| Title:
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RELIGION AND PUBLIC MEMORY
A CULTURAL HISTORY OF SAINT NAMDEV IN INDIA |
| By: |
Christian Lee Novetzke |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| List price:
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£28.00 |
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£22.40 |
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£5.60 |
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| ISBN 10: |
0231141858 |
| ISBN 13: |
9780231141857 |
| Availability: |
Usually dispatched within 1-3 weeks.
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| Publisher: |
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS |
| Pub. date: |
25 October, 2011 |
| Pages: |
336 |
| Description: |
Born into a low caste of tailors in thirteenth-century India, Namdev gained widespread fame for his innovative performances of devotional songs and simple affection for God. Today the figure of Saint Namdev is central to many religious traditions within Hinduism and Sikhism and is a key presence in the early religious literature of northern India, Maharashtra, and Punjab in the second millennium. He appears throughout Marathi and Hindi modern public spheres, where his identity fluctuates between regional associations and a pan-Indian, nationalist-secularist character. Through the lens of memory and public performance, Christian Lee Novetzke considers Namdev's historical permutations in India over eight centuries. Drawing on ethnographies of devotional performance, archival materials, scholarly historiography, and popular media including film, he vividly illustrates how India's religious communities preserve their pasts and create new historical narratives around perennially sacred figures. |
| Synopsis: |
Namdev is a central figure in the cultural history of India, especially within the field of bhakti, a devotional practice that has created publics of memory for over eight centuries. Born in the Marathi-speaking region of the Deccan in the late thirteenth century, Namdev is remembered as a simple, low-caste Hindu tailor whose innovative performances of devotional songs spread his fame widely. He is central to many religious traditions within Hinduism, as well as to Sikhism, and he is a key early literary figure in Maharashtra, northern India, and Punjab. In the modern period, Namdev appears throughout the public spheres of Marathi and Hindi and in India at large, where his identity fluctuates between regional associations and a quiet, pan-Indian, nationalist-secularist profile that champions the poor, oppressed, marginalized, and low caste. Christian Lee Novetzke considers the way social memory coheres around the figure of Namdev from the sixteenth century to the present, examining the practices that situate Namdev's memory in multiple historical publics. Focusing primarily on Maharashtra and drawing on ethnographies of devotional performance, archival materials, scholarly historiography, and popular media, especially film, Novetzke vividly illustrates how religious communities in India preserve their pasts and, in turn, create their own historical narratives. |
| Illustrations: |
25 illus. |
| Publication: |
US |
| Imprint: |
Columbia University Press |
| Returns: |
Returnable |
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