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Why Sacred Groves Matter: Post-Romantic Claims
February 9, 2010 @ 7:30 pm - 9:00 pm
A public lecture with Professor Ann Grodzins Gold, Professor in the Departments of Religion & Anthropology at Syracuse University.
Professor Gold’s research in North India has focused on religious practices, gender oral traditions, and oral histories of ecological change. Her publications include numerous articles and four books: Fruitful Journeys: The Ways of Rajasthani Pilgrims; A Carnival of Parting: The Tales of King Bharthari and King Gopi Chand; Listen to the Heron’s Words: Reimagining Gender and Kinship in North India (co-authored with Gloria Raheja); and In the Time of Trees and Sorrows: Nature, Power and Memory in Rajasthan (co-authored with Bhoju Ram Gujar) which in 2004 was awarded the Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy Book Prize from the Association for Asian Studies. Gold’s recent work has concerned origin tales and miracle tales at rural shrines to regional deities whose healing powers are linked to protected landscapes and natural beauty. Her newest project, for which she holds a senior fellowship for 2010-11 from the American Institute of Indian Studies, will look at neighborhood, commerce and religious pluralism in a small market town. In diverse regions of India exist thousands of mostly small forested areas surrounding built shrines or understood as spaces inhabited by gods or spirits. These spaces harbor complex worlds of meaning, where greenery is integral to pilgrimage practices focused on everyday devotion and a quest for extraordinary healing miracles.
Sponsored by the Center for the Humanities and the Public Sphere with support from the Jerome A. Yavitz Fund, the Department of Religion, and the Center for the Study of Hindu Traditions (ChiTra). This event is free and open to the public.
On Tuesday, February 9th, Professor Gold will also be conducting a seminar for faculty and graduate students on the subject of “Food Values: Sketches from Rajasthan.” Professor Gold would like participants in the graduate student/ faculty seminar to read the draft of her essay prior to the discussion. Please email Anne Newman at annen1@ufl.edu if you are interested in attending the seminar.