Brajbhasha and Early Hindi Retreat in Transylvania

[Gary Tubb]

I am forwarding the following to the list by request:

Dear Colleagues,
Brajbhasha and Early Hindi Retreat in Transylvania, 2011

The Alexander Csoma de Kőrös Centre for Oriental Studies and the Department of Humanities at the Faculty of Economic and Human Sciences at Sapientia — Hungarian University of Transylvania, Miercurea Ciuc/Csíkszereda is organising a Brajbhasha and Early Hindi Retreat between Monday 15 Aug and Saturday, 27 Aug. 2011.

The aim of the retreat is to bring together scholars and advanced students of Brajbhasha in a relatively informal way and to discuss or simply to enjoy reading together texts on which a specialist is working. In this way not only the audience would benefit from the leader's expertise but important feedback will also be provided for the leaders of the session from a qualified audience. The format will be similar to the Intensive Sanskrit Retreats (http://ind.elte.hu/node/41) including reading texts out in the nature, if weather permits.

The retreat will be organised around three ninety-minute reading sessions each day conducted by outstanding specialists. One text will be read through six or twelve panels. Participants are normally academics and graduate students; however, undergraduates with a firm commitment are also encouraged to attend. A minimum requirement is familiarity with Rupert Snell’s The Hindi Classical Tradition: A Brajbhasha Reader or a similar level of competence in Brajbhasha.

Sessions will be lead by Allison Busch, Monika Horstmann, Swapna Sharma and others tba. Francesca Orsini, Danuta Stasik and Ramdev Shukla  will also help us with their expertise.

Readings will include:

— Bhasha versions of the Bhagavata ekadasa skandha (We will read versions  conditioned by performance traditions and thus in many ways different from the basic text. This leads on to particular translation techniques transmitted by scholars of the period.)

— Highlights of riti poetry with special reference to the historical side.

other possible readigs

— Bhakti poetry from Vrindaban

— Late Brajbhasha court poetry from Bundelkhand: the “Ritimukt” Thakur

Updated information will be available at

http://www.sapientia.siculorum.ro/sapientia/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=143&Itemid=1

Accommodation with full board will cost about 400 Euros per person.

If you intend to apply or if you have any query regarding the conference please write to Mr Béla Bács (bbacsb at netscape.net). Questions and regarding the academic content should be addressed to Dr Imre Bangha (imre.bangha at orinst.ox.ac.uk).