A Storm of Songs
India and the Idea of the Bhakti Movement
Seiten
2015
Harvard University Press (Verlag)
978-0-674-18746-7 (ISBN)
Harvard University Press (Verlag)
978-0-674-18746-7 (ISBN)
A widely-accepted explanation for India’s national unity is a narrative called the bhakti movement—poet-saints singing bhakti from India’s southern tip to the Himalayas between 600 and 1600. John Hawley shows that this narrative, with its political overtones, was created by the early-twentieth-century circle around Rabindranath Tagore in Bengal.
India celebrates itself as a nation of unity in diversity, but where does that sense of unity come from? One important source is a widely-accepted narrative called the “bhakti movement.” Bhakti is the religion of the heart, of song, of common participation, of inner peace, of anguished protest. The idea known as the bhakti movement asserts that between 600 and 1600 CE, poet-saints sang bhakti from India’s southernmost tip to its northern Himalayan heights, laying the religious bedrock upon which the modern state of India would be built.
Challenging this canonical narrative, John Stratton Hawley clarifies the historical and political contingencies that gave birth to the concept of the bhakti movement. Starting with the Mughals and their Kachvaha allies, North Indian groups looked to the Hindu South as a resource that would give religious and linguistic depth to their own collective history. Only in the early twentieth century did the idea of a bhakti “movement” crystallize—in the intellectual circle surrounding Rabindranath Tagore in Bengal. Interactions between Hindus and Muslims, between the sexes, between proud regional cultures, and between upper castes and Dalits are crucially embedded in the narrative, making it a powerful political resource.
A Storm of Songs ponders the destiny of the idea of the bhakti movement in a globalizing India. If bhakti is the beating heart of India, this is the story of how it was implanted there—and whether it can survive.
India celebrates itself as a nation of unity in diversity, but where does that sense of unity come from? One important source is a widely-accepted narrative called the “bhakti movement.” Bhakti is the religion of the heart, of song, of common participation, of inner peace, of anguished protest. The idea known as the bhakti movement asserts that between 600 and 1600 CE, poet-saints sang bhakti from India’s southernmost tip to its northern Himalayan heights, laying the religious bedrock upon which the modern state of India would be built.
Challenging this canonical narrative, John Stratton Hawley clarifies the historical and political contingencies that gave birth to the concept of the bhakti movement. Starting with the Mughals and their Kachvaha allies, North Indian groups looked to the Hindu South as a resource that would give religious and linguistic depth to their own collective history. Only in the early twentieth century did the idea of a bhakti “movement” crystallize—in the intellectual circle surrounding Rabindranath Tagore in Bengal. Interactions between Hindus and Muslims, between the sexes, between proud regional cultures, and between upper castes and Dalits are crucially embedded in the narrative, making it a powerful political resource.
A Storm of Songs ponders the destiny of the idea of the bhakti movement in a globalizing India. If bhakti is the beating heart of India, this is the story of how it was implanted there—and whether it can survive.
John Stratton Hawley is an award-winning translator and scholar of religious studies. He has written extensively on the bhakti movement and is the Claire Tow Professor of Religion at Barnard College, Columbia University.
| Erscheint lt. Verlag | 26.3.2015 |
|---|---|
| Zusatzinfo | 11 halftones, 2 maps, 1 table |
| Verlagsort | Cambridge, Mass |
| Sprache | englisch |
| Maße | 156 x 235 mm |
| Themenwelt | Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte |
| Geschichte ► Teilgebiete der Geschichte ► Religionsgeschichte | |
| Geisteswissenschaften ► Religion / Theologie ► Hinduismus | |
| ISBN-10 | 0-674-18746-6 / 0674187466 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-0-674-18746-7 / 9780674187467 |
| Zustand | Neuware |
| Haben Sie eine Frage zum Produkt? |
Mehr entdecken
aus dem Bereich
aus dem Bereich
Herkunft, Blüte, Weg nach Osten
Buch | Hardcover (2024)
C.H.Beck (Verlag)
CHF 55,90
Von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart
Buch | Hardcover (2022)
C.H.Beck (Verlag)
CHF 47,60
von den Anfängen bis zu Konstantin dem Großen
Buch | Softcover (2024)
C.H.Beck (Verlag)
CHF 16,80
