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On Violence: Voices and Visions from Hindu Goddess Traditions
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On Violence: Voices and Visions from Hindu Goddess Traditions

A special issue of Religions (ISSN 2077-1444).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 December 2019) | Viewed by 33949

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Patricia Dold

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Religious Studies, Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, St. John’s, NL A1C 5S7, Canada
Interests: representations of females in Hindu Sanskrit texts
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

During the first decade of the 21st century, the many-year efforts of Manushi to promote justice and rights of street vendors included the establishment of a new deity, Swaccha Narayani in her abode in the Sewa Nagar street market:

On 12 March, 2005, a new broom wielding deity, MANUSHI Swachha Narayani, Goddess of Good Governance and Citizenship Rights, chose Sewa Nagar street hawker market as her abode. At the time, Sewa Nagar was being developed by MANUSHI as a model market for street vendors. The Goddess took her avatar in form to lend strength to MANUSHI's long battle to protect street hawkers from routine human rights abuses, assaults on their livelihood and huge extortion rackets legitimized by archaic laws which treat their legitimate occupation as an "illegal activity" despite the fact that the city cannot function without street vendors. (Kishwar, Madhu Purnima, Part I: The Making and Unmaking of a Model Market for Street Vendors, Manushi: Forum for Women’s Rights and Democratic Reforms, posted Feb. 29, 2012 http://manushi.in/articles.php?articleId=1586&ptype=campaigns#.W04KUthKgk4 accessed July 17, 2018.)

In two Manushi articles (see also manushi.in/articles.php?articleId=1587#.W04OithKgk4), Madhu Kishwar documents the successes of the Sewa Nagar civic project as well as the challenges and even violence faced by herself and her fellow activists and how the movement created and developed its own local Goddess.

In 2006, the “Save our Sisters” campaign against domestic violence released ads depicting Hindu Goddesses, their faces bruised and cut.  The ads won awards and sparked controversy in various quarters including among Indian feminists. (See Karnika Kohli, “Brusied, battered Goddesses feature in campaign against domestic violence,” Times of India, updated Sept 10, 2013 https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Bruised-battered-goddesses-feature-in-campaign-against-domestic-violence/articleshow/22461046.cms, accessed July 17 2018; and Suddha Tilak, “’Bruised goddesses’ hurt Indian feminists,” Al Jazeera, Oct. 10, 2013 https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2013/10/goddesses-hurt-indian-feminists-2013105104822923415.html accessed July 17, 2018.)

Like the “Save our Sisters” campaign, the creation of Priya’s Shakti was sparked by the gang rape and murder of a young woman on a bus in Delhi in 2012 and features the superhero Priya, who mobilizes her Shakti to secure justice for herself as a survivor of rape and to assist other women who have been targets of abuse and violence (see www.priyashakti.com).

Submissions are sought for a Special Issue to explore a broad range of responses to violence in or through Hindu Goddess traditions.  Primary data can be modern or pre-modern; it can be text, visual media and/or performance.  Usage or presentational context of the data might be religious or secular.  Historical, social, and/or cultural contexts, however, should be well-focused, that is, there is a preference here for the specific over the sweeping.  Critical scholarly analysis must engage with emic interpretations of the data and must avoid imposition of essentialist gender stereotypes, as well as orientalist assumptions.

Violence here is broadly understood to include physical harm or destruction but also non-physical forms of harm such as emotional abuse, systemic social violence, racism, xenophobia, environmental violence, and/or violence against non-human animals. Traditions is understood to include any manner of established phenomena and is not meant to evoke only formal institutions. It is also acknowledged that what is Hindu is not always clearly marked or differentiated from what is non-Hindu.

Prof. Patricia Dold
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Religions is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • Hindu goddesses
  • justice
  • violence
  • Śakti
  • Śākta(s)
  • Śāktism
  • Devīs

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

29 pages, 3459 KiB  
Article
Bloodthirsty, or Not, That Is the Question: An Ethnography-Based Discussion of Bhadrakāḷi’s Use of Violence in Popular Worship, Ritual Performing Arts and Narratives in Central Kerala (South India)1
by Marianne Pasty-Abdul Wahid
Religions 2020, 11(4), 170; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel11040170 - 05 Apr 2020
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 4377
Abstract
Violence is a characteristic that has somewhat become definitional for the Hindu goddess Kālī. But looking at it through the lens of folk narrative and the popular, devotion-infused and highly personalised opinions of her devotees shows that not only the understanding, but also [...] Read more.
Violence is a characteristic that has somewhat become definitional for the Hindu goddess Kālī. But looking at it through the lens of folk narrative and the popular, devotion-infused and highly personalised opinions of her devotees shows that not only the understanding, but also the acceptance of this violence and the connected anger and bloodthirst that are usually attached to it, as well as the feelings of fear and danger that arise from them on the devotees’ end, are subjects open to discussion. This article, at the juncture between anthropology, performance, and Hindu studies, analyses and compares discourses about her Malayali counterpart, Bhadrakāḷi, drawing simultaneously on various versions of her founding myth of Dārikavadham (‘The Slaying of Dārikan’), ritual routines of her temples in Central Kerala as well as ritual performing arts that are conducted in some of them. The concluding discussion of her alleged thirst for blood and identification of the ’real‘ addressee of blood offerings made to her particularly illustrates how far the negotiation of Bhadrakāḷi’s use of violence and her very definition as violent goddess reaches deep into the worshipper/deity relationship that lies at the heart of popular worship. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue On Violence: Voices and Visions from Hindu Goddess Traditions)
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19 pages, 341 KiB  
Article
Tales of Endings and Beginnings: Cycles of Violence as a Leitmotif in the Narrative Structure of the Bhadrakāḷīmāhātmya
by Noor van Brussel
Religions 2020, 11(3), 119; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel11030119 - 10 Mar 2020
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2714
Abstract
The asura’s demise at the hands of the goddess is a theme frequently revisited in Hindu myth. It is the chronicle of a death foretold. So too is the Bhadrakāḷīmāhātmya, a sixteenth century regional purāṇa from Kerala, that narrates the tale of [...] Read more.
The asura’s demise at the hands of the goddess is a theme frequently revisited in Hindu myth. It is the chronicle of a death foretold. So too is the Bhadrakāḷīmāhātmya, a sixteenth century regional purāṇa from Kerala, that narrates the tale of fierce goddess Bhadrakāḷī and her predestined triumph over asura king Dārika. Violence is ubiquitous in this narrative, which was designed with one goal in mind: glorifying the ultimate act of defeating the asura enemy. In its course the story exhibits many kinds of violence: self-harm, cosmic warfare, murder, etc. This paper argues that (1) violence comes to serve as a structural aspect in the text. Reappearing consistently at key moments in the narrative, violence both frames and structures the goddess’s tale. Yet, it is not only the violent act that dominates, it is its accompaniment by equal acts of regeneration that dictates the flow of the narrative, creating a pulsating course of endings and beginnings; (2) these cycles, that strategically occur throughout the narrative, come to serve as a Leitmotif referring to the cyclic tandem of destruction and regeneration that has dominated post-Vedic Hindu myth in many forms. The pulsating dynamic of death and revival thus becomes a specific narrative design that aims to embed the regional goddess within a grander framework of Time. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue On Violence: Voices and Visions from Hindu Goddess Traditions)
19 pages, 40904 KiB  
Article
Using Verbal Art to Deal with Conflicts: Women’s Voices on Family and Kinship in Kāmākhyā (Assam)
by Emilie Arrago-Boruah
Religions 2019, 10(8), 455; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel10080455 - 26 Jul 2019
Viewed by 3008
Abstract
Analyzing two women’s rituals in which verbal art on family and kinship is prominent, this article explores situations in which tales and songs in Assamese are staged by newly married and about-to-be-married young women. Active participation in stories and song sessions, under the [...] Read more.
Analyzing two women’s rituals in which verbal art on family and kinship is prominent, this article explores situations in which tales and songs in Assamese are staged by newly married and about-to-be-married young women. Active participation in stories and song sessions, under the guidance of older storytellers or singers, imparts practical knowledge to young women about the possible ways by which to retaliate against male domination and domestic tensions with one’s mother-in-law. The young women who participate are not merely engaged in the performance but are also encouraged to place themselves in the story. This performance study, based on the ecology of Assam and the annual calendar of festivals at the great temple of the goddess Kāmākhyā, combines the exploration of these narratives with the observation of rituals. It also seeks to question whether social language practices endow women with the power to affirm themselves and with the knowledge, through ritual performance, to deal with conflict. Finally, it shows how the use of an original ritual object—a small house—can be put into perspective with the concept of “house” as understood in particular by Lévi-Strauss. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue On Violence: Voices and Visions from Hindu Goddess Traditions)
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22 pages, 8853 KiB  
Article
Mobilizing Shakti: Hindu Goddesses and Campaigns Against Gender-Based Violence
by Ali Smears
Religions 2019, 10(6), 381; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel10060381 - 13 Jun 2019
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 18626
Abstract
Hindu goddesses have been mobilized as powerful symbols by various groups of activists in both visual and verbal campaigns in India. Although these mobilizations have different motivations and goals, they have frequently emphasized the theological association between goddesses and women, connected through their [...] Read more.
Hindu goddesses have been mobilized as powerful symbols by various groups of activists in both visual and verbal campaigns in India. Although these mobilizations have different motivations and goals, they have frequently emphasized the theological association between goddesses and women, connected through their common possession of Shakti (power). These campaigns commonly highlight the idea that both goddesses and Hindu women share in this power in order to inspire women to action in particular ways. While this association has largely been used as a campaign strategy by Hindu right-wing women’s organizations in India, it has also become a strategy employed in particular feminist campaigns as well. This article offers a discourse analysis of two online activist campaigns (Priya's Shakti and Abused Goddesses) which mobilize Hindu goddesses (and their power) in order to raise awareness about gender-based violence in India. I examine whether marginalized identities of women in India, in relation to caste, class and religious identity, are represented in the texts and images. To do so, I analyze how politically-charged, normative imaginings of Indian women are constructed (or maintained). This analysis raises questions about the usefulness of employing Hindu goddesses as feminist symbols, particularly in contemporary Indian society, in which communal and caste-based tensions are elevated. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue On Violence: Voices and Visions from Hindu Goddess Traditions)
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19 pages, 251 KiB  
Article
Visions and Revisions of the Hindu Goddess: Sound, Structure, and Artful Ambivalence in the Devī Māhātmya
by Raj Balkaran
Religions 2019, 10(5), 322; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel10050322 - 14 May 2019
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 4277
Abstract
The Hindu Goddess makes her Brahmanical debut circa 5th century CE in the Sanskrit narrative work Devī Māhātmya, the “Greatness of the Goddess” (henceforth DM). This monumental mythic moment enshrines the first Indic articulation of ultimate divinity as feminine. That she is perennially [...] Read more.
The Hindu Goddess makes her Brahmanical debut circa 5th century CE in the Sanskrit narrative work Devī Māhātmya, the “Greatness of the Goddess” (henceforth DM). This monumental mythic moment enshrines the first Indic articulation of ultimate divinity as feminine. That she is perennially feminine and ever omnipotent, there can be no doubt. But how do we further characterize this feminine face? This study performs a close synchronic examination of the DM to demonstrate the extent to which it encodes an ambivalence on behalf of the Devī (Goddess) between violent wrath and compassionate care. Preserving paradox as only narrative can, the DM dispenses with neither face of the supreme Goddess—yet it posits her benign visage as ultimately supreme. This paper firstly examines the use of sound throughout the DM as expressive of the Devī’s sacrality and virulence alike. While violent sound is something the Devī deploys, sacred sound is something the Devī is. It then proceeds to analyze the second of the four hymns within the DM—the Śakrādi Stuti, occupying Chapter 4—to demonstrate the artful manner in which the hymn encodes the Devi’s ambivalence through its sophisticated design. This paper ultimately suggests that this ambivalence of the Devī finds an earthly analogue in the Indian king. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue On Violence: Voices and Visions from Hindu Goddess Traditions)
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