Encompassing a Fractal World

Presents a different paradigm, which opens up several perspectives for understanding and analyzing Hindu life and culture. This book attempts to 'connect the dots', moving beyond isolated local village-based studies in order to bridge the gulf between anthropology and Hindu studies.

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Encompassing a Fractal World presents a groundbreaking, innovative paradigm which opens up new perspectives for understanding and analyzing Hindu life and culture. In particular, it has crucial implications for the understanding of Hindu cosmology, ritual, architecture, kinship, social relationships, and agriculture as well as modern anthropological theories of ritual, action, and agency. Gil Daryn's main thrust is not that the fractal concept may neatly bring together much of what has been written about Hindu culture, but instead it argues the case for an additional and gendered fractal dimension. Encompassing a Fractal World is exceptional in scope, drawing from an extensive set of comparative materials ranging from Vedic cosmogonies and sacrifice through Puranic mythology to contemporary ethnographic accounts from Nepal and India. This book is an interdisciplinary comparative work which attempts to 'connect the dots', moving beyond isolated local village-based studies in order to bridge the gulf between anthropology and Hindu studies.