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John S. Hawley
Course Description: This course will explore historical, theological, social, and ritual dimensions of “lived Hinduism” in the greater New York area. Common readings deal with diasporic Hinduism in several locations and with the religious plurality of contemporary New York. Individual field projects will focus on several worshipping communities, a parade, and two yoga centers.
Course Rationale: It is often argued that in the last half century, Hindus living outside of India have exerted an influence on conceptualizations of Hinduism that is far more creative and influential than their sheer numbers would predict. This course enables students to investigate that phenomenon while simultaneously getting a sense of how disparate—yet interconnected—are the environments where such rethinking and “repracticing” take place in the greater New York area. Simultaneously, it provides a framework in which students can work individually and in small groups to investigate and document the life of several such sites by means of interviews, participant observation, life histories, and archival research. In the latter part of the course, students generate corporate reading assignments appropriate to their individual projects, and present those projects to the class as a whole. The course prepares the way for a conference (in fall, 2005) in which Hindus associated with various sites selected for field study discuss with students the results of their research; and in a class project in which these results are tailored for a website.
Course Requirements:
(a) Reading and class participation. Students are expected to attend all class sessions, and to participate vigorously in class discussion on the basis of a thoughtful reading of the assigned materials. (b) Reading response postings. Four postings must be made to CourseWorks in weeks 2-9, in which students reflect on the issues that arise in the reading assignments for that particular week. These should be no longer than 2 pages double-spaced, and must be posted by midnight of the Sunday preceding the week in question. (c) Seminar projects. Starting early in the course, students spend significant time and effort relating their readings to the study of one particular site, which serves as the basis of the seminar paper each will produce. These papers will be individual efforts, but students will usually work in groups of two or three, so as to produce more than one perspective on a single site. Writing relevant to the seminar will be presented in four stages:
1- Field notes, proposal, bibliography (February 22) 2- Text to be posted on the course website (March 22) 3- Draft seminar paper (April 5) 3- Seminar paper, final version (May 2).
Evaluation system:
Reading responses and class participation (30%) Field project submission 2/22 (10%) Website text 3/22 (20%) Final seminar paper 5/2 ( 40%)
Course Readings:
(1) Books.
The following books are required for the course, and are available for purchase at Labyrinth Books (536 W. 112th Street). Copies are also available on reserve at the Barnard College Library.
Paul Connerton, How Societies Remember (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).
Diana L. Eck, A New Religious America (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2001).
Robert M. Emerson, Rachel I. Fretz, and Linda L. Shaw, Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995).
Joanna Lessinger, From the Ganges to the Hudson: Indian Immigrants in New York City(Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1995)
Robert A. Orsi, ed., Gods of the City (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999).
Vijay Prashad, The Karma of Brown Folk (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2000).
Steven Vertovec, The Hindu Diaspora: Comparative Patterns (London: Routledge, 2000).
(2) Other required reading.
Certain materials will be handed out in class. These are indicated on the course syllabus with an asterisk (*).
Articles and short portions from books that are required reading for the course have been assembled in a course reader that can be purchased at The Village Copier. Items in the course reader are signified in the syllabus with a double asterisk (**). Almost all of these materials can also be located in the Barnard and Columbia libraries, if you would prefer. A single, unbound copy of the course reader is available for you to consult on a limited-time basis in Milbank 219 (see Tynisha Rue, our Departmental Assistant).
(3) Additional resources. Readings that may be helpful but are not required are listed with other readings for the weeks to which they most closely pertain, and are indicated with a triple asterisk (***).
Course Policies: The Pluralism Project: This course is affiliated with the Pluralism Project at Harvard University and has received a grant in that connection. Our association with the Pluralism Project carries with it the responsibility and privilege of contributing to the general archives of the Pluralism Project, and potentially to the Project’s website and future editions of its CD-ROM On Common Ground. Travel funds: Thanks to our grant from the Pluralism Project, funds will be available to defray the cost of student travel to distant sites. If you are working at such a site, please introduce yourself to Tynisha Rue for further information about how to negotiate the financial hurdles. Late work: Except in case of serious medical or family emergencies, late work will be downgraded one-half letter grade per day. General Travel Advisory: There’s much to be said for keeping generally abreast of issues affecting members of the Hindu community in the United States and specifically in the New York area. Here are several resources—a small sampling of a list that is potentially very large: www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/indiv/southasia/cuvl
Course Syllabus
Week 1: January 18. Introduction to the course and to the sites on which we will focus. Formation of project groups and launching of a first visit (keep brief notes).
Week 2: January 25. American religious plurality. Finalization of project groups. Field Work – I.
Diana L. Eck, A New Religious America (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2001), pp. 1-26, 61-141.
Robert M. Emerson, Rachel I. Fretz, and Linda L. Shaw, Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), pp. 1-38.
Complete the Human Subjects Research training program available at https://www.rascal.columbia.edu. Select the Compliance module and within that, the Testing Center. This on-line course is intended to take one hour to complete and once done, provides you the certification necessary to proceed with our course.
*** Diana L. Eck, On Common Ground: World Religions in America [CD-ROM] (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997; second edition, 2002).
Week 3: February 1. Diasporic Hinduism – I. Field Work – II.
Steven Vertovec, The Hindu Diaspora: Comparative Patterns (London: Routledge, 2000), entire.
Emerson et al., Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes, pp. 39-65.
** Ron Grimes, “Fieldwork in Religious Studies: Guidelines and Forms for the Waterloo Religions Project,” unpublished paper, Wilfrid Laurier University, 2002, pp. 7-10, 17-24, 43-54.
* Courtney Bender et al., “Pointers and Guidelines for Observing Religious Services” (adapted).
* Courtney Bender, “Protocol for Field Notes.”
*** Harry F. Wolcott, The Art of Fieldwork (Walnut Creek: AltaMira Press, 1995), chapter 5, pp. 86-121.
*** Harold Coward, John R. Hinnells, and Raymond Brady Williams, ed., The South Asian Religious Diaspsora in Britain, Canada, and the United States (Albany: SUNY Press, 2000).
*** Raymond B. Williams, Religions of Immigrants from India and Pakistan: New Threads in an American Tapestry (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988).
*** Colin Clarke, Ceri Peach, and Steven Vertovec, eds., South Asians Overseas: Migration and Ethnicity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990).
Week 4: February 8. Diasporic Hinduism – II. Field Work – III.
Vijay Prashad, The Karma of Brown Folk (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2000), pp. 1-156.
** Sandhya Shukla, “Locations for South Asian Diasporas,” Annual Review of Anthropology 30 (2001), pp. 551-572.
*** Aparna Rayaprol, Negotiating Identities: Women in the Indian Diaspora (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1997).
*** Tony Carnes and Fenggang Yang, eds., Asian American Religions: Borders and Boundaries (New York: New York University Press, 2004).
*** Robert M. Emerson, Rachel I. Fretz, and Linda L. Shaw, Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995). The remaining chapters of this book are a helpful resources throughout the course.
*** Arthur J. Magida, ed., How to Be a Perfect Stranger: A Guide to Etiquette in Other People’s Religious Ceremonies (Woodstock, VT: Jewish Lights Publishing, 1996).
*** James Clifford and George E. Marcus, eds., Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986). See especially the chapter by Vincent Crapanzano, “Hermes’ Dilemma: The Masking of Subversion in Ethnographic Description,” pp. 51-76.
*** Daniel Miller and Don Slater, The Internet: An Ethnographic Approach (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000).
Week 5: February 15. Indians in New York.
Joanna Lessinger, From the Ganges to the Hudson: Indian Immigrants in New York City(Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1995), entire.
** J. S. Hawley, “Global Hinduism in Gotham,” in Tony Carnes and Fenggang Yang, eds., Asian American Religions: Borders and Boundaries (New York: New York University Press, 2004), pp. 112-137..
*** Susan Slyomovics, “New York City’s Muslim World Day Parade,” in Peter van der Veer, ed., Nation and Migration: The Politics of Space in the South Asian Diaspora (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1995), pp. 157-177.
*** Madhulika S. Khandelwal, “Índian Immigration in Queens, New York City: Patterns of Spatial Concentration and Distribution, 1965-1990,” in Peter van der Veer, Nation and Migration, pp. 178-196.
*** Daniel Jasper, “The Incorporation of Hinduism in New York,” International Center for Migration, Ethnicity, and Citizenship, The New School University. Posted at:
Week 6. February 22. On City Religion.
NB: Your initial field report is due in class. It should contain (1) a copy of your field jottings to date, for which there is no page limit; (2) a five-page thematic essay in which you forecast the shape of your seminar paper for the course; and (3) a draft bibliography of works you have read or intend to consult.
Robert A. Orsi, ed., Gods of the City (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999), pp. 1-154.
** Joanne Waghorne, “The Gentrification of the Goddess,” International Journal of Hindu Studies 5:3 (2003), pp. 11-51.
*** Tony Carnes and Anna Karpathakis, eds., New York Glory: Religions in the City (New York: New York University Press, 2001).
*** R. Scott Hanson, “City of Gods: Religious Freedom, Immigration, and Pluralism in Flushing, New York,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Chicago, 2000.
*** Joanne Punzo Waghorne, Diaspora of the Gods: Modern Hindu Temples in an Urban Middle-Class World (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004).
Week 7. March 1. On Memory.
Paul Connerton, How Societies Remember (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), entire.
** Maurice Halbwachs, “Religious Collective Memory,” which is part I, chapter 6 of Halbwachs, On Collective Memory, tr. Lewis A. Coser (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), pp. 84-119.
The “Midnight’s Children” website: http://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/mmt/mc.
*** Elizabeth Castelli, Martyrdom and Memory: Early Christian Culture Making (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), pp. 10-32.
Week 8. March 8. On the ‘Construction’ of Hinduism.
NB: Texts to be posted on the course website are due in class today. These will be shorter than and distinct from your seminar papers. For reasons having to do with ethical standards and legal obligations, they should not contain any “human subjects” content. These will be distinctly in the public domain. You are welcome—indeed, encouraged—to consult with persons you have met at your research site in fashioning this text.
** David N. Lorenzen, “Who Invented Hinduism?,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 41:4 (1999), pp. 630-359.
** J. S. Hawley, “Naming Hinduism,” The Wilson Quarterly 15:3 (summer 1991), pp. 20-34.
** Wendy Doniger, “Hinduism by Any Other Name,” The Wilson Quarterly 15:3 (summer 1991), pp. 35-41.
** Vasudha Narayanan, “Creating South Indian Hindu Experience in the United States,” in Raymond B. Williams, ed., A Sacred Thread: Modern Transmission of Hindu Traditions in India and Abroad (Chambersburg, PA: Anima Publications, 1992), pp. 147-176.
** Prema Kurien, “Becoming American by Becoming Hindu: Indian Americans Take Their Place at the Multicultural Table,” in R. Stephen Warner and Judith G. Wittner, eds., Gatherings in Diaspora: Religious Communities and the New Immigration (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1998), pp. 37-70.
*** Vasudha Dalmia and Heinrich von Stietencron, eds., Representing Hinduism: The Construction of Religious Traditions and National Identity (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 1995).
*** Ronald Inden, Imagining India (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1990), pp. 85-130.
*** Gunther D. Sontheimer and Hermann Kulke, eds., Hinduism Reconsidered (New Delhi: Manohar, 1989).
Spring Recess. No class on March 15.
Week 9. March 22. Evaluating Others’ Work.
2003 “Hinduism Here” results: http://www.barnard.edu/religion/hinduismhere.
** Lindsey Harlan, “Reversing the Gaze in America: Parody in Divali Performance at Connecticut College,” in Knut A. Jacobsen and P. Pratap Kumar, eds., South Asians in the Diaspora (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2004), pp. 161-179.
** Ron Grimes, Fieldwork in Religious Studies, pp. 32-33.
** T. S. Rukmani, ed., Hindu Diaspora: Global Perspectives (Montreal: Concordia University, Chair in Hindu Studies, 1999), selections. NB: This book does not form a part of the course reader and is only available by purchase or on reserve. Students will report on one chapter only—of their own selection—in class.
*** Hanna Kim, “Being Swaminarayan: The Ontology and Significance of Belief in the Construction of a Gujarati Diaspora,” PhD. dissertation, Columbia University, 2001..
Week 10. March 29. Paper drafting week: no class. First drafts of seminar papers are to be posted on CourseWorks by midnight Friday April 1. A hard-copy version is due in the lucite box marked “Religion” outside 219 Milbank by 5:00 Sunday, April 3. Please note: the building may be locked after noon on Saturday.
Week 11. April 5. Site Projects – I.
This is the first of three weeks in which two groups of students will present their work. Draft versions of the project reports will provide the main reading for each of these weeks, available on CourseWorks. These will be judiciously supplemented by additional readings that presenters wish to assign as background especially relevant to their presentations. Students not making presentations will be responsible for editorial evaluations of the papers presented in any given week (probably with two students commmenting on a given paper).
Week 12. April 12. Site Projects – II.
Week 13. April 19. Site Projects – III.
Week 14. April 26. Evaluations, Disputations, Conclusions
Rajiv Malhotra, “The Position of Hinduism in America’s Higher Education,” www.infinityfoundation.com/ECIThinduismframe.htm, downloaded December 4, 2000, with e-correspondence from J. S. Hawley, Rupa Viswanath, and Nate Roberts.
“Defamation/Anti/Defamation: Hindus in Dialogue with the Western Academy,” www.barnard.edu/religion/hindu. [TO BE ALTERED] These are the edited proceedings of a panel held at the American Academy of Religion in Denver in fall, 2001.
*** Rajiv Malhotra, “RISA Lila – 1: Wendy’s Child Syndrome,” www.sulekha.com/column.asp?cid=239156, version of September 6, 2002.
Paul Courtright, “Studying Religion in an Age of Terror,” unpublished paper.
Monday, May 2. The final version of your seminar paper is due in Milbank 219 at 4:00 pm.
The Sites
The following “sites” have been selected for investigation and encounter by students enrolled in the course in Spring, 2005.
Ammachi Satsang of the Upper West Side Arya Spiritual Center, Jamaica, Queens Be Yoga, Manhattan Divya Dham, Woodside, Queens Durga Temple, South Brunswick, NJ Geeta Temple, Elmhurst, Queens Maha Vallabha Ganapati Devasthanam, Queens Phagwah Parade, Jamaica, Queens Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Center, Manhattan Vedanta Society, Manhattan
About
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