HINDREP · Early modern Catholic representations of Hinduism

Early modern Catholic representations of Hinduism

The purpose of this two year project was to contribute to a more exact and comprehensive understanding of the ways Hinduism was interpreted by Europe during the early modern age. The specific objectives of the project were: 1.To detect,catalogue and compare the greatest possible number of different Catholic textual representations of Hinduism that were produced by Europeans during the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries andthat are today conserved in Europe, India and America. 2.To analyse these textual representations in the light of the visual representations of Hindu gods, rituals and devotees that were developed by Europeans over the same period. 3.To classify the corpus of representations according to different patterns taking into account differences in national origin, religious orders, periods, missionary locations and expertise on local Indian contexts. 4.To compare these models with the historiographical literature on the Protestant missions in order to verify to what extent a Catholic or Protestant Background could determine different perceptions of Hinduism. 5.To compare the different European representations of Hinduism with the perceptions that Hindus had of themselves during the early modern period. Over the two years of the Fellowship Aranha has been able to take advantage of and contribute to the intellectual life of the Warburg Institute. The opportunity to undertake research in this stimulating environment has had a significant impact on his research work and scholarly profile. Aranha has been able to interact with a range of scholars at the Institute; staff, fellows and visiting researchers. He has strengthened and broadened his understanding of cultural and intellectual history through attendance and participation in seminars, workshops, conferences and symposia held at the Institute. The Warburg Library has provided the opportunity to make new interdisciplinary connections and discoveries which have enhanced the range and scope of his research. The accessibility of other world class libraries in London has also been of great benefit to Aranha's research. During the first year of the project Paolo Aranha reviewed the historiography of relevant material, incorporating research visits, undertook a first analysis of findings, attended and contributed to a conference and an expert panel and received training in two oriental languages and on the use and application of databases for historians. During the second year of the project Aranha was able to undertake a systematic analysis of research material he had gathered, which constitutes the entire field of the early modern Catholic representations of Hinduism, and to identify developments and links which have not previously been fully identified. He also organised a successful conference on the topic, continued his intensive language training in Sanskrit and in Tamil, delivered and published a range of papers on the topic and began to prepare material for publication as articles and monographs. The Fellowship has enabled Aranha to strengthen and extend his scholarly network through the development of an informal research network which includes scholars in Brazil, Mexico, the USA, Portugal, France, Italy, Germany, India and China and active participation in the research activities of two French research centres. Aranha also improved his research management skills through the organisation of conference panels and provided informal tuition and support to four young scholars. The research outputs of the Fellowship include two published articles in edited volumes, twenty one conference papers, progress towards the completion of nine further articles, two book reviews and three monographs. The Fellowship has enabled Paolo Aranha to enhance his research skills and to develop towards scholarly maturity. He has secured a research Fellowship awarded by the Gerda Henkel Stiftung tenable from 2013.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз