Panel One - Regenerative Potential
Regenerative Potential: April 6, 11 AM - 12:35 PM
How are growth and regeneration gendered? In an Anglophone context, the earth is often characterized as a mother, a caregiver, and feminine, a paradigm that suggests nature provides and nourishes. At the same time, the natural is said to be wild and untamed, suggesting that the organic world is a site to be conquered by stereotypically “masculine” forces of civilization, order, and reason. But do these paternalistic tropes hold when we consider other geographic and cultural contexts?
Addressing topics like construction tools and wooden icons, the papers in this panel examine a diverse array of expressions that convey a gendering of forces in pivotal moments of procreation, transformation, and destruction involving the earth, architectured terrain, and above all, the sky. These presentations on South and East Asian material offer nuanced perspectives on the interactions of gendered force and the immediate environment in both narratives of the distant legendary past and worldly ritual and artistic practice, shaping social dynamics and enduring patterns within their communities.
Discussant: Carolyn Wargula, Assistant Professor of Art History, Bucknell University
Regenerative Potential
“Touching the Earth: Calling the Earth to Witness Revisited”
Dessi Vendova (Buddhism Public Scholar, MFA Boston) - “Touching the Earth: Calling the Earth to Witness Revisited”
Tree worship and the belief in tree spirits were essential to various religious belief systems in premodern Asia. We see significant traces of it in the earliest extant Buddhist archaeological, art historical, and textual evidence from around the second century BCE. Trees, tree deities, and other earthly spirits also appear in the life of the Buddha, where each of the major life events is closely associated with trees. One tree of particular importance is the Bodhi tree, which, in turn, is also an object of worship, and also a symbol for the Buddha himself. One of the most recognizable visual representations of the events under the Bodhi tree is Gautama’s calling the earth deity as a witness. Contrary to one commonly established simplified explanation of the meaning of this gesture, the Bodhisattva is not asking the earth to witness his Enlightenment, but rather, challenged by Mara, calls the earth goddess as a witness to his worthiness to be seated on the “Diamond Seat” as the powerful spot under the Bodhi tree is also known as. The important implication is that the Bodhisattva has earned to sit under the Bodhi tree through countless acts of generosity in his numerous previous lives, thus meaningfully tying this pivotal biographical moment with the Buddha’s extended life story. Drawing on early textual and visual sources from South and East Asia, this paper will discuss different textual and visual representations of this and other pivotal moments connected with the events of Shakyamuni’s Enlightenment.
“Artful Ambiguities in Angkor’s Literary and Visua Culture: Locating Śrī in Inscriptions and Art”
Soumya James (Independent Art Historian) - “Artful Ambiguities in Angkor’s Literary and Visua Culture: Locating Śrī in Inscriptions and Art”
The literary and material landscapes of Angkor abound in metaphors. In Sanskrit inscriptions, Śrī (or Lakṣmī) has a persistent presence, typically to eulogize the king. Metaphorical language in inscriptions is often ambiguous, enigmatically referring either to the goddess (Śrī), the abstract qualities she embodies (śrī), or both. Using examples from inscriptions and art, I explore the fluidity of Ś/śrī’s states-of-being that define or qualify the king, kingship, and the relationship between the ruler and his territory. Angkorian inscriptions describe Śrī as representing the earth and its generative qualities, political power, wealth, beauty, and fecundity. Inscriptions narrate that after the king earns his right to the throne by literally shedding blood on the battlefield, Śrī chooses him as her suitor, even over the gods. Her presence with him ensures the prosperity of the land. Indeed, the material landscape of Angkor with its stately monuments and verdant rice fields could be interpreted as the manifestation of Ś/śrī. Nonetheless, visual and textual references also convey a sense of ambiguity in her status with regards to the king. Hovering between form and formlessness, this ambiguity of Ś/śrī in turn projects an impermanence of kingly power and economic well-being. I suggest that Ś/śrī was a metaphor to communicate the understanding that sovereign power was neither guaranteed nor permanent, but that the land always held the potential for each king to make it so if only for a time.
“Flourishing Femininity and the Embodiment of Reproductive Karma”
Jesse LeFebvre (Assistant Professor, University of Rochester) - “Flourishing Femininity and the Embodiment of Reproductive Karma”
According to one legendary account in Hasedera reigenki (The Miraculous Accounts of Hasedera), the Kannon of Hasedera appeared before Emperor Shōmu (701-756, r. 724-749) radiating light in ten directions and leading a retinue of dragon kings, divine youths, and countless heavenly beings. The emperor’s devotion to had ensured his ascent to the throne and secured his lineage’s rule far into the future. In return, the Hasedera Kannon requested that the emperor provide her with curtains and screens so that she may hide herself from undignified exposure. In this way, asking to be treated as would an aristocratic woman of the court, she spoke to the sovereign saying, “The only thing that can pacify the ferocious beings of the defiled age is a woman. I have softened the intensity of my light, manifested in the form of a woman, and will offer protection to this realm until the end of the final age of the dharma.” According to Hasedera reigenki, the only thing capable of defying delusion, destruction, and suffering in the final age of the dharma is a woman.
This presentation will trace the development of the Hasedera Kannon’s unique iconography and material qualities as they emerged at the confluences of natural processes, politics, religious belief, and visions of cosmology. In the body of the Hasedera Kannon, lightning strikes and centuries of marriage politics were given shape and worshipped as an expression of flourishing femininity and generative reproductive potential, giving birth to an icon that unified the karmic capacity of nature, biology, and politics in both its materiality and iconographical program.
