Sree Padma is the executive director of the Inter-Collegiate Sri Lanka Education (ISLE) Program, a study abroad program in Sri Lanka. She also teaches at Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine, offering courses on the cultural history of south Asia. She has been a research associate in the Department of History and Archaeology at Andhra University, Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, where she completed her Ph.D. She has taught at Harvard University as a lecturer and research associate in women's studies and history of religions and at Bowdoin College as assistant professor of history. She is the author of Costume, Coiffure, and Ornament in the Temple Sculpture of Northern Andhra (Agama Kala Prakasan, 1991) and the co-editor of Buddhism in the Krishna River Valley of Andhra (State University of New York Press, 2008).

• Table of Contents ; Acknowledgements ; Introduction ; 1. Goddess Explained - Perspectives From the West ; 2. Contextualizing the Fertility Goddess and the Gramadevata ; 3. Fertility Symbols of the Goddesses: ; Historical Renderings and Contemporary Practices ; 4. Profiles of Anthropomorphic Goddesses in Myth, Ritual, and History ; 5. Bala Perantalu: ; Auspicious Virgin Mothers ; 6. Perantalu: ; Auspicious Wives ; 7. Deifying Victimized Women: ; Sacrifices and Murders ; Conclusion ; Bibliography

A coherent and convincing thesis on goddess worship...Padma's methodological approach combining anthropology, archaeology, history, and mythology is refreshing and boldly successful...Her synthesis of pre-Vedic, Buddhist, Jaina, Vaisnava, and Saiva material into the framework of village goddess worship enriches her findings and makes her study unique...Her appraisals of on-the-ground religious practices past and present offer much to experts and non-experts interested in a new lens through which to approach Indic religions.

Sree Padma is the executive director of the Inter-Collegiate Sri Lanka Education (ISLE) Program, a study abroad program in Sri Lanka. She also teaches at Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine, offering courses on the cultural history of south Asia. She has been a research associate in the Department of History and Archaeology at Andhra University, Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, where she completed her Ph.D. She has taught at Harvard University as a lecturer and research associate in women's studies and history of religions and at Bowdoin College as assistant professor of history. She is the author of Costume, Coiffure, and Ornament in the Temple Sculpture of Northern Andhra (Agama Kala Prakasan, 1991) and the co-editor of Buddhism in the Krishna River Valley of Andhra (State University of New York Press, 2008).

• Table of Contents ; Acknowledgements ; Introduction ; 1. Goddess Explained - Perspectives From the West ; 2. Contextualizing the Fertility Goddess and the Gramadevata ; 3. Fertility Symbols of the Goddesses: ; Historical Renderings and Contemporary Practices ; 4. Profiles of Anthropomorphic Goddesses in Myth, Ritual, and History ; 5. Bala Perantalu: ; Auspicious Virgin Mothers ; 6. Perantalu: ; Auspicious Wives ; 7. Deifying Victimized Women: ; Sacrifices and Murders ; Conclusion ; Bibliography

A coherent and convincing thesis on goddess worship...Padma's methodological approach combining anthropology, archaeology, history, and mythology is refreshing and boldly successful...Her synthesis of pre-Vedic, Buddhist, Jaina, Vaisnava, and Saiva material into the framework of village goddess worship enriches her findings and makes her study unique...Her appraisals of on-the-ground religious practices past and present offer much to experts and non-experts interested in a new lens through which to approach Indic religions.

Sree Padma is the executive director of the Inter-Collegiate Sri Lanka Education (ISLE) Program, a study abroad program in Sri Lanka. She also teaches at Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine, offering courses on the cultural history of south Asia. She has been a research associate in the Department of History and Archaeology at Andhra University, Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, where she completed her Ph.D. She has taught at Harvard University as a lecturer and research associate in women's studies and history of religions and at Bowdoin College as assistant professor of history. She is the author of Costume, Coiffure, and Ornament in the Temple Sculpture of Northern Andhra (Agama Kala Prakasan, 1991) and the co-editor of Buddhism in the Krishna River Valley of Andhra (State University of New York Press, 2008).

• Table of Contents ; Acknowledgements ; Introduction ; 1. Goddess Explained - Perspectives From the West ; 2. Contextualizing the Fertility Goddess and the Gramadevata ; 3. Fertility Symbols of the Goddesses: ; Historical Renderings and Contemporary Practices ; 4. Profiles of Anthropomorphic Goddesses in Myth, Ritual, and History ; 5. Bala Perantalu: ; Auspicious Virgin Mothers ; 6. Perantalu: ; Auspicious Wives ; 7. Deifying Victimized Women: ; Sacrifices and Murders ; Conclusion ; Bibliography

A coherent and convincing thesis on goddess worship...Padma's methodological approach combining anthropology, archaeology, history, and mythology is refreshing and boldly successful...Her synthesis of pre-Vedic, Buddhist, Jaina, Vaisnava, and Saiva material into the framework of village goddess worship enriches her findings and makes her study unique...Her appraisals of on-the-ground religious practices past and present offer much to experts and non-experts interested in a new lens through which to approach Indic religions.