| Description |
1 online resource : illustrations. |
| Physical Medium |
polychrome |
| Description |
text file |
| Series |
SUNY series in Hindu studies
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SUNY series in Hindu studies.
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| Summary |
A systematic analysis of the myth cycle of Paraśurāma ("Rāma with the Axe"), an avatára of Viṛṇu with a much darker reputation.The Other Rāma presents a systematic analysis of the myth cycle of Paraśurāma ("Rāma with the Axe"), an avatára of Viṛṇu best known for decapitating his own mother and annihilating twenty-one generations of the Kṛatriya warrior caste in an extermination campaign frequently referred to as "genocide" by modern scholars. Compared to Rāma and Kq̣ṛṇa, the other human forms of Viṛṇu, Paraśurāma has a much darker reputation, with few temples devoted to him and scant worshippers. He has also attracted far less scholarly attention. But dozens of important castes and clans across the subcontinent claim Paraśurāma as the originator of their bloodline, and his mother, Reṇukā, is worshipped in the form of a severed head throughout South India.Using the tools of comparative mythology and psychoanalysis, Brian Collins identifies three major motifs in the mythology of Paraśurāma: his hybrid status as a Brahmin warrior, his act of matricide, and his bloody one-man war to cleanse the earth of Kṛatriyas. Collins considers a wide variety of representations of the myth, from its origins in the Mahābhārata to contemporary debates online. He also examines Paraśurāma alongside the Wandering Jew of European legend and Psycho's matricidal serial killer Norman Bates. He examines why mythmakers once elevated this transgressive and antisocial figure to the level of an avatāra and why he still holds such fascination for a world that continues to grapple with mass killings and violence against women.Brian Collins is Drs. Ram and Sushila Gawande Chair in Indian Religion and Philosophy at Ohio University. He is the author of The Head beneath the Altar: Hindu Mythology and the Critique of Sacrifice. |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| Contents |
Intro -- Contents -- List of Figures -- Abbreviations -- Acknowledgments -- Preface: The Other Rāma -- Introduction: God with an Axe -- The Paraśurāma Cycle -- The Argument, Purpose, and Structure of This Book -- Argument -- Purpose -- Structure -- A Note on Method: How Myths Make Sense -- A Warning: The Politics of Speculative Arguments -- Critiques of Comparison -- Myth/Myths/Mythos/Mythology -- Myths are Narratives -- Myths Express Values -- Myths Express Anxieties -- Myths Express Worldviews -- Myths Are Received and Reproduced |
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Myth Reception: Psychoanalysis, Structure, and Subjectivity -- Chapter 1 The Brahmin Warrior: Paraśurāma in Extremis -- Universal, Particular, Singular: Paraśurāma's Fractured Identity -- Brahmin Power and Kṛatriya Puissance -- Droṇa, Dattātreya, and Viśvāmitra: Symbols of Dislocation, Excess, and Becoming -- Crossing Paths and Streams with Droṇa -- Dattātreya and Paraśurāma -- Kings and Cattle -- The Royal Sage versus the Brahmin Warrior -- Sovereign and Supplement -- Dharma and the Sovereign -- Between Two Deaths: The Cirañjīvin, the Wandering Jew, and the Double Negation |
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The Vengeance of Aśvatthāman -- Conclusion -- Chapter 2 Matricide I: The Broken Pot -- The Matricidal Micromyth: "Death to all that flows" -- The First Element: "Incontinent the Void" -- Defilement and Akrasia -- Gandharvas, the Chora, and the Woman Waylaid at the Well -- Reading Myth through Ritual -- Conclusion -- Chapter 3 Matricide II: The Severed Head -- Abjection, Repression, Renunciation: Language and the Law of the Father -- The Matricidal Axe -- Axe Murdering and Mother Killing in the Śaiva Tradition -- Cooler Heads Prevail While Others Roll: The Story of Cirakāri |
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Reṇukā the Headless Goddess -- Further Psychoanalytic Readings of the Matricide Micromyth -- Mapping the Forest -- Ek-Hi or Fort-Da? -- The Dead Mother Complex -- Conclusion -- Chapter 4 Varṇicide I: The Extermination of the Kṛatriyas and Its Aftermath -- Scenes from the Bhārgava-Haihaya Feud -- Var.icide and Genocide: From Limited to Limitless Violence -- The Patron Saint of Total War -- Aśvatthāman as a Shadow of Paraśurāma -- The First Theology of Paraśurāma: Mitigating the Myth's Violence in the Pāñcarātra Tradition -- Wrath and Pride: The Jaina Paraśurāma -- Conclusion |
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Chapter 5 Varṇicide II: Blood and Soil in Malabar and Maharashtra -- The Uses and Abuses of Paraśurāma -- The Kṛatra as Sacrificial Remainder -- The Land Creation Submotif -- The Nambudiris: Paraśurāma and the Culture of the Malabar Coast -- Paraśurāma and the Keralan Martial Arts Traditions -- The Citpāvans: "Paraśarāma" [sic] Among the Marāṭhās -- Conclusion -- Conclusion: Introducing Paraśurāma -- Summary of Contents -- Tying It All Together: Structure and Transformation in the Myth Core -- The Analogic Key: Father, Mother, Brahmin, Kṛatriya -- Double Birth |
| Local Note |
eBooks on EBSCOhost EBSCO eBook Subscription Academic Collection - North America |
| Subject |
Paraśurāma (Hindu deity)
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Paraśurāma (Hindu deity) |
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Hindu mythology.
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Hindu mythology. |
| Genre/Form |
Electronic books.
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| ISBN |
9781438480404 (electronic book) |
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1438480407 (electronic book) |
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9781438480381 |
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