The Devadasi and the Saint
Author: V. Sriram
Publisher:
Published: 2007
Total Pages: 0
ISBN-13: 9788188661701
DOWNLOAD EBOOKBiography of a Carnatic musician and folk theater actress from Karnataka.
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Unfinished Gestures
Author: Davesh Soneji
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Published: 2012-01-15
Total Pages: 329
ISBN-13: 0226768090
DOWNLOAD EBOOK'Unfinished Gestures' presents the social and cultural history of courtesans in South India, focusing on their encounters with colonial modernity in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Nityasumangali
Author: Saskia C. Kersenboom-Story
Publisher: Motilal Banarsidass Publ.
Published: 1987
Total Pages: 256
ISBN-13: 9788120803305
DOWNLOAD EBOOKIn this book the author has first investigated the concept of the devadasi as found in the cultural history of South India, especialy in Tamil Nadu. Hereafter the function and form of the devadasi tradition are examined within the Temple Ritual of Tamil Nadu. This is not the study of the fact of the devadasi tradition, but of its meaning and the mode of production of that meaning.
The Last Devadasi
Author: Barbara L. Baer
Publisher: Open Books Publishing (UK)
Published: 2018-09
Total Pages: 212
ISBN-13: 9781948598088
DOWNLOAD EBOOKPassionate and forbidden love clashes with tradition and caste in a changing India. Kamala Kumari is more than a Gemini Studio starlet: she's a classical dancer trained in the age-old line of Devadasis, a caste set in place a thousand years ago when girls were first dedicated in south Indian temples to serve the gods and men. From the promise of art and devotion, the sacred dancers fell into the hands of priests who both exalted and betrayed them. Beautiful, brilliant and proud, Kamala struggles to escape the old ways, entangling her Indian assistant, Dutch lover, and his young American wife. With its turbulent passions amid social upheavals, The Last Devadasi takes readers on a sensual feast in the 1970s palm-shaded trading city of Madras.
Devadasis of India
Author: Veenus Jain
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2021-03-18
Total Pages: 153
ISBN-13: 939035899X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKAncient India has been a land of wisdom, riches and mysteries. Its fabled saints, philosophers, ascetics, its multiplicity of Gods & religions, complex rituals and even snake charmers and magicians never ceased to fascinate the world. Socio-religious tradition of Devadasis or the 'Brides of God' as they were known in India, is one such tradition, shrouded in mystery that attracts attention. It compels a curious mind to take a closer look to learn more and understand its realities. These women are generally referred to by the term devadasi which literally means 'female servant of the deity'. This work bears on many topics such as origin, belief, development, ceremonies, organization, functions, activities, paramours, sexuality, historical survey, statistical analysis, preventive measures and the pathetic stories of devadasis. Because it was conceived as a study of women, culture and religion, it must be borne in mind that all these concerns are dealt with as they arise out of a close attention to the practices of the devadasis.
Muvalur Ramamirthammal's Web of Deceit
Author: Muvalar Ramamirthammal
Publisher: Zubaan
Published: 2003
Total Pages: 236
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKGiven to the Goddess
Author: Lucinda Ramberg
Publisher: Duke University Press
Published: 2014-09-17
Total Pages: 295
ISBN-13: 0822376415
DOWNLOAD EBOOKWho and what are marriage and sex for? Whose practices and which ways of talking to god can count as religion? Lucinda Ramberg considers these questions based upon two years of ethnographic research on an ongoing South Indian practice of dedication in which girls, and sometimes boys, are married to a goddess. Called devadasis, or jogatis, those dedicated become female and male women who conduct the rites of the goddess outside the walls of her main temple and transact in sex outside the bounds of conjugal matrimony. Marriage to the goddess, as well as the rites that the dedication ceremony authorizes jogatis to perform, have long been seen as illegitimate and criminalized. Kinship with the goddess is productive for the families who dedicate their children, Ramberg argues, and yet it cannot conform to modern conceptions of gender, family, or religion. This nonconformity, she suggests, speaks to the limitations of modern categories, as well as to the possibilities of relations—between and among humans and deities—that exceed such categories.
Devadasi, ''A Nun's Story''
Author: Tom Matthews
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
Published: 2012-09-05
Total Pages: 137
ISBN-13: 1479708372
DOWNLOAD EBOOK"The author wonderfully captures the powerful emotions and human condition of each character. The book is filled with interesting episodes and incidents and it is a fascinating journey for the reader. Well-crafted plot..."
Servants of the Goddess
Author: Catherine Rubin Kermorgant
Publisher: Random House India
Published: 2014-02-24
Total Pages: 406
ISBN-13: 8184005601
DOWNLOAD EBOOKServants of the Goddess weaves together the heartbreaking, yet paradoxically life-affirming stories of five devadasis—women, in the clutches of an ancient fertility cult, forced to serve the gods. Catherine Rubin Kermorgant sets out attempting to make a documentary film about the lives of present-day devadasis. Through her, we meet and get to know the devadasi women of Kalyana, a remote village in Karnataka. As they grow to trust Kermorgant and welcome her as an honorary sister, we hear their stories in their own words: stories of oppression, discrimination, violence and, most importantly, resilience. Kermorgant becomes a part of these stories and finds herself unwittingly enmeshed in a world of gender and caste bias which extends far beyond Kalyana—all the way to Paris, where the documentary is to be edited and produced. Servants of the Goddess is a testament to women’s strength and spirit, and a remarkably astute analysis of gender and caste relations in today’s rural India.
Ideals, Images, and Real Lives
Author: Alice Thorner
Publisher: Orient Blackswan
Published: 2000
Total Pages: 380
ISBN-13: 9788125008439
DOWNLOAD EBOOKWomen studies as a distinct field emerged in India in the mid-seventies. But preoccupation with the position of women dates back to more than a century and a half. By the use of methods of history, literary criticism and analysis of discourse, this volume seeks not only to illustrate the broadening of the sphere of women studies in India in recent years, but also to point to the need for relating ideas about women and gender relations to the social and economic forces that shape history.
