book announcement (sorry for cross-mailing)

[Axel Michaels]

Gutschow, Niels
New from Harrassowitz Publishers (Wiesbaden, Germany):

Gutschow, Niels / Michaels, Axel
Growing up
Hindu and Buddhist Initiation Rituals among Newar Children in Bhaktapur (Nepal)
Photograph: Bau, Christian  
 volume : 6 
pages/dimensions : 332 pages, 84 b&w, 16 colour pict., Film-DVD by Christian Bau - 29,7 × 2 
binding: Gebunden 
publishing date: 1. Auflage 09.2008 
price info: 64,00 Eur[D] / 109,00 CHF 
ISBN10: 3-447-05752-1 
ISBN: 978-3-447-05752-3 


 Table of Contents 

More titles of this subject:
ethno-indology
Ethnology
India: Religion
 
64,00 Eur   
The authors - an architectural historian (Niels Gutschow) and an indologist (Axel Michaels) - are presenting the second part of a trilogy of studies of life-cycle rituals in Nepal, carried out under the auspices of the Collaborative Research Centre "Dynamics of Ritual". The initiation of boys and girls of both Hindus and Buddhists of the ethnic community of Newars in the Kathmandu Valley are documented. The first part of the book presents elements of Newar rituals, the spatial background of Bhaktapur and the hierarchy of ritual specialists - illustrated by 21 maps. The second part documents with detailed descriptions the . rst feeding of solid food, birthday rituals, and pre-puberty rituals like the first shaving of the hair, the boy's initiation with the loincloth (in Buddhist and Hindu contexts), the girl's marriage with the bel fruit and the girl's seclusion. One girl's marriage (Ihi) and three boy's initiations (Kaytapuja) are documented on a DVD.
 The third part presents the textual tradition: local handbooks and manuals used by the Brahmin priest to guide the rituals. Two of these texts are edited and translated to demonstrate the function of such texts in a variety of contexts.
 Axel Michaels

Prof. Dr. Axel Michaels (Speaker of the Collaborative Research Center (SFB) 619 "Dynamics of Ritual"; Co-Director of the Cluster of Excellence "Asia and Europe"), University of Heidelberg, South Asia Institute, Im Neuenheimer Feld 330, D-69120 Heidelberg, Tel. +49-6221-548917 / Fax +49-6221-546338, 

http://www.sai.uni-heidelberg.de/abt/IND/index.html, http://www.ritualdynamik.uni-hd.de, http://vjc.uni-hd.de, Axel.Michaels at urz.uni-heidelberg.de