Veiled Gurus

Download or read book Veiled Gurus written by Colleen M. Yim and published by University Press of America. This book was released on 2008 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work examines the social reality of a Hindu woman's involvement in the transmission of religious knowledge. The two-year ethnographic study traces the steps of Dalit women in an urban village in New Delhi, India, in which Dr. Yim explores the mother's role in life cycle rituals, festivals, vrats (ritual fasts), and daily life. In this study, Yim attempts to bridge the gap between the word of religious texts and the reality of the women's lives. Despite the tradition of religious texts to overlook the role of women as teachers, this study found that women are the primary agents of religious knowledge transmission. The Dalit women in this study convey their erudition through informal education, such as observation; worship; imitation; and family responsibilities. The implications of this study are not only to validate informal education as an effective means of teaching, but to confirm the central role Hindu women have in the transmission of religious knowledge to their children.