Constructions of Gender, Sexuality, and the Family in South Asian Cultures

RELIGION 1733 Subject & Catalog Number

Description

This course will provide you with a comprehensive historical overview of gender issues as they are represented in the great textual traditions of South Asia (these categories include Vedic materials, medical literature, treatises on law and sexual behavior, and texts that outline the great debates over questions of gender identity and salvation preserved for us in certain Jaina and Buddhist materials). To make these classical texts more relevant, readings in recent anthropological studies of religion, performance, and kinship will also be included to enable you to trace recurring themes, images, and symbols. You will thereby gain a sense of continuity of traditions and attitudes as well as generative innovations and contemporary variants and divergences within them.  Jointly offered by South Asian Studies as SAS 171, and by Harvard Divinity School.