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Academic Year 2004/2005

Mahabharata and Ramayana: The Sanskrit Epics and Indian Visual Culture
ARHA 290 SP

Clusters: Southern Asia and Indian Ocean

This course focuses on the multifaceted interface between literary text and visual image in traditional South Asia. Our primary focus is on the two Sanskrit epics, MAHABHARATA and RAMAYANA. Both epics will be read in abridged translation to provide familiarity with the overall narrative structure and thematic concerns of the two texts, and a number of excerpts from unabridged translations will be studied in detail to arrive at a fuller understanding of the contents of key episodes and of the style and texture of the two works. The first part of the course addresses a series of questions pertaining to the literary versions of the MAHABHARATA and RAMAYANA: What is epic as a genre, and what are its social roles? Do the MAHABHARATA and RAMAYANA manifest similarities that permit us to identify a distinctive "Indian" epic type? What are the connections between these epics and the early history of India? Why, and how, did the written texts we have today come to be redacted from bodies of oral tradition? What further transformations did the Sanskrit epics undergo as they were dramatized in the Sanskrit theater, recast in the form of lyric poetry, and "translated" into various vernacular languages such as Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu? In the second part of the course, we will shift our focus from epic as literature to consider different types of visual embodiments of the epics, ranging from spatial mappings of epic geography onto local landscapes to illustrated manuscripts and painted scrolls used as instruments for oral epic performance. Our overarching concerns will be to understand the shifting modes of relationship between image and text: does the image always follow and serve the text, suggesting that a textual embodiment of epic is primary, or are there cases in which the visual embodiment is primary and the text follows its lead?
This course requires no prior knowledge of Indian literature, history, or art, and may serve as an effective introduction to the culture and civilization of South Asia.

MAJOR READINGS

EXAMINATIONS AND ASSIGNMENTS

COURSE FORMAT: Lecture/Discussion

REGISTRATION INFORMATION

Level: UGRD    Credit: 1    Gen Ed Area Dept: NONE    Grading Mode: Graded   

Prerequisites: NONE

SECTION 01

Instructor(s): Wagoner,Phillip B.   

Times: ..T.R.. 02:40PM-04:00PM;     Location: DAC300;

Reserved Seats:    (Total Limit: 20)

SR. major: 4   Jr. major: 4

SR. non-major: 4   Jr. non-major: 4   SO: 4   FR: 0

Special Attributes:

Curricular Renewal:    Reading Non-Verbal Texts, Focused Inquiry Course

Last Updated on MAR-21-2005

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