The Shaligram phenomenon reveals how sacred objects can connect diverse peoples while reflecting patterns of migration and community formation in contested spaces.
Dr. Holly Walters is a cultural anthropologist (Wellesley College, Massachusetts) whose work focuses on sacred objects, ritual practices, pilgrimage, and mobility in South Asia. Her work also addresses the interpretation of fossils as texts and the challenges of religious revival online.
Recensioner i media
In Shaligram Pilgrimage in the Nepal Himalayas, the author's careful treatment of the subject matter allows the reader to consider the lives of stone persons alongside our own and personhoods that derive from vast natural cycles beyond human control. To do so was no easy task, I'm sure, and the result is an important addition to interdisciplinary object studies.- Donna Yates, Journal of Material Religion, July 2021, Walters' book represents almost a decade of in-depth study in India and Nepal in search of the meaning of shaligram worship. [...] Her meticulously researched book provides deep insight into the culture of these sacred fossils and of the age-old pilgrimage to Muktinath. Shaligram Pilgrimage is the most comprehensive study of the living fossils written to date.- Don Messerschmidt, Himal Southasian, July 2021
Innehållsförteckning
Acknowledgements, Note on Transliteration, Chapter 1 - Living Fossils, Chapter 2 - Spiral Notebooks, Chapter 3 - Picked Up Pieces, Chapter 4 - A Mirror to Our Being, Chapter 5 - A Bridge to Everywhere, Chapter 6 - Turning to Stone, Chapter 7 - The River Road, Chapter 8 - Ashes and Immortality, Conclusion - Touch Stones,Primary Sources, Bibliography, Index.
