Deconstructing Gender in Hinduism

H-Announce Unravelling the threads of “revealed knowledge”: deconstructing gender in Hinduism.

Announcement published by Tapati Bharadwaj on Monday, November 9, 2015 Type: Call for Papers Date: January 31, 2016 Subject Fields: Literature, Women's & Gender History / Studies, South Asian History / Studies, Colonial and Post- Colonial History / Studies, Religious Studies and Theology

Unravelling the threads of “revealed knowledge”: deconstructing gender in Hinduism.

This is a call for paper which will examine the nature of religious texts and how oppressive gender norms are inscribed within them. The focus is to read religious texts as “texts” within a literary- feminist interpretative parameter, and in the process, make it possible to re-write sections of these texts which are misogynous/ caste-ist.

Feminist scholars can cry themselves hoarse in trying to understand the nature of institutionalised misogyny that permeates all aspects of civil, social and religious life and has been seen as the status quo since times immemorial. On similar lines, development theorists and economists have tried to address how poverty works in order to alleviate it. But if we refuse to acknowledge that religion which is the bedrock of all societies- is the perpetrator in enabling this kind of gender-class oppression – then it is a losing battle that feminists and economists wage as they analyse the origins of social inequalities.

And so – whom should we blame? For example, if the Upanishads articulate a sense of heightened machismo – and the sole purpose of religious institutions is to perpetuate and propagate this particular brand of religion, apart from also referring to ways of achieving Nirvana, – then this sense of misogyny will exist in an a-historical manner and there is nothing that the secular state can do to undo the entrenched misogyny. For example, in the Aiteraya Upanishad, it is written:

In man indeed is the soul first conceived. That which is this semen is extracted from all the limbs as their vigour. He holds that self of his in his own self. When he sheds it into his wife, then he procreates it. That is its first birth.

…

She, the nourisher, becomes fit to be nourished [protected]. The wife bears that embryo (before the birth).

Women are seen as passive – only of use in procreation. And this is the recurring trope which dominates all religious texts. No one has the authority to question the nature of “revealed

Citation: Tapati Bharadwaj. Unravelling the threads of “revealed knowledge”: deconstructing gender in Hinduism.. H-Announce. 11-09-2015. https://networks.h-net.org/node/73374/announcements/93426/unravelling-threads-%E2%80%9Crevealed-knowledge%E2%80%9D-deco nstructing-gender Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 1 H-Announce knowledge” which determines socio-cultural values.

If we look at how a religious institution works and I cite the example of a global institution like the Ramakrishna Mission – which considers itself as progressive and modern in its outlook – despite the enormous charitable work that it has done – not a single peep has emerged from the hallowed corridors of this religious order about the misogyny within Hinduism and neither has it ever attempted to address the fact that the very bedrock of its existence –that the religious mantra it preaches – is laden with misogyny. Any institution that propagates the Hindu religious texts – is complicit in acts of perpetuating misogyny in an institutionalised manner. How is it that no one ever holds them accountable for spreading such kinds of hate-speech? Why is it that feminists and economists and development scholars never analyse how these religious institutions work in creating a social order which entrenches misogyny in the psyche of all citizens?

For more information, please write to: Tapati Bharadwaj at: [email protected].

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