Majcher 2015 Becoming Sanskrit (original) (raw)

Revisiting Sanskritization in Contemporary India

IASSI Quarterly: Contributions to Indian Social Science, 2021

M.N Srinivas’ concept of Sanskritisation helped us understand that the emulation of ritual practices of people in the upper strata of the Hindu social order by those in the lower order is a critical route of social mobility in everyday life. It is in this context that the present article, delineates as to how Srinivas’s concept of ‘sanskritisation’ seen as a ‘Chronotope’ (or layered-process; used in the Bakhtian sense) helps us to (a) bring the debate out of the Brahmanical mould and hence entrench it into non-brahmanical hierarchies and (b) examine the change in community-interaction from being a mere emulation of established orders to that of setting up of alternatives. In other words, this paper tries to prod on the question as to why in recent years are caste communities articulating an independent cultural identity.

Sanskrit and the Morning After: The Metaphorics and Theory of Intellectual Change

Indian Economic and Social History Review

This essay offers critical reflection on the work of Sheldon Pollock and Sudipto Kaviraj in connection with the project, ‘Sanskrit Knowledge-Systems on the Eve of Colonialism.’ While both Pollock and Kaviraj have written of the ‘death’ of Sanskrit, this essay advises against metaphors of historical rupture. If we wish to make sense of the fate of Sanskrit intellectuals under colonial modernity, we should attend to processes of cultural convergence and the concrete choices made by Sanskrit scholars. A selection from the reformist writings of Ishwaracandra Vidyasagara is examined to demonstrate one pandit’s on-going engagement with the Sanskrit intellectual tradition.

Review of: Sabine Ziegler, Klassisches Sanskrit. Wiesbaden: Ludwig Reichert, 2012

Journal of South Asian Languages and Linguistics 4.2, 2017

The journal provides a peer-reviewed forum for publishing original research articles and reviews in the fi eld of South Asian languages and linguistics, with a focus on descriptive, functional and typological investigations. Descriptive analyses are encouraged to the extent that they present analyses of lesserknown languages, based on original fi eldwork. Other areas covered by the journal include language change (including contact-induced change) and sociolinguistics. The journal also publishes occasional special issues on focused themes relating to South Asian languages and linguistics for which it welcomes proposals.

World in the Embrace of Sanskrit: Language Beyond Politics and Nationalism

2022

Sanskrit, one of the oldest languages in the world has many joyful takers across the globe who wants to learn the language and the Sanskritic values associated with it. Sanskrit has been the language that has led to the birth many vernaculars and other regional languages. The treasure house of Sanskrit has been recognized by the world and many corporates, heads of various countries want to speak the language and instill its values in their places. The article explores how Sanskrit has re-emerged at the global level and distributing wealth as it did in Ancient India but in a revised way.

The Battle for Sanskrit Review

Despite its neglect by scholars in the Western academic world, Rajiv Malhotra’s recent bestselling and impactive book `The Battle for Sanskrit’ (TBFS) succeeds in its objective and will resonate with its target readers: traditional Sanskrit scholars in India as well as English-speaking right-leaning Hindus across the world. Malhotra raises hard questions and presents grim facts in lucid vocabulary and a style which is a combination of academic, critical, trenchant, and motivational. He summarizes debatable and objectionable views and theories of Sheldon Pollock and what he calls ‘American Orientalism’; offers counter-views and alternate theories; and exhorts traditional Sanskrit scholars to critique Pollock’s works, views, and theories more substantially. In this article, I present a detailed review of the book and highlight what in my opinion are the strengths and weaknesses of the book. Although I have a favourable opinion of Malhotra’s book, I hope the contents of the article will prove useful, for the purpose of discussions and debates around the issues raised in the book, to even readers who are neutral or opposed to Malhotra’s views. In addition to an appendix on proofreading errors in TBFS, the article includes two more appendixes—one critiquing Pollock’s claim of an instance of semantic inversion and another analyzing contents of a recent statement that Pollock signed.

SANSKRIT IN THE ARCHIPELAGO: TRANSLATION, VERNACULARIZATION AND TRANSLOCAL IDENTITY

Hunter, Thomas M. 2011 “Sanskrit in the Archipelago: Translation, Vernacularization and Translocal Identity.” In Suchorita Chatopadhyay (ed.) Tracing Transactions: An Anthology of Critical Essays on India and Southeast Asia. [a Centre for Advanced Study Publication of the Department of Comparative Literature, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India]. New Delhi: Worldview Publications (2011; in press) Abstract: In this study I suggest that we should understand process of translation from Sanskrit into Old Javanese in terms of the role of transculturation and processes of translocal identity formation as explored in the works of scholars like Sheldon Pollock with reference to a “Sanskrit cosmopolis” or “Sanskrit ecumene” (1996) and the development of “cosmopolitan vernacular” languages (1998) within the same socio-cultural zones at the end of the 1st millennium CE. I begin this study by comparing claims made by Pollock regarding the role of Sanskrit and Prakrit languages in the Indian inscriptional record with the evidence of the Malay-Indonesian archipelago, concluding that a basic similarity stands out, but that developments in the archipelago take a different course at various times due to local historical and socio-economic constraints. I then study the early literary history of Java and Bali in terms of “a culture of diglossia” that I claim was basic to the development of a wide variety of textual discourses of insular Southeast Asia during the era of the Sanskrit ecumene. I draw on works like Braginsky’s (1993) contrast of literatures that “shape literary zones” and those that connect pre-existing zones, and Nihom’s (1994) use of the term “narrativization” to help explain the way that South Asian philosophical and religious discourses were developed in the context of the archipelago. In order to describe a common form of rhetorical structure characteristic of the didactic tradition in Old Javanese (OJ) I develop the term “translation dyads”, noting that it can be applied as well to the study of the OJ Parwa and that its role continues to be felt in the noetics of Javano-Balinese theatrical traditions, which I suggest should be understood in terms of a performance culture of “theatrical diglossia.” Finally I suggest that diglossic linguistic practices, the text-building strategies of Old Malay and Old Javanese, and processes of lexical incorporation that evolved during the era of the “Sanskrit ecumene” had a long-lasting influence on later cultural practices in the archipelago whose roots go back to the development of the Old Javanese language as a “cosmopolitan vernacular” (Pollock 1998), and the consequent emergence of a fully self-conscious literary tradition in the archipelago. Keywords: Sanskrit poetics, Old Javanese poetics, kāvya (literary genre), kakawin (literary genre), court centres (kraton), ritual labour (buat hyang, buat haji), Sanskrit cosmopolis, Sanskrit ecumene, Bhaṭṭikāvyam, Kakawin Rāmāyaṇa (Old Javanese Rāmāyaṇa) The Indonesian translation of this article has been published as: “Bahasa Sanskerta di Nusantara: Terjemahan, Pemribumian, Dan Identitas Antardaerah.” In Henri Chambert-Loir, (ed.) Sadur: Sejarah Terjemahan di Indonesia dan Malaysia. Jakarta: Kepustakaan Populer Gramedia, pp. 23-47.