Philip Lutgendorf | The University of Iowa (original) (raw)
Papers by Philip Lutgendorf
Tea in India
Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures, 2016
11. The Secret Life of Rāmcandra of Ayodhya
Many Rāmāyaṇas
Article Making tea in India: Chai, capitalism
This essay examines the process by which tea, a plant and product introduced into the Indian subc... more This essay examines the process by which tea, a plant and product introduced into the Indian subcontinent in the early 19th century as a colonial cash crop, became indigenized and popularized as chai, often regarded today as India’s ‘national drink’. This process mainly occurred during the 20th century and involved aggressive and innovative marketing by both British and Indian commercial interests, advances in the technology of processing Assam tea, and changes in social space and practice, especially in urban areas. Keywords
Cecil B. DeMille’s famously cynical adage, “God is box office,” may be applied to Indian popular ... more Cecil B. DeMille’s famously cynical adage, “God is box office,” may be applied to Indian popular cinema, the output of the world’s largest film industry, albeit with certain adjustments—one must pluralize and sometimes feminize its subject. The genres known as “mythologicals” and “devotionals” were present at the creation of the Indian film and have remained hardy perennials of its vast output, yet they constitute one of the least-studied aspects of this comparatively under-studied cinema. Indeed, I will venture that for scholars and critics, mythologicals have generally been “hard to see.” Yet DeMille’s words also belie the fact that most mythologicals—like most commercial films of any genre—flop at the box office. The comparatively few that have enjoyed remarkable and sustained acclaim hence merit study both as religious expressions and as successful examples of popular art and entertainment.
Two dances and a conference
South Asian Popular Culture, 2017
A symposium on ‘The Evolution of Song and Dance in Hindi Cinema’ was held at California’s Sonoma ... more A symposium on ‘The Evolution of Song and Dance in Hindi Cinema’ was held at California’s Sonoma State University in April 2017. Organized by Rajinder Dudrah and Ajay Gehlawat, its presentations, which generated the articles featured in this special issue of SAPC, offered an array of new perspectives on this cinema’s musical and choreographic dimensions, with notable and especially welcome attention given to the latter. For despite general agreement among scholars of popular Hindi cinema that the presence of music and dance is one of its trademark features, scholarship on this formidable entertainment industry has often focused on its narratives as texts, and to a lesser extent on acting, camerawork, and mise-en-scène – largely ignoring the music and dance sequences that may constitute as much as a third of a film’s running time, or even dismissing them as insignificant add-ons or ‘spectacles’ of emotional excess (see, e.g. Prasad; Dissanayake and Sahai). And if song itself has been...
ONE. Ram's Story in Shiva's City: Public Arenas and Private Patronage
Cultural and Power in Banaras
Jai Santoshi Maa Revisited
Representing Religion in World Cinema, 2003
Cecil B. DeMille’s cynical adage, “God is box office,” may be applied to Indian popular cinema, t... more Cecil B. DeMille’s cynical adage, “God is box office,” may be applied to Indian popular cinema, the output of the world’s largest film industry, albeit with certain adjustments—one must pluralize and sometimes feminize the subject of the adage. The film genre known as “mythological” was present at the creation of the Indian feature film and has remained a hardy perennial of its vast output, yet it constitutes one of the least-studied aspects of this comparatively understudied cinema, cursorily dismissed (or more often ignored) by scholars and critics.2 Yet DeMille’s words also belie the fact that most mythologicals—like most commercial films of any genre— flop at the box office. The comparatively few that have enjoyed remarkable and sustained acclaim hence merit study both as religious expressions and as successful examples of popular art and entertainment.
Himalaya the Journal of the Association For Nepal and Himalayan Studies, 2005
Fantasies about life beyond the front range of the Great Himalaya have been a trope in lndian lit... more Fantasies about life beyond the front range of the Great Himalaya have been a trope in lndian literature since at least the period of the Sanskrit epics. The demi-divine beings believed to inhabit the high country were famously sexually active, and even th e human "northern Kurus" (as residents of the region have somet.imes been called) were rumored to have long, happy lives unburdened by inhibitions, especially in sexual matters: their women were allegedly free to enjoy multiple extramarital liasons and polyandrous marriages. Such legends appear to persist in popular 20th century narrative through a much-used trope in Bombay cinema: the depiction of the Himalayas as a realm of uninhibited romantic fantasy. Although this trope is often confined to virtually extra-narrative song sequences that whisk the hero and heroine to Himalayan (or lately European or even New Zealand alpine) locales, a number of highly successful films have given it much more extended treatment by romantically pairing a plains-dwelling hero with a Himalayan heroine. This article briefly traces th e history of this scenario and then considers the contextual and cultural implications of its use in two notable films: Raj Kapoor's Ran1 Tcri Ganga lvlaili (1984) and Mani Ratnam's Oil Sc (1998).
Five heads and no tale: Hanumān and the popularization of Tantra
International Journal of Hindu Studies, 2001
... Although there is some variation in the iconography of five-faced HanumS.n, most images appea... more ... Although there is some variation in the iconography of five-faced HanumS.n, most images appear to follow the prescriptions of a single set of 'visualization verses' (dhyana ~loka) that are usually said to be excerpted from the Sudargana Samhita. ...
Imagining Ayodhyā: Utopia and its shadows in a Hindu landscape
International journal of Hindu studies, 1997
Page 1. Imagining Ayodhyfi: Utopia and its shadows in a Hindu landscape Philip Lutgendorf RS.ma i... more Page 1. Imagining Ayodhyfi: Utopia and its shadows in a Hindu landscape Philip Lutgendorf RS.ma is king, Ayodhya his capital, and gods and sages hymn their glory. --Tulsid~s Oh beautiful for patriot dream, that sees beyond ...
Evolving a monkey: Hanuman, poster art and postcolonial anxiety
… practices and ideologies in modern India, 2003
Hanuman, simian sidekick to the principal human hero of the Ramayana tradition, has evolved withi... more Hanuman, simian sidekick to the principal human hero of the Ramayana tradition, has evolved within comparatively recent times into one of the most popular and ubiquitous of Hindu deities. He is revered by tens of millions as their ishta-deva or ‘chosen, personal deity’, and his shrines have proliferated in both urban and rural areas. The visual representation of this deity has likewise evolved conventions that, through the mass reproduction and gradual homogenisation characteristic of 20th century popular art, have crystallised in a number of readily-recognisable icons. After briefly surveying the range of Hanuman's historical representations, this essay focuses on a subset of 20th century images in which the divine monkey appears as afurless, humanised, and (of late) heavily-muscled hero with only vestigial simian characteristics, and situates these images within the context of a number of contemporary trends in popular visual culture. Finally, it attempts to link this new visual convention to a widespread body of discourse concerning the ‘scientific’ rationalisation and historicisation of Hindu sacred legend.
The View from the Ghats: Traditional Exegesis of a Hindu Epic
The Journal of Asian Studies
The View from the Ghats: Traditional Exegesis of a Hindu Epic PHILIP LUTGENDORF X he most popular... more The View from the Ghats: Traditional Exegesis of a Hindu Epic PHILIP LUTGENDORF X he most popular book in northern India is a Hindi retelling of the ancient tale of Prince Rãm and his wife, Siti, composed in about AD 1574 by the poet-saint Tulsïdas of Bañaras. Throughout ...
Monkey in the Middle
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
A Reader's Guide to the Hanumāyana
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
A Long and Winding Tail
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
The Life of a Text: Performing the Ramcaritmanas of Tulsidas
The Journal of American Folklore, 1992
... Indian Studies; I would like to thank, at the Delhi office of the latter institution, Pradeep... more ... Indian Studies; I would like to thank, at the Delhi office of the latter institution, Pradeep Mehendiratta and his staff, and my Hindi instructor, Santwana Nigam. ... the Hindi work was found to have risen to the top of the pile, and its cover bore the words satyatn, sivam, sundaram (truth ...
Sitings and Sightings
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
The Hanumāyana
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
Prayers, Recipes, Memoirs
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
Tea in India
Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures, 2016
11. The Secret Life of Rāmcandra of Ayodhya
Many Rāmāyaṇas
Article Making tea in India: Chai, capitalism
This essay examines the process by which tea, a plant and product introduced into the Indian subc... more This essay examines the process by which tea, a plant and product introduced into the Indian subcontinent in the early 19th century as a colonial cash crop, became indigenized and popularized as chai, often regarded today as India’s ‘national drink’. This process mainly occurred during the 20th century and involved aggressive and innovative marketing by both British and Indian commercial interests, advances in the technology of processing Assam tea, and changes in social space and practice, especially in urban areas. Keywords
Cecil B. DeMille’s famously cynical adage, “God is box office,” may be applied to Indian popular ... more Cecil B. DeMille’s famously cynical adage, “God is box office,” may be applied to Indian popular cinema, the output of the world’s largest film industry, albeit with certain adjustments—one must pluralize and sometimes feminize its subject. The genres known as “mythologicals” and “devotionals” were present at the creation of the Indian film and have remained hardy perennials of its vast output, yet they constitute one of the least-studied aspects of this comparatively under-studied cinema. Indeed, I will venture that for scholars and critics, mythologicals have generally been “hard to see.” Yet DeMille’s words also belie the fact that most mythologicals—like most commercial films of any genre—flop at the box office. The comparatively few that have enjoyed remarkable and sustained acclaim hence merit study both as religious expressions and as successful examples of popular art and entertainment.
Two dances and a conference
South Asian Popular Culture, 2017
A symposium on ‘The Evolution of Song and Dance in Hindi Cinema’ was held at California’s Sonoma ... more A symposium on ‘The Evolution of Song and Dance in Hindi Cinema’ was held at California’s Sonoma State University in April 2017. Organized by Rajinder Dudrah and Ajay Gehlawat, its presentations, which generated the articles featured in this special issue of SAPC, offered an array of new perspectives on this cinema’s musical and choreographic dimensions, with notable and especially welcome attention given to the latter. For despite general agreement among scholars of popular Hindi cinema that the presence of music and dance is one of its trademark features, scholarship on this formidable entertainment industry has often focused on its narratives as texts, and to a lesser extent on acting, camerawork, and mise-en-scène – largely ignoring the music and dance sequences that may constitute as much as a third of a film’s running time, or even dismissing them as insignificant add-ons or ‘spectacles’ of emotional excess (see, e.g. Prasad; Dissanayake and Sahai). And if song itself has been...
ONE. Ram's Story in Shiva's City: Public Arenas and Private Patronage
Cultural and Power in Banaras
Jai Santoshi Maa Revisited
Representing Religion in World Cinema, 2003
Cecil B. DeMille’s cynical adage, “God is box office,” may be applied to Indian popular cinema, t... more Cecil B. DeMille’s cynical adage, “God is box office,” may be applied to Indian popular cinema, the output of the world’s largest film industry, albeit with certain adjustments—one must pluralize and sometimes feminize the subject of the adage. The film genre known as “mythological” was present at the creation of the Indian feature film and has remained a hardy perennial of its vast output, yet it constitutes one of the least-studied aspects of this comparatively understudied cinema, cursorily dismissed (or more often ignored) by scholars and critics.2 Yet DeMille’s words also belie the fact that most mythologicals—like most commercial films of any genre— flop at the box office. The comparatively few that have enjoyed remarkable and sustained acclaim hence merit study both as religious expressions and as successful examples of popular art and entertainment.
Himalaya the Journal of the Association For Nepal and Himalayan Studies, 2005
Fantasies about life beyond the front range of the Great Himalaya have been a trope in lndian lit... more Fantasies about life beyond the front range of the Great Himalaya have been a trope in lndian literature since at least the period of the Sanskrit epics. The demi-divine beings believed to inhabit the high country were famously sexually active, and even th e human "northern Kurus" (as residents of the region have somet.imes been called) were rumored to have long, happy lives unburdened by inhibitions, especially in sexual matters: their women were allegedly free to enjoy multiple extramarital liasons and polyandrous marriages. Such legends appear to persist in popular 20th century narrative through a much-used trope in Bombay cinema: the depiction of the Himalayas as a realm of uninhibited romantic fantasy. Although this trope is often confined to virtually extra-narrative song sequences that whisk the hero and heroine to Himalayan (or lately European or even New Zealand alpine) locales, a number of highly successful films have given it much more extended treatment by romantically pairing a plains-dwelling hero with a Himalayan heroine. This article briefly traces th e history of this scenario and then considers the contextual and cultural implications of its use in two notable films: Raj Kapoor's Ran1 Tcri Ganga lvlaili (1984) and Mani Ratnam's Oil Sc (1998).
Five heads and no tale: Hanumān and the popularization of Tantra
International Journal of Hindu Studies, 2001
... Although there is some variation in the iconography of five-faced HanumS.n, most images appea... more ... Although there is some variation in the iconography of five-faced HanumS.n, most images appear to follow the prescriptions of a single set of 'visualization verses' (dhyana ~loka) that are usually said to be excerpted from the Sudargana Samhita. ...
Imagining Ayodhyā: Utopia and its shadows in a Hindu landscape
International journal of Hindu studies, 1997
Page 1. Imagining Ayodhyfi: Utopia and its shadows in a Hindu landscape Philip Lutgendorf RS.ma i... more Page 1. Imagining Ayodhyfi: Utopia and its shadows in a Hindu landscape Philip Lutgendorf RS.ma is king, Ayodhya his capital, and gods and sages hymn their glory. --Tulsid~s Oh beautiful for patriot dream, that sees beyond ...
Evolving a monkey: Hanuman, poster art and postcolonial anxiety
… practices and ideologies in modern India, 2003
Hanuman, simian sidekick to the principal human hero of the Ramayana tradition, has evolved withi... more Hanuman, simian sidekick to the principal human hero of the Ramayana tradition, has evolved within comparatively recent times into one of the most popular and ubiquitous of Hindu deities. He is revered by tens of millions as their ishta-deva or ‘chosen, personal deity’, and his shrines have proliferated in both urban and rural areas. The visual representation of this deity has likewise evolved conventions that, through the mass reproduction and gradual homogenisation characteristic of 20th century popular art, have crystallised in a number of readily-recognisable icons. After briefly surveying the range of Hanuman's historical representations, this essay focuses on a subset of 20th century images in which the divine monkey appears as afurless, humanised, and (of late) heavily-muscled hero with only vestigial simian characteristics, and situates these images within the context of a number of contemporary trends in popular visual culture. Finally, it attempts to link this new visual convention to a widespread body of discourse concerning the ‘scientific’ rationalisation and historicisation of Hindu sacred legend.
The View from the Ghats: Traditional Exegesis of a Hindu Epic
The Journal of Asian Studies
The View from the Ghats: Traditional Exegesis of a Hindu Epic PHILIP LUTGENDORF X he most popular... more The View from the Ghats: Traditional Exegesis of a Hindu Epic PHILIP LUTGENDORF X he most popular book in northern India is a Hindi retelling of the ancient tale of Prince Rãm and his wife, Siti, composed in about AD 1574 by the poet-saint Tulsïdas of Bañaras. Throughout ...
Monkey in the Middle
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
A Reader's Guide to the Hanumāyana
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
A Long and Winding Tail
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
The Life of a Text: Performing the Ramcaritmanas of Tulsidas
The Journal of American Folklore, 1992
... Indian Studies; I would like to thank, at the Delhi office of the latter institution, Pradeep... more ... Indian Studies; I would like to thank, at the Delhi office of the latter institution, Pradeep Mehendiratta and his staff, and my Hindi instructor, Santwana Nigam. ... the Hindi work was found to have risen to the top of the pile, and its cover bore the words satyatn, sivam, sundaram (truth ...
Sitings and Sightings
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
The Hanumāyana
Hanuman's Tale, 2007
Prayers, Recipes, Memoirs
Hanuman's Tale, 2007