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Being a Child in a Mixed Family in Nowadays Transylvania

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Being a Child in a Mixed Family in Nowadays Transylvania

Author(s): Luminiţa Dumănescu / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2015

Mixed marriage is an image, on a small scale, of the multiethnic, multilinguistic and multicultural society of Transylvania. Previous studies have attempted to explain the mechanisms through which (ethnic or denominational) intermarriage occurs or issues related to language, religion and identity concerning these couples. The present study tackles the ways in which mixed couples from Transylvania solve problems regarding their children’s ethnic, linguistic and denominational affiliation. If in the case of intermarriage the fear of an identity-related fading opens up the path to intrusions from the part of the extended family, of the community and of the church, in relation to the choices made by parents regarding their children these interferences are limited and the partners alone decide their children’s future. This research thus details three elements that we have deemed determinant for what we have labelled “the issue of children born into intermarriages”: language, religion and ethnic identification. The study is based upon the qualitative research unfolded within the project Interethnic marriages: between an exercise of tolerance and a modern expression of indifference. 1895-2010.

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O tarapatach tożsamości w ciasnym świecie

Author(s): Zygmunt Bauman / Language(s): Polish Issue: 6/2003

Zygmunt Bauman's essay begins with an analysis of the political and social situation in selected European countries where leading politicians nurture xenophobia and pander to fears of crime. Bauman describes population and immigration surpluses in terms of "human waste" produced by the introduction and imposition of social order and economic progress. This has led to the emergence of the "social recuperation" industry. At the same time the traditional division of the world into the homely and civilised places which "we" occupy and isolated noman's-lands as well as uncultivated expanses in need of colonisation has disappeared. The world has become a tighter place to live in. In those globalised circumstances the question of identity is particularly pressing. Bauman argues that the identity fostered by such circumstances cannot be a product of self-definition. Rather, it is forged and imposed by others, beyond the control of its bearer. Thus identity appears to be an agonistic notion which makes us seek and castigate the other/alien in us. The trouble with identity, Bauman concludes, is a global issue; it cannot be solved on a local scale.

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The Veda and the Patronage Economy of the Hindu Temple

Author(s): Cezary Galewicz / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

The ambiguous relationship between the Veda and Hinduism has attracted considerable scholarship. So have recent cases of revival and redesigning of Vedic ritualism. Much less has been written on the concepts, forms and actual practices of the coexistence of temple ritual and the Veda within the territory of the Hindu temple. This relationship, by no means homogenous and not easy to articulate, must often have been problematic while engaging issues of identity, eligibility, agency, economy and power. It remains relevant to contemporary national Hinduism and political scene. From the early years of temple Hinduism, the presence of the Veda in the Hindu temple depended on a dynamic process of inclusion and exclusion with prestige game, status aspiration and competition among ritual agents. To make sense of this relationship, the essay proposes a historically in-formed perspective set against a background of regional patterns of pat-ronage and temple economy while addressing a variety of such relation-ships from historical Malabar (today‘s Kerala) with a focus on the temple ritual of vāraṃ.

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Tumuli Stones, Sacred Geography, and Meditation Halls for Mantra

Author(s): Keith Edward Cantú / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

This article examines how the patronage of tumuli, belief in sacred geography, the institution of meditation halls, and the practice of mantra at these halls converged in Tamil Nadu at the turn of the 19th century to facilitate a pan-sectarian Tamil “consensus” on yoga in the literature of Sri Sabhapati Swami (Capāpati Cuvāmikaḷ, b. 1828). The article begins by analyzing the phenomenon of tumuli (Tamil jīva-camāti) among Sabhapati’s gurus in the line of Kumara Devar (Kumāratēvar), as well as his own students. It then shows how such a phenomenon was intertwined with the mythology of Agastya and the Tamil Siddhas via Sabhapati’s other guru line. Consideration is also given to the role of mantra in these tumuli and their accompanying “Meditation Halls” (maṭālayams). The article concludes by claiming that intersections between tumuli sites, yoga, and mantra warrant more attention given their ability to attract emotional investment and financial patronage from various levels of society.

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Damage Management

Author(s): Libbie Mills / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

Jīrṇoddhāra replacement and repair of icons and the buildings that house them is an essential part of the full ritual of worship. Ritual officiants are there to ensure the procedure is carried out correctly, but it is the yajamāna, the patron, who must initiate the task, act as its host, and fund it. The paper considers Jīrṇoddhāra and the yajamāna’s role in it, as presented by the Devyāmata.

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Poetry and Legitimacy at the Mughal Court

Author(s): Oskar Podlasiński / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

The present paper proposes to take a new look at the imperial Mughal court’s pattern of patronage of arts and letters as a vital and indispensable component of the imperial state machinery on the one hand and an instrument of historical change on the other. It focuses on, and draws from, Čahār čaman, a mid-17th-c. work by Chandar Bhan Brahman, one of the prominent figures among poets, writers, scribes and secretaries in Mughal service; a person involved in the never-ending, and aesthetically intricate, ceremonial exchange of goods, honors, acts of refined praise and proofs of recognition that not only made up the rich and variegated courtly milieu of the period but also gave form and actively shaped the ethos of the Mughal state’s pattern of self-representation—all in the service of legitimating the imperial power and its expanding claim over increasingly vaster stretches of the Indian subcontinent and its regional rulers and their riches. The same was done in the garb of sophisticated aesthetics of imperial power that demanded rulers, princes, prominent chiefs and officers, executive clerks, accountants and administrative professionals to communicate and ever prove anew their status and position in the language and manners recognized as aesthetically pleasing and in the form requiring literary, if not poetical, skills and competence based on knowledge of recognized expressive forms and appropriate genres as well as individual talent and personal ambition.

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Unworthy Recipients and the Mercy of God

Author(s): Jarosław Zapart / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

This article examines the ideology of gift in the Sant hagiographies (paracaī) of Anantadās (16th/17th century). It is assumed that understanding author’s implicit view of gift giving (dāna) is fundamental to unraveling the meaning of certain episodes of the paracaīs. These involve curious cases such as that of Kabīr abandoning his dāna-related duties or those of various Sants, for example, Pīpā, offering gifts to the brahmins (who are, nevertheless, depicted mainly as enemies of the bhakts). The approach of Anantadās to dāna seems to differ significantly from the ideas expounded by the medieval Brahmanic, Buddhist, and Jain sources as it transcends the notion of the gift as being motivated by the socioreligious status of the recipient. It also proves the existence of a certain God-bhakt reciprocity. As such, dāna works on a soteriological level, as a devotional act aimed at creating a relationship with Hari, and on a proselytic level as a tool for expanding the religious community.

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Competitiveness in Sacred Learning

Author(s): Diletta Falqui / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2024

The current notion of the Vrātyas aggressivity seems to be mainly based on certain Vedic texts that record a biased account of their history. It is usually assumed that relevant passages refer to the aggression displayed by the Vrātyas during verbal confrontations with their opponents in order to determine the correct stance on ritual matters. However, even outside the Vrātya context, competitive hospitality and violent verbal exchanges may be found in the sapiential sphere, often in the form of riddles—the so-called brahmodya. Among the sections in the Mahābhārata that demonstrate epic traces of competitiveness in the field of sacred knowledge, this paper will primarily examine the Aṣṭāvakrīya-Upākhyāna (MBh 3.132–134), which features the sole Mahābhārata reference to the term brahmodya.

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Vrātya or Ancient Indo-Aryan Violence?

Author(s): Chiara Neri,Tiziana Pontillo / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2024

Jaiminīya-Brāhmaṇa (JB) II 225 and Pañcaviṃśa-Brāhmaṇa (PB) XVII 1.9 have been authoritatively interpreted by Falk (1986: 29–30) as evidence that the Vrātyas behaved in a peculiarly aggressive way. The present study puts forward the hypothesis that such violence was not a distinguishing feature of the Vrātyas, but an inherited common trait of the Indo-Aryan culture, which, for example, is well documented in its strong warrior tradition, in clashes between clans and families for dynastic reasons, in the frequent use of curses and other acts of verbal violence and in the ritual violence of bloody sacrifices. These various deep-rooted cultural patterns might all have stemmed from the original highly competitive social organization of the Indo-Aryan people. The way in which Vrātyas selected their leader, regardless of his birth status, in line with Buddhist meritocracy, also proves to be in line with this assumed competitiveness of the origins. This paper concentrates on the violence inherent in the Vrātya dialogues and their dramatic consequences. These dialogues are compared here with the Old and Middle Indo-Aryan “verbal contests” on the basis of Vedic and Pali texts, in the wake of work by Witzel (1987) and Manné (1990), who singled out relevant schemes and formulas in both the Brahmanical and Buddhist sources. Indeed, the earliest sources provide ample evidence of agonistic sapiential debates (the so-called brahmodyas), in which the loser is forced to submit to the winner or even undergo a much worse punishment.

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Vrātya and vrātīna in Sanskrit Grammatical Sources

Author(s): Valentina Ferrero / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2024

The present research aims at studying the derivation of vrātya- on the basis of the Aṣṭādhyāyī [A] of Pāṇini and on the relevant commentaries, to understand the Vedic usage of this lexeme and to investigate the origin of the notion of violence linked by default with the Vrātya identity. After a general overview of vrata- and vrāta- lexemes, rule A 5.2.21 vrātena jīvati is used to derive vrātīna-, and the relevant commentaries Mahābhāṣya [M], Kāśikāvṛttī [KV], and Siddhāntakaumudī [SK], turn out to be useful in understanding the many nuances of vrāta-. The derivation of vrātya- appears more complicated; the proposal advanced here resorts to A 5.3.113 vrātacphañor astriyām to explain both vrātyaḥ (nom. sg.), i.e., the outstanding ascetic mentioned in Śaunaka Atharvaveda-Saṃhitā and in Jaiminīya-Upaniṣad-Brāhmaṇa, and the more widespread vrātyāḥ (nom. pl.). Instead, other authoritative etymologies advanced over this last century interpret vrātya- as deriving from vrāta- based on vrata- (‘ritual vow’) or are influenced by the late association of Vrātyas with a violent behaviour.

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Between Secularity and Ultra-Orthodoxy: The Cultural Conflict between Hilonim and Haredim and Its Impact on Israel’s Cultural Security

Author(s): Piotr Kosiorek,Marcin Szydzisz,Elżbieta Szyszlak / Language(s): English Issue: 48/2024

This study deals with the dispute between secular Jews (Hilonim) and Orthodox Jews (Haredim) that is taking place in Israel today. Because of its nature – it concerns values, lifestyles, religion, worldview, and identity issues – it can be catego-rised as a cultural conflict. They represent one of the most significant challenges to cultural security. The case of Israel is no different. This paper looks closely at the determinants of the dispute between Haredim and Hilonim and the critical issues at stake. The discussion is placed in the context of Israel’s major cultural security issues

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A népszerűség ára

Author(s): Júlia Vallasek / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 08/2024

Barna Emília – Patakfalvi-Czirják Ágnes (szerk.): Populáris kultúra és politika. Typotex Kiadó, Bp., 2024.

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Becsületünk korlátairól. Alvin Plantinga könyve kapcsán

Author(s): Gergely Bakos / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 08/2024

Alvin Plantinga: Tudás és keresztény meggyőződés. Casparus Kiadó, Bp., 2023

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ANTY-MORALNOŚĆ I MORALNOŚĆ PODPORZĄDKOWANA W UJĘCIU SOCJOLOGII QUEER

Author(s): Jacek Kochanowski / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2024

The aim of this article is to undertake a theoretical reflection on the possible directions of socio- logical analysis of morality undertaken from the perspective of queer studies. In the first part of the article five approaches of conceptualising morality are presented, the starting point of which is the experience of sexually and/or gender non-normative people. These approaches are: morality as a dispositif of biopolitical power, as a system of hegemonic knowledge, as a set of practices of “judging power”, as an effect of “ideological lining”, and as a set of moral practices. The author then presents two broader theoretical frameworks of queer moral sociology: the theory of anti- morality and the theory of subordinate morality.

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INNE KOBIETY: LETHAL LESBIANS I LESBIAN CHIC – OBLICZA I EWOLUCJE WIZERUNKU HOMOSEKSUALNYCH KOBIET W HOLLYWOODZKICH THRILLERACH LAT 90.

Author(s): Marta Snoch / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2024

The article showcases different images and aspects of lesbian characters in 1990s, with special focus on the media landscapes and Hollywood neo-noir thrillers. Stereotypical themes like lethal lesbians and their impact in American cinema are tied with early 90s trends of media portrayal of lesbian chic. The author also highlights the various restrictions of lesbian characters in mainstream cinema, that allows only the visually attractive images of homosexual body to be shown on the screen. Whole article also depicts evolutions of homosexual’s images in 90s media and cinema, the role of male gaze and society fears after the previous homophobic decade in these cultural constructions.

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Przestrzeń pogranicza kulturowego: granice, uwspólnianie światów, tożsamościowe i ojczyźniane konotacje

Author(s): Alicja Szerląg / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2024

Introduction. One of the phenomena of contemporary multiculturalism is the constitution of a cultural borderland, marked by a multitude of constantly revealed and created internal (social) borders, which are characterised by overdetermination, polysemy, heterogeneity, and omnipresence. In this context, the process of commonality of worlds in the space of a cultural borderland, resulting in the construction of the order of this borderland, appears cognitively interesting. In the case of a cultural borderland in particular, we are dealing with a multiplicity of identities defined and realised to different extents. This, in turn, has an impact on the degree of distinctness of borders in social consciousness. As a result, the borderland appears as a dynamically interactive and discursive, multi-scalar place of pro- ximity. In this regard, the national, socio-cultural, and intercultural contexts of this process are of paramount importance. Aim. The object of the study is to provide an insight into the cultural borderland from a constructionist perspective, enabling the disclosure of its identity-related and homeland connotations, resulting from identifications taking place in the cultural borderland. Methods and materials. Critical subject literature review. Results and conclusions The analysis revealed there are areas in which a multidimen- sional identity is constructed, embracing national, familial, state, transnational, and com- munal provenances. In its essence, such identity orientates towards the homeland space, which, in the cultural borderland, has an increasingly symbolic value and meaning andbecomes a ‘place’ where familiarity dominates over strangeness. As a result, the perceived homeland also takes on a multidimensional form, as the family homeland, the national homeland, and the small homeland are revealed. In the “borderland” person’s awareness and everyday life, these homelands can dominate each other individually or interpenetrate each other, creating a multifaceted homeland space.

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Fenomen hikikomori i jego ukazanie w wybranych wytworach polskiej kultury

Author(s): Dominika Barwińska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2023

The article raises the question of how the phenomenon of shakaiteki hikikomori, recognised in Japan, isperceived and portrayed in culturally distant Polish society. For this purpose, the author uses the theory ofanomie by Emile Durkheim and Robert K. Merton, as well as the concept of social construction of reality byPeter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann, moving around the field of sociology of knowledge. Assuming thatsociety itself produces knowledge starting with everyday experiences and insights, through objectificationand re-internalisation, the article takes a closer look at the understanding of hikikomori as revealed in onlineforums (shaped by every day, familial experiences), then in cultural productions such as theatre play, film orradio reportage, and finally in research-based scholary work.

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Identity as a phenomenon of individual self- determination based on queer studies theory

Author(s): Artur Lisowski / Language(s): English Issue: 18/2023

On the one hand, identity concerns the way in which an individual considers and con-structs themselves as a member of specific social groups: nation, social class, culturallevel, ethnicity, gender or occupation. On the other hand, however, it is related the way inwhich the norms of these groups make each individual think, behave, position and relateto themselves, to others, to the group in question and to external groups understood, per-ceived and classified as “otherness”.According to Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and Julia Kristeva, queer theory questionsthe naturalness of an individual’s gender identity, sexual identity and sexual acts, arguingthat they are fully or partially social constructs and hence individuals cannot be describedby such general terms as ‘heterosexual’ or ‘female’. Queer theory therefore challengesthe common practice of categorising people to make them ‘fit’ into one or more specific,pre-defined categories.

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Znaki zapytania. O aktualnej kondycji teorii kultury

Author(s): Ewa Kosowska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2024

An attempt at describing the condition of cultural theory in contemporary Poland might be assessed as, to say the least, a hazardous endeavour. It is not my intention, however, for this essay either to subject any particular texts to criticism or to refer to any particular authors’ positions. What I do intend is to verbalise some of my personal impressions after reading theoretical literature published in Poland over the last fi fty years. This is quite a long period, enabling one to observe both certain continuity and the change that occurs in the paradigmatic conditions signifi - cant for the ways in which culture is interpreted. These ways are not only determined by external infl uences (the amount of which has increased markedly over the last thirty years, as compared with earlier periods), but also dependent on the local traditions of various scholarly disciplines that utilise the concept of culture, adapting it for their specifi c needs. Since culture was recognised as an autonomous subject of study, creating a theory of culture has become a requirement binding not only adherents of the modern paradigm, but also those of the postmodern one. It ought to be observed that what is understood by the term of cultural theory in Poland is not the creation of a theory of Polish culture. Quite the contrary, many researchers attempt to establish theoretical interdependencies with a view to co-creating a universal theory of culture. In such a situation, attempts at building a contextual theory, i.e. one that takes into account the specifi city of local traditions and habits, are sometimes marginalized. Nevertheless, they ought to be considered important and inspiring. In his concept of the mnemotopos, Stefan Bednarek presumed the existence of a certain community of representations and signs. This line of thought led me to asking whether traces of community to be found in Poles’ symbolic representations and dreams, indicating the longue-durée existence of axiological basis for individual and collective behaviours, also translate into the sphere of intellectual choices made in the processes of describing and interpreting the cultural reality that surrounds us. I am asking about the extent to which common and traditional patterns of perceiving the world, as well as ways of self-interpretation that are both common and specifi c for Polish culture, reappear in those descriptions, characterisations and syntheses.

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O strukturach wartości dziś. Od polaryzacji do wewnętrznego porządku

Author(s): Łukasz Rozwadowski / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2024

Commonly used expressions, such as “left-wing values” or “traditional values,” suggestthat the keystone connecting dispersed values into a tangible whole can only be a specifi c identityor ideology, whose meaning is constructed within a polarization. Today, as we are aﬄ icted byclashes typical of contemporary cultural wars, the question of whether spheres of values can beconceived beyond a language that reduces everything valuable to opposition becomes even moreimportant. In response to this issue, the article presents a concept developed in cultural studies atthe University of Wrocław, according to which structures of values derive their specifi city fromtheir own particular construction. Given certain shortcomings of this concept — including theoverly narrow concept of values — a correction has been made aiming to replace the human asthe subject of valuation with subjectivity in a phenomenological sense. Possible types of relationsbetween values have also been indicated: in addition to hierarchical relationships, two others areproposed: co-occurrence and disjunction.

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