Saswati Bhattacharya's Books

Mutating Goddesses

Bengal’s Laukika Hinduism and Gender Rights

By: Saswati Sengupta

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Mutating Goddesses

Bengal’s Laukika Hinduism and Gender Rights

By: Saswati Sengupta

Mutating Goddesses traces the shifting fortunes of four specific Hindu deities—Manasa, Candi, Sasthi and Laksmi—from the fifteenth century to the present time. It focuses on the goddess-invested tradition of Bengal's Hinduism to argue for a historical evolution/devolution of divinities in tandem with sectarian interests and illumines in the process the knotted correlation of gender, caste and class in the sanctioning of female subjectivities through goddess formation. The critical studies of Hindu goddesses have been dominated by the sastrik perspective deriving from the Sanskrit scriptures authorized by the male Brahman. But there are religious practices and beliefs under the broad rubric of Hinduism that are neither governed by the male Brahman nor articulated in Sanskrit. It is this vibrant laukika archive—considered low from the hegemonic perspective—that Mutating Goddesses explores to realize the politic trafficking between this realm and the sastrik. The book excavates the multiple and layered heritage of the region which includes tribal culture, Buddhism, Tantricism, and so on, as is available in rituals, proverbs, verses, circulating myths, poetic genres and kathas, caste manuals, census records etc to illustrate how tradition is a matter of strategic selection.

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Page Count

299

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0190993251

ISBN 13

9780190993252

Potters without a Wheel

Ethnography of the Mritshilpis in Kolkata

By: Saswati Bhattacharya

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Potters without a Wheel

Ethnography of the Mritshilpis in Kolkata

By: Saswati Bhattacharya

This book is an ethnographic study of clay idol-makers of Kumartuli in Kolkata, India. Much of the visibility and identity of Kolkata’s creative culture has been dependent upon the clay artists of Kumartuli for the last 100 years or so. This book explores the nature of the carefully constructed identity of these idol-makers as mritshilpis , or clay artists, who, as opposed to ordinary potters, work with their hands instead of a wheel. It looks at how the mritshilpis consciously embrace and expand their market based on this variation and elevated status as artists instead of artisans and studies the embeddedness of this identity within the commodity markets. It also shows that commodity markets, in this case the market of clay idols, are an outcome of trends of urbanisation, popular demand, corporatisation and commodification of culture, all of which have shaped the contours of clay idol-making as not only an occupation but a brand identity. Drawing on extensive fieldwork and in-depth interviews, the book highlights the larger structural relationship between urbanisation, indigenous occupational categories and identity politics. It will be indispensable to scholars and researchers of sociology, social anthropology, political studies, cultural history, urban economy, art history, urbanisation, cultural studies and urban sociology.

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Page Count

158

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Published Date

ISBN 10

1000598632

ISBN 13

9781000598636

The Song Seekers

By: Saswati Sengupta

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The Song Seekers

By: Saswati Sengupta

As the monsoon rains wash over the city of Kolkata, four women sit and read and talk in the kitchen of Kailash—the old mansion of the Chattopadhyays where Uma comes to live after her marriage in the summer of 1962. Her husband’s silence about his mother and the childhood tragedy that beckons him from the shadowy landing of Kailash, the embroidered handkerchiefs in an old soap box in her father-in-law’s room and the presence of the old, green-eyed Pishi intrigue Uma. But it is only as she begins to read aloud the traditional Chandimangal composed by her husband’s grandfather to celebrate the goddess that the smothered stories begin to emerge... The novel weaves in the history of the militant goddess recast as wife, the Portuguese in Bengal, the rise of print and the making of memories from the swadeshi movement to the turbulent sixties in Bengal as Uma discovers that the foundation of Kailash is not only very deep but also camouflages the stink of death. Published by Zubaan.

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Page Count

315

Publisher

Zubaan

Published Date

ISBN 10

9381017484

ISBN 13

9789381017487

New Aspects of Mesozoic Biodiversity

By: Saswati Bandyopadhyay

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New Aspects of Mesozoic Biodiversity

By: Saswati Bandyopadhyay

The Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) was established on 17th December, 1931 by a great visionary Prof. Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis to promote research in the theory and applications of statistics as a new scienti c discipline in India. In 1959, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, the then Prime Minister of India introduced the ISI Act in the parliament and designated it as an Institution of National Importance because of its remarkable achievements in statistical work as well as its contribution to economic planning. Today, the Indian Statistical Institute occupies a prestigious position in the a- demic rmament. It has been a haven for bright and talented academics working in a number of disciplines. Its research faculty has done India proud in the arenas of Statistics, Mathematics, Economics, Computer Science, among others. Over s- enty ve years, it has grown into a massive banyan tree, like the institute emblem. The Institute now serves the nation as a uni ed and monolithic organization from different places, namely Kolkata, the Headquarters, Delhi, Bangalore, and Chennai, three centers, a network of ve SQC-OR Units located at Mumbai, Pune, Baroda, Hyderabad and Coimbatore, and a branch ( eld station) at Giridih. The platinum jubilee celebrations of ISI have been launched by Honorable Prime Minister Prof. Manmohan Singh on December 24, 2006, and the Govt. of India has declared 29th June as the “Statistics Day” to commemorate the birthday of Prof. Mahalanobis nationally.

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Page Count

144

Publisher

Springer

Published Date

ISBN 10

3642103111

ISBN 13

9783642103117

Potters without a Wheel

Ethnography of the Mritshilpis in Kolkata

By: Saswati Bhattacharya

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Potters without a Wheel

Ethnography of the Mritshilpis in Kolkata

By: Saswati Bhattacharya

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Solve jigsaw puzzle

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Page Count

158

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Published Date

ISBN 10

1000598632

ISBN 13

9781000598636

Book's by Saswati Bhattacharya

Mutating Goddesses

Mutating Goddesses

Potters without a Wheel

Potters without a Wheel

The Song Seekers

The Song Seekers

New Aspects of Mesozoic Biodiversity

New Aspects of Mesozoic Biodiversity

Potters without a Wheel

Potters without a Wheel

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