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Dear list members,
Our next seminar will be at 6:00-7:30pm on Wednesday June 3 in Room
S325 of the John Woolley Building, University of Sydney.
We hope you can attend.
Kind regards,
AABS Executive
Re-envisioning Sanskrit: Approaching Texts through Language
and Embodiment
According to the models of existence that are presented in the Ṛgvedic
Āraṇyakas, language belongs to a group of diverse deities (devatā) that abide
within the mortal body and together generate the person or puruṣa as a
constantly shifting array of emotional, psychological, sensory, and
physiological dynamics. While the transience of these states and their
appearance of incommensurability with the goal of realizing a self (ātman) has led
scholars to value them negatively as an impediment to realization, it is
the deities’ contribution of their own substantial identities to the
person that sets the parameters of spiritual attainment in its temporal
and practical aspects and describes the potential for transformation. In
contrast, then, to the critical interpretations that have come to
dominance in historical studies of Sanskrit’s religious significance,
these texts and their teachings demonstrate an understanding that
language and its internal structures are crucially involved in personhood,
its very manifestation and malleability. This indicates that as a living
expression of reality with its hidden connections, physical embodiment is
the immediate context for the unfolding of Vedic revelation. The result
is the suggestion that rather than looking for a language named Sanskrit
it would be more productive to ask what it means to become saṃskṛta.
Stephanie Majcher works
in both the academic and wider communities as a lecturer on the religious
traditions and culture of South Asia. She is currently completing a PhD
in Indian Studies at the University of Sydney and in previous years has
been actively involved in the development and delivery of both language
and non-language programs. Stephanie has been the recipient of a
Postgraduate Teaching Fellowship and a University Medal for her work on
Sanskrit, and will be a presenter at the 16th World Sanskrit Conference
(Bangkok).
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