[INDOLOGY] Publication Announcement

[Lavanya Vemsani]

Congratulations! Looking forward to reading your excellent work.
Thanks
Lavanya

On Mon, Feb 12, 2024 at 12:40 PM Matthew Robertson via INDOLOGY <
indology at list.indology.info> wrote:

> Dear Colleagues,
>
> I’m thrilled to announce the publication of my first book, *Puruṣa:
> Personhood in Ancient India *(OUP).
>
> Please find a description of the work below. Interested parties may
> receive *30% off* the title by using the code *AAFLYG6*. A sample chapter
> is also available by following this link
> <https://academic.oup.com/book/55730/chapter/434169835>.
>
> Description of the work via OUP
> <https://global.oup.com/academic/product/purua-9780197693605?cc=us&lang=en&#>
> :
>
> Personhood is central to the worldview of ancient India. Across voluminous
> texts and diverse traditions, the subject of the *puruṣa*, the Sanskrit
> term for "person," has been a constant source of insight and innovation.
> Yet little sustained scholarly attention has been paid to the precise
> meanings of the *puruṣa* concept or its historical transformations within
> and across traditions. In *Puruṣa: Personhood in Ancient India*, Matthew
> I. Robertson traces the history of Indic thinking about *puruṣas* through
> an extensive analysis of the major texts and traditions of ancient India.
>
> Through clear explanations of classic Sanskrit texts and the idioms of
> Indian traditions, Robertson discerns the emergence and development of a
> sustained, paradigmatic understanding that persons are deeply confluent
> with the world. Personhood is worldhood. *Puruṣa* argues for the
> significance of this "worldly" thinking about personhood to Indian
> traditions and identifies a host of techniques that were developed to
> "extend" and "expand" persons to ever-greater scopes. Ritualized swellings
> of sovereigns to match the extent of their realm find complement in ascetic
> meditations on the intersubjective nature of perceptually delimited
> person-worlds, which in turn find complement in yogas of sensory restraint,
> the dietary regimens of Ayurvedic medicine, and the devotional theologies
> by which persons "share" and "eat" the expansive divinity of God. Whether
> in the guise of a king, an ascetic, a yogi, a buddha, or a patient in the
> care of an Ayurvedic physician, fully realized persons know themselves to
> be coterminous with the horizons of their world.
>
> Offering new readings of classic works and addressing the fields of
> religion, politics, philosophy, medicine, and literature, *Puruṣa:
> Personhood in Ancient India* challenges us to reexamine the goals of
> ancient Indian religions and yields new insights into the interrelated
> natures of persons and the worlds in which they live.
>
>
> From the back cover:
>
> "Thinking precisely and clearly about personhood and its relationship to
> the worldhood is important.' This golden thread runs through the whole of
> this fascinating book that examines the social, philosophical, and
> religious understandings of puruṣa through Indian history. From deepest
> antiquity to the mid-first millennium, Robertson explores the very
> different evolutions of the central concept of personhood through the great
> traditions of Indian reflection and belief. This is a nuanced and
> sophisticated series of reflections on one of the most important and
> continuous themes in South Asian thought." -- Dominik Wujastyk, Singhmar
> Chair in Indian Society and Polity, University of Alberta
>
> "This magnificent, groundbreaking study of the ancient Indian category of
> puruṣa, the Indian 'person,' sweeps us into a world where the dimensions of
> inner and outer, and body and cosmos, collapse. Also collapsing are several
> received notions concerning Indian metaphysics." -- David Gordon White,
> Author of *The Yoga Sutra of Patanjali: A Biography*
>
>
> With very best wishes to all,
> Matthew
>
> Matthew I. Robertson, PhD
> (he / him / his)
> Lecturer, Department of History
> Coordinator, Religious Studies Minor
> Murray State University
> mrobertson13 at murraystate.edu
> matthewianrobertson at gmail.com
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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>


-- 

*Dr. Lavanya Vemsani*  Ph.D. History (Univ. of Hyderabad) & Ph.D. Religious
Studies (McMaster Univ.)

Distinguished University Professor of History, Department of Social Sciences

*Shawnee State University*

Portsmouth OH 45662

V:7403513233 F:7403513153 E:lvemsani at shawnee.edu


Editor, *American Journal of  Indic Studies*
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