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The Exotic
None
Otherwise Occupied
Tracing the historical development of recent identity-based trends in literary theory to their roots in structuralism, Dorothy M. Figueira questions the extent to which theories and pedagogies of alterity have actually enabled us to engage the Other. She tracks academic attempts to deal with alterity from their inception in critical thought in the 1960s to the present. Focusing on multiculturalism and postcolonialism as professional and institutional practices, Figueira examines how such theories and pedagogies informed the academic and public discourse regarding September 11. She also investigates the theories and pedagogies of alterity as crucial elements in the bureaucratization of diversity within academe and discusses their impact on affirmative action.
The Hermeneutics of Suspicion
Through a unique combination of theoretical scope and material, and historical, breadth The Hermeneutics of Suspicion poses an original investigation into our understanding of alterity in Indian literature and history, and significantly contributes to an emerging discourse on East-West literary relations. Hans Georg Gadamer's notion of hermeneutical consciousness seeks to open up a cultural context through which to engage the other. It stands in opposition to the hermeneutics of suspicion advocated by recent popular theories, such as colonial discourse analysis, multiculturalism, postcolonial theory, the critique of globalism, etc. In his late work, Paul Ricoeur charts a middle path between ...
Sati, the Blessing and the Curse
Several years ago in Rajasthan, an eighteen-year-old woman was burned on her husband's funeral pyre and thus became sati. Before ascending the pyre, she was expected to deliver both blessings and curses: blessings to guard her family and clan for many generations, and curses to prevent anyone from thwarting her desire to die. Sati also means blessing and curse in a broader sense. To those who revere it, sati symbolizes ultimate loyalty and self-sacrifice. It often figures near the core of a Hindu identity that feels embattled in a modern world. Yet to those who deplore it, sati is a curse, a violation of every woman's womanhood. It is murder mystified, and as such, the symbol of precisely wh...
Otherwise Occupied
Tracing the historical development of recent identity-based trends in literary theory to their roots in structuralism, Dorothy M. Figueira questions the extent to which theories and pedagogies of alterity have actually enabled us to engage the Other. She tracks academic attempts to deal with alterity from their inception in critical thought in the 1960s to the present. Focusing on multiculturalism and postcolonialism as professional and institutional practices, Figueira examines how such theories and pedagogies informed the academic and public discourse regarding September 11. She also investigates the theories and pedagogies of alterity as crucial elements in the bureaucratization of diversity within academe and discusses their impact on affirmative action.
Rebuilding the Profession
This volume is meant to be a retrospective look at the field of Comparative Literature as it has developed in the past two decades, as well as a reflection on its future direction if it is to remain relevant (and innovative) as a field of study. From its inception in the second half of the twentieth century, Comparative Literature in the US has been conceived as a cross-disciplinary, cross-national, and crosscultural enterprise that brings together theoretical developments in the Humanities and Social Sciences to reflect on the most important intellectual and cultural trends from a comparative perspective through the lens of literary studies. Most of the founders of Comparative Literature were distinguished European scholars who sought a safe haven from the ravages of World War II and its aftermath and who, understandably focused on the Western literary, intellectual and cultural tradition, which at the time was in danger of being annihilated by the onslaught of Fascism and Communism. With the advent of the age of globalization the field of Comparative Literature has become increasingly diverse and must, therefore, be reoriented and recognized accordingly.
Translating the Orient
This book examines the emplotment of India in the Western literary imagination. Basing her discussion on the reception of an emblematic Sanskrit text, Kālidāsa's Śākuntala, Figueira studies how and why this text was distorted in translation, criticism, and adaptation, and isolates the linguistic errors and cultural distortions that can be grouped into trends and patterns. The unique situation of Śākuntala's reception affords the author the opportunity to look at the way Europeans projected their cultural needs upon India. The author puts into perspective an entire social and intellectual history of Europe's encounter with Indian culture, an examination of its cultural and political consequences, and a philosophical inquiry into differences between Eastern and Western world views.
Dilemma in Politics
Dilemma in Politics underlines the major faults and fissures in the academic discourses around the themes emphasizing upon the prevalence of dichotomy between ‘what ought to be’ and ‘what is’ in the political sphere. How do political values get marginalized, if not compromised, in the name of ideological conflicts and alliances? This book highlights this dilemma across a range of themes which explore the gaps in the practice and the praxis of politics. The chapters in this volume present detailed analytical perspective on issues concerning environment, female empowerment and feminist discourses and identity-based politics and its limitations, among various other key themes. Further, ...
The German Gita
How did the Bhagavadgãtà first become an object of German philosophical and philological inquiry? How were its foundational concepts initially interpreted within German intellectual circles, and what does this episode in the history of cross-cultural encounter teach us about the status of comparative philosophy today? This book addresses these questions through a careful study of the figures who read, translated and interpreted the Bhagavadgãtà around the turn of the nineteenth century in Germany: J.G. Herder, F. Majer, F. Schlegel, A.W. Schlegel, W. von Humboldt, and G.W.F. Hegel. Methodologically, the study attends to the intellectual contexts and prejudices that framed the early reception of the text. But it also delves deeper by investigating the way these frameworks inflected the construction of the Bhagavadgãtà and its foundational concepts through the scholarly acts of excerpting, anthologization, and translation. Overall, the project contributes to the pluralization of Western philosophy and its history while simultaneously arguing for a continued critical alertness in cross-cultural comparison of philosophical and religious worldviews.
