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Research Interests ... |
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Area 1 : History of Religions
Hinduism in India and America, studies in pilgrimage and rituals, and temple traditions
Recent Publications"Vishnu's Universe in Ritual Space: The AbhishekaConsecration of Penn Hills' Sri Venkatesvara," Journal of Ritual Studies, 2006: 20 (2): 1–18, plates and figures
"The Prakara's Narrative Art at Srisailam: An Iconological Study," Artibus Asiae (forthcoming June 2008)
"Honoring Venkateswara Regally, The Material Dimensions of Sacred Images in Tirumala-Tirupati," (forthcoming in Hosting the Immanent Divine: Material Religion in South Asian Traditions, edited anthology by Tracy Pinchman & Selva Raj, SUNY 2008)
"Who has Privileged Authority and who has Acquired Authority to Speak for Hinduism in America?" (Forthcoming in Authority and its Challenges in Hindu Texts, Translations, and Transnational Communities, edited anthology by Deepak Sharma, 2008)
"When a Great Tradition Globalizes, The Brahmotsva: A Vaisnava Vaikhanasa Study in American Hinduism," International Journal of Hindu Studies (under review)
Book manuscript in progressTemple Hinduism
Custodianship, Cultural Politics, and Religious Identity in South India
My book reconstructs the historical development of temple traditions at Srisailam, a Hindu pilgrimage center in the South Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. It explores two major questions: what factors contributed to the two major shifts that took place during a period of seven hundred years of Srisailam’s temple history? What transformations these shifts brought about and how did they shape the development of temple traditions of Shiva and Bhramarambha?
Area 2: Interdisciplinary Studies
- Religion and art, material religion and culture Articles in progress: study of iconology of 2000 art narratives of Srisailam temple
- Women’s studies: oral traditions in performance, female gurus and asceticism, and women writings Projects in progress: Batukamma, women’s festival with song and dance performance traditions Feminist writings and social activism, Malladi Subbamma and the women’s movements
- Hindu-Muslim encounters in south India Project in progress: Ethno-historical study of Venkat Khaja Ashram, a 20th-century religious organization
Area 3: Sanskrit and Telugu Literature
- Pan-Indian, Regional, and Local narrative frameworks in Sanskrit literary works Project in progress: Text and Context: Making the Sense of the Srisailakhandamu (15th century)
- Religious literature in medieval Telugu Projects: Textual analysis of Panditaradhya Caritramu (13th century) and Navanatha Caritramu (15th century)
- Novels and folk literature in Modern Telugu Project: Reading novels religiously: Viswanatha Satyanarayana’s Vayipadagalu
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