•  96
    The symbolism of Black and White babies in the myth of parental impression
    Social Research: An International Quarterly 70 (1): 1-44. 2003.
    An ancient and enduring cross-cultural mythology explores what the texts generally perceive as a paradox: the birth of white offspring to black parents, or black offspring to white parents. This mythology in the Hebrew Bible is limited to animal husbandry, but in Indian literature from the third century B.C.E. and Greek and Hebrew literature from the third or fourth century C.E. it was transferred to stories about human beings. These stories originally express a fascination with the dark skin of…Read more
  •  62
    Bisexuality in the Mythology of Ancient India
    Diogenes 52 (4): 50-60. 2005.
    Hindu texts call into question our own gender conceptions; they tell us that desire for bisexual pleasure and the wish to belong to both sexes at the same time are very real, but unrealizable, except by those with magic gifts. Many myths bear witness to the existential perception of human beings as bisexual and to active bisexual transformations. Some may show the desire to be androgynous and, contrary to the dominant homophobic paradigm, present veiled images of a bisexuality fulfilled in happi…Read more
  •  53
    From kama to karma: The resurgence of puritanism in contemporary India
    Social Research: An International Quarterly 78 (1): 49-74. 2011.
    Erotic religious imagery is as old as Hinduism. The earliest Hindu sacred text, the Rig Veda , revels in the language of both pleasure and fertility. In addition to this and other religious texts that incorporated eroticism, there were more worldly texts that treated the erotic tout court, of which the Kamasutra, composed in north India, probably in the third century CE, is the most famous. The two words in its title mean "desire/love/pleasure/sex" and "a treatise" . Virtually nothing is known a…Read more
  •  42
    A dispute about the symbolism of the lingam, a cylindrical votary object that represents the Hindu god Shiva, has been going on for many centuries: is its meaning inexorably tied to a particular part of the physical body of the god, or is it abstract, purely spiritual? This essay will trace the history of this dispute, considering both icons made of carved stone in India that may or may not represent lingams and images made of words in Indian texts that refer to lingams in contexts that are some…Read more
  •  38
    This volume comprises papers presented at a conference marking the 50th anniversary of Joachim Wach's death, and the centennial of Mircea Eliade's birth.
  •  33
    Kamasutra: Miniature Edition (edited book)
    with Sudhir Kakar
    Oxford University Press. 2003.
    The Kamasutra is the oldest extant Hindu textbook of erotic love. About the art of living as well as about the positions in sexual intercourse, it is here newly translated into clear, vivid, sexually frank English together with three commentaries: excerpts from the earliest and most famous Sanskrit commentary, a twentieth-century Hindi commentary, and explanatory notes by the translators. The edition is enhanced by a selection of colour plates from an early edition of the work.
  •  26
    On Translating the Kamasutra: A Gurudakshina for Daniel H. H. Ingalls (review)
    Journal of Indian Philosophy 29 (1/2): 81-94. 2001.
  •  23
    The mythology of masquerading animals, or, bestiality
    Social Research: An International Quarterly. forthcoming.
  •  18
    Rings of rejection and recognition in ancient india
    Journal of Indian Philosophy 26 (5): 435-453. 1998.
  •  12
    Sex, Lies and Tall Tales
    Social Research: An International Quarterly 63. 1996.
  •  10
    Eating Karma, In Classical South Asian Texts
    Social Research: An International Quarterly 66. 1999.
  •  9
    The Mythology of the Face-lift
    Social Research: An International Quarterly 67. 2000.
  •  8
    The Concept of duty in South Asia (edited book)
    with J. Duncan M. Derrett
    Vikas Pub. House. 1977.
  •  8
    Curriculum Vitae of Lorraine Daston
    with Susan Neiman and Peter Galison
    In Susan Neiman, Peter Galison & Wendy Doniger (eds.), What Reason Promises: Essays on Reason, Nature and History, De Gruyter. pp. 261-277. 2016.
  •  8
    What Reason Promises: Essays on Reason, Nature and History (edited book)
    with Susan Neiman and Peter Galison
    De Gruyter. 2016.
    This collection demonstrates the range of approaches that some of the leading scholars of our day take to basic questions at the intersection of the natural and human worlds. The essays focus on three interlocking categories: Reason stakes a bigger territory than the enclosed yard of universal rules. Nature expands over a far larger region than an eternal category of the natural. And history refuses to be confined to claims of an unencumbered truth of how things happened.
  •  7
    La bisexualité dans la mythologie de l'Inde ancienne
    Diogène 208 (4): 58-71. 2004.
  •  7
    Myth, Reason, and Rationality
    In Susan Neiman, Peter Galison & Wendy Doniger (eds.), What Reason Promises: Essays on Reason, Nature and History, De Gruyter. pp. 62-68. 2016.
  •  6
    Review at William Dalrymple, Nine Lives. In search of the sacred in modern India
    International Journal on Humanistic Ideology 4 (1): 143-151. 2011.
  •  5
    Table of Contents
    with Susan Neiman and Peter Galison
    In Susan Neiman, Peter Galison & Wendy Doniger (eds.), What Reason Promises: Essays on Reason, Nature and History, De Gruyter. 2016.
  •  4
    Frontmatter
    with Susan Neiman and Peter Galison
    In Susan Neiman, Peter Galison & Wendy Doniger (eds.), What Reason Promises: Essays on Reason, Nature and History, De Gruyter. 2016.
  •  4
    An esteemed scholar of Hinduism presents a groundbreaking interpretation of ancient Indian texts and their historic influence on subversive resistance. Ancient Hindu texts speak of the three aims of human life: dharma, artha, and kama. Translated, these might be called religion, politics, and pleasure, and each is held to be an essential requirement of a full life. Balance among the three is a goal not always met, however, and dharma has historically taken precedence over the other two qualities…Read more
  •  4
    Index of Authors and Subjects
    with Susan Neiman and Peter Galison
    In Susan Neiman, Peter Galison & Wendy Doniger (eds.), What Reason Promises: Essays on Reason, Nature and History, De Gruyter. pp. 278-284. 2016.
  •  4
    Contributors
    with Susan Neiman and Peter Galison
    In Susan Neiman, Peter Galison & Wendy Doniger (eds.), What Reason Promises: Essays on Reason, Nature and History, De Gruyter. pp. 254-260. 2016.
  •  4
    Purana Perennis: Reciprocity and Transformation in Hindu and Jaina Texts
    with Ludo Rocher
    Journal of the American Oriental Society 117 (2): 401. 1997.
  •  1
    A dispute about the symbolism of the lingam, a cylindrical votary object that represents the Hindu god Shiva, has been going on for many centuries: is its meaning inexorably tied to a particular part of the physical body of the god, or is it abstract, purely spiritual? This essay will trace the history of this dispute, considering both icons made of carved stone in India that may or may not represent lingams and images made of words in Indian texts that refer to lingams in contexts that are some…Read more
  • From Kama to Karma: The Resurgence of Puritanism in Contemporary India
    Social Research: An International Quarterly 78 (1): 49-74. 2011.
    Erotic religious imagery is as old as Hinduism. The earliest Hindu sacred text, the Rig Veda, revels in the language of both pleasure and fertility. In addition to this and other religious texts that incorporated eroticism, there were more worldly texts that treated the erotic tout court, of which the Kamasutra, composed in north India, probably in the third century CE, is the most famous. The two words in its title mean "desire/love/pleasure/sex" and "a treatise". Virtually nothing is known abo…Read more