction also looks at the composition and metrics, vocabulary and grammar, and contents and doctrine of the text. It also includes a discussion of the extensive intertextualities of the Rādhā Tantra, as well as the sources used for this edition. The Sanskrit text in Roman transliteration, following the standard IAST system, is then presented, followed by an English translation of the text. This book will be of interest to scholars of South Asian Religion, Tantric Studies and Religious History.

Religious Experience in the Hindu Tradition

June McDaniel
Religious Experience in the Hindu Tradition Book PDF

Author : June McDaniel
Publisher : MDPI
Page : 198 pages
File Size : 45,9 Mb
Release : 2019-07-31
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9783039210503

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Religious Experience in the Hindu Tradition by June McDaniel Pdf

This book is a printed edition of the Special Issue Religious Experience in the Hindu Tradition that was published in Religions

Art for a Modern India, 1947-1980

Rebecca M. Brown
Art for a Modern India 1947 1980 Book PDF

Author : Rebecca M. Brown
Publisher : Duke University Press
Page : 222 pages
File Size : 52,5 Mb
Release : 2009-03-17
Category : Art
ISBN : 9780822392262

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Art for a Modern India, 1947-1980 by Rebecca M. Brown Pdf

Following India’s independence in 1947, Indian artists creating modern works of art sought to maintain a local idiom, an “Indianness” representative of their newly independent nation, while connecting to modernism, an aesthetic then understood as both universal and presumptively Western. These artists depicted India’s precolonial past while embracing aspects of modernism’s pursuit of the new, and they challenged the West’s dismissal of non-Western places and cultures as sources of primitivist imagery but not of modernist artworks. In Art for a Modern India, Rebecca M. Brown explores the emergence of a self-conscious Indian modernism—in painting, drawing, sculpture, architecture, film, and photography—in the years between independence and 1980, by which time the Indian art scene had changed significantly and postcolonial discourse had begun to complicate mid-century ideas of nationalism. Through close analyses of specific objects of art and design, Brown describes how Indian artists engaged with questions of authenticity, iconicity, narrative, urbanization, and science and technology. She explains how the filmmaker Satyajit Ray presented the rural Indian village as a socially complex space rather than as the idealized site of “authentic India” in his acclaimed Apu Trilogy, how the painter Bhupen Khakhar reworked Indian folk idioms and borrowed iconic images from calendar prints in his paintings of urban dwellers, and how Indian architects developed a revivalist style of bold architectural gestures anchored in India’s past as they planned the Ashok Hotel and the Vigyan Bhavan Conference Center, both in New Delhi. Discussing these and other works of art and design, Brown chronicles the mid-twentieth-century trajectory of India’s modern visual culture.

Devotional Visualities

Karen Pechilis,Amy-Ruth Holt
Devotional Visualities Book PDF

Author : Karen Pechilis,Amy-Ruth Holt
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
Page : 337 pages
File Size : 47,9 Mb
Release : 2023-09-21
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781350214194

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Devotional Visualities by Karen Pechilis,Amy-Ruth Holt Pdf

This book is the first to focus on material visualities of bhakti imagery that inspire, shape, convey, and expand both the visual practices of devotional communities, as well as possibilities for extending the reach of devotion in society in new and often unexpected ways. Communities of interpreters of bhakti images discussed in this book include not only a number of distinctive Hindu bhakti groups, but also artisans, diaspora women, South Asian Sufis, businessmen, dancers, and filmmakers. This book's identification of devotional practices of looking, such as materializing memory, mirroring and immaterializing portraits, and shaping the return look, connect material and visual cultures as well as illustrate modes of established and experimental image usage. Bhakti is one of the most-studied aspects of Indic devotionalism on account of its expression through emotive poetry, song, and vivid hagiographies of saints. The diverse devotional visualities analyzed in this book meaningfully circulate bhakti images in past and present, generating their renewed relationship to contemporary concerns.

The Matter of Wonder

Loriliai Biernacki
The Matter of Wonder Book PDF

Author : Loriliai Biernacki
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 265 pages
File Size : 49,6 Mb
Release : 2023
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780197643075

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The Matter of Wonder by Loriliai Biernacki Pdf

"The current discourse of New Materialism seeks to chart a way of addressing our contemporary predicament around environmental destruction through reassessing our relationship and attitudes to matter. This book argues that the panentheism of the 11th century Indian Hindu thinker Abhinavagupta offers a cogent philosophical model that gives us new ways of thinking about matter, which can help a contemporary New Materialist thought. What makes panentheism an attractive model for Abhinavagupta's philosophy is its Tantric impetus towards both the materiality of the world and the transcendence of divinity, proposing a philosophy that finds consciousness-a subjectivity as, and at the very core of matter. With this, Abhinavagupta's articulation of a foundational and encompassing subjectivity proposes a panentheist solution to a familiar conundrum, one we still grapple with today-that is: how does consciousness, which is so unlike matter, how does it actually connect to the materiality of our world? In familar 21st century terms, how does mind connect to body? This book brings this question to bear in comparative fashion on contemporary issues: our current concerns around what is sentient-animals? viruses? artificial intelligence?-set in relation to Abhinavagupta's articulation of what gives rise to sentience via his use of the term vimarśa; our current conceptions of information as data-articulated in juxtaposition to Abhinavagupta's theology of mantra, mystic sound; examining Abhinavagupta's use of wonder (camatkāra) as as a philosophical concept, and how his cosmological system (tattva) underwrites his understanding of a foundational subjectivity"--

Contemplative Studies & Jainism

Purushottama Bilimoria,Cogen Bohanec,Rita D. Sherma
Contemplative Studies Jainism Book PDF

Author : Purushottama Bilimoria,Cogen Bohanec,Rita D. Sherma
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
Page : 180 pages
File Size : 48,7 Mb
Release : 2023-08-01
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781000918335

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Contemplative Studies & Jainism by Purushottama Bilimoria,Cogen Bohanec,Rita D. Sherma Pdf

This volume is one of the first wide-ranging academic surveys of the major types and categories of Jain praxis. It covers a breadth of scholarly viewpoints that reflect both the variegation in terms of spiritual practices within the Jain traditions as well as the Jain hermeneutical perspectives, which are employed in understanding its rich diversity. The volume illustrates a complex and nuanced understanding of the multifaceted category of Jain religious thought and practice. It offers a rare intrareligious dialogue within Jain traditions and at the same time, significantly broadens and enriches the field of Contemplative Studies to include an ancient, ascetic, non-theistic tradition. Meditation, yoga, ritual, prayer are common to all Indic spiritual traditions. By investigating these diverse, yet overlapping, categories one might obtain a sophisticated understanding of religious traditions that originally emerged in South Asia. Essays in this book demonstrate how these forms of praxis in Jainism, and the philosophies that anchor those practices, are interrelated, and when brought into dialogue, help to foster new tools for understanding a complex and variegated tradition such as Jain Dharma. This book will be useful to scholars and researchers of religious and theological studies, contemplative studies, Jain studies, Hindu studies, consciousness studies, Yoga studies, Indian philosophy and religion, sociology of religion, philosophy of religion, comparative religion, and South Asian studies, as well as general readers interested in the topic.

The Cambridge Handbook of Intercultural Training

Dan Landis,Dharm P. S. Bhawuk
The Cambridge Handbook of Intercultural Training Book PDF

Author : Dan Landis,Dharm P. S. Bhawuk
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 1081 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 2020-08-27
Category : Psychology
ISBN : 9781108846462

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The Cambridge Handbook of Intercultural Training by Dan Landis,Dharm P. S. Bhawuk Pdf

With the number of international migrants globally reaching an estimated 272 million (United Nations report, September 2019), the need for intercultural training is stronger than ever. Since its first edition, this handbook has evaluated the methodologies and suggested the best practice to develop effective programs aimed at facilitating cross-cultural dialogue and boosting the economic developments of the countries mostly affected by migration. This handbook builds and expands on the previous editions by presenting the rational and scientific foundations of intercultural training and focuses on unique approaches, theories, and areas of the world. In doing so, it gives students, managers, and other professionals undertaking international assignments a theoretical foundation and practical suggestions for improving intercultural training programs.