Religions of the East

Stephen Hunt is Reader in Sociology at the University of the West of England, UK

• Contents: Introduction; Part I Sexuality and Cultural Expression: Concerning kamasutras: challenging narratives of history and sexuality, Jyoti Puri; The cult of the Earth Goddess among the Magar of Nepal, Marie Lecomte-Tilouine; Women in Honglou meng: prescriptions of purity in the femininity of Qing dynasty China, Louise Edwards; Contemporary Theravada and Zen Buddhist attitudes to human sexuality: an exercise in comparative ethics, Michel Clasquin-Johnson; Sexuality; the Chinese and the Judeo-Christian traditions in Hong Kong, Adolf K.T. Tsang. Part II Renunciation and Asceticism: Singing the glory of asceticism in Jainism, John E. Cort; ’Asceticism and sexuality in the mythology of Siva. Part II, Wendy Doniger O’Flaherty; Temple girls of medieval Karnataka, Aloka Parasher and Usha Naik; Kumari or 'virgin' worship in Kathmandu valley, M.R. Allen; Social consequences of marrying Visnu Narayana: primary marriage among the Newars of Kathmandu Valley, Anne Vergati. Part III Eastern Religion: Sexuality, Gender and Patriarchy: 'Abductions' and the constellation of a Hindu communal bloc in Bengal of the 1920s, P.K. Dutta; Women, sexuality and enlightenment: ’Kankyo no Tomo’, Rajyashree Pandey; Re-Imagining the divine in Sikhism, Nikky-Guninder Kaur Singh; The power to pollute and the power to preserve: perceptions of female power in a Hindu village, Catherine Thompson; Lustful women, elusive lovers: identifying males as objects of female desire, Prem Chowdhry. Part IV Eastern Religion: Sexual Variants: Not this, not that: the hijras of India and the cultural politics of sexuality, Vinay Lal; Like a city ablaze: the 3rd sex and the creation of sexuality in Jain religious literature, Leonard Zwilling and Michael J. Sweet; A comparative analysis of hijras and drag queens: the subversive possibilities and limits of parading effeminacy and negotiating masculinity, Sandeep Bakshi; Transsexualism, gender, and anxiety in traditional India, Robert P. Goldman; Ambiguous s

'This book captures historical diversity as well as contemporary dilemmas...an epic book covering the issue of sexuality principally in relation to Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism.' Religion and Human Rights Journal