Religion - Wissen - Diskurse

Johanna Sieben

Promotionsprojekt:

Body, Religion and Power - Transformations of Images of Body and Gender in the Religious Sphere in South Asia

 

The state of India as a relatively new state in the political web of the world, has experienced major changes and transformations over the last few decades. Due to the influence of colonialism, during the struggle for independence, in the years following the independence movement and continuing in the present time, categories of political power have been constantly altered. Two of those political categories of power which hold significance in the public, as well as in the private, are the categories “Gender/Body” and “Religion”. Both have been used and still continue to be used as tools for the exercise of power and for the purpose of essentializing subjects within a certain political sphere, to be able to construct a relatively closed and limited political space. To construct the colonial state of British India “Religion” and also “Body/Gender” of the colonized have been constructed as a significant “Other” in order to build up, justify and maintain imperial aspirations.

 

This dissertation will focus on the question in which ways the images of body and gender within the religious sphere in India have changed, the influence colonialism had on those changes and the importance and meaning those colonial images bear in contemporary India, and within global discourses and interactions. One important aspect of this thesis is the question, in which ways the construction of Hinduism as static religion during the 18th century - an interplay between local Brahmins and British elites - had political power and how this influenced perceptions of body, gender and political space. The focus will be laid on three specific religious phenomena, which are closely related to questions of body and gender. A central question is as well, if India, according to the mentioned categories, must still be called a “postcolonial” state or if this term undermines the autonomous developments of this growing society.

 

Profil:

Johanna Sieben, geboren 1986, studierte an der Ruhr Universität Bochum Literatur- und Theaterwissenschaft (B.A.) sowie an der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin Religion und Kultur (M.A.). Im Verlaufe des Bachelorstudiums absolvierte sie einen Auslandsaufenthalt in Antwerpen, Belgien. Nach dem Bachelorstudium folgten weitere Auslandsaufenthalte in Indien sowie in Ungarn. Seit April 2014 arbeitet sie an ihrem englischsprachigem Dissertationsprojekt mit dem Titel „The Transformations of the Perceptions of Body and Gender in the Religious Sphere in South Asia“ und ist Teilnehmerin des strukturierten Promotionsprogramms „Religion – Wissen – Diskurse“ der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Das Forschungsinteresse sowie der Fokus der Dissertation liegen im Bereich der Südasienstudien, der Gender Studies und der Postcolonial Studies.