While Tamil-speaking South India is celebrated for its preservation of Hindu tradition, other religious communities have played a significant role in shaping the region's religious history. Among these non-Hindu communities is that of the Buddhists, who are little-understood because of the scarcity of remnants of Tamil-speaking Buddhist culture. Here, focusing on the two Buddhist texts in Tamil that are complete (a sixth-century poetic narrative and an eleventh-century treatise on grammar and poetics), Monius sheds light on the role of literature and literary culture in the formation, articulation, and evolution of religious identity and community.
Imagining a Place for Buddhism
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle.
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||
Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Review
"Anne Monius has produced a learned and detailed book on the insufficiently studied subject of Buddhism in South India, which greatly enriches our knowledge of the religious life of the early medieval Tamil-speaking region. . . . Monius's lucidly written book greatly broadens our understanding of early Tamil Buddhist identity formation and evolution. It is a very welcome and creative addition to Tamil scholarship that sets a high standard for future work in the field and deserves to be widely read."--The Journal of Religion
About the Author
Anne E. Monius is at University of Virginia.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Medieval Buddhist texts and communities,
By megorox (Springfield, MO USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Imagining a Place for Buddhism: Literary Culture and Religious Community in Tamil-Speaking South India (Hardcover)
The thesis of this book revolves around the notion that Buddhist literature (the Manimekalai and the Viracoliyam specifically) molded and created the Buddhist communities in which it was popularized, versus the communities creating the literature to fit their particular social and religious situations. This is more of an academic work than a book to read for fun.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
Inside This Book
(learn more)
First Sentence:
U. V. Caminataiyar (1855-1942), one of the scholars responsible for the preservation of and modern renaissance of interest in the oldest literary works composed in Tamil, thus records his initial response to the moving beauty of a poetic narrative, a narrative whose Buddhist idiom he often found frustrating. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
multilingual literary culture, nonliteral exchange, regional literary language, renunciatory vow, bowl relic, poetic ornamentation, interdependent origination, branch stories, heightened emotional experience, landscape envisioned, public rest house, glorious community, literary connoisseurs, poetic grammar, cosmic place, chronicle literature, community envisioned, northern texts, poetic corpus, poetic ornaments, devotional poets, beneficial conditions, heightened mood, poetic anthologies, commentarial literature Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, Reading Manimékalai, South Asian, Tamil Buddhist, Kómuki Lake, North Indian, Imagining Community, Lord Siva, Jewel Island, King Punniyarácan, Prince Utayakumaran, Tamil-speaking Buddhist, Nilakanta Sastri, Old Javanese, Tamil Manimékalai New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
U. V. Caminataiyar (1855-1942), one of the scholars responsible for the preservation of and modern renaissance of interest in the oldest literary works composed in Tamil, thus records his initial response to the moving beauty of a poetic narrative, a narrative whose Buddhist idiom he often found frustrating. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
multilingual literary culture, nonliteral exchange, regional literary language, renunciatory vow, bowl relic, poetic ornamentation, interdependent origination, branch stories, heightened emotional experience, landscape envisioned, public rest house, glorious community, literary connoisseurs, poetic grammar, cosmic place, chronicle literature, community envisioned, northern texts, poetic corpus, poetic ornaments, devotional poets, beneficial conditions, heightened mood, poetic anthologies, commentarial literature Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, Reading Manimékalai, South Asian, Tamil Buddhist, Kómuki Lake, North Indian, Imagining Community, Lord Siva, Jewel Island, King Punniyarácan, Prince Utayakumaran, Tamil-speaking Buddhist, Nilakanta Sastri, Old Javanese, Tamil Manimékalai New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Citations (learn more)
This book cites 95
books:
See all 95 books this book cites
3
books
cite this book:
- Lexicon of Tamil Literature (Handbuch Der Orientalistik Zweite Abteilung, Indien) by Kamil V. Zvelebil on 12 pages
- Commentary on the Dhammapada by H.C. Norman on 9 pages
- Reader-Response Criticism: From Formalism to Post-Structuralism by Jane P. Tompkins on 6 pages
- Poems to Siva: The Hymns of the Tamil Saints by Indira Viswanathan Peterson on 5 pages
- Companion Studies to the History of Tamil Literature (Handbuch Der Orientalistik, Erganzungsband 5) by Kamil V. Zvelebil on 5 pages
See all 95 books this book cites
- Alternative Krishnas: Regional And Vernacular Variations On A Hindu Deity by Guy L. Beck on page 149, and Back Matter
- The Different Paths of Buddhism: A Narrative-Historical Introduction by Carl Olson in Back Matter
- Relics of the Buddha (Buddhisms) by John S. Strong in Back Matter
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
