Academic literature on the topic 'Draupasī (Hindu mythology)'

The pañcabhūtas convoked are pṛthvi ‘earth’, ap ‘water’, tejas ‘fire’, vāyu ‘air or wind’ and ākāśa ‘ether’. They are the five elements of nature in Hindu mythology. These are considered the abstractions of Viṣṇu (Figures 1–3, 6 and 10), Śiva (Figure 11) or Dēvī (Figures 7 and 15) as the case may be. Most virile among the five are ‘water’ and ‘fire’, the symbols of creation and destruction. Water from the Darwinian point of view is the creative force in which living organisms originate and survive. It is the sustaining principle, for example, the Mother feeding the child with milk as rain for the plant kingdom. Water is the symbol of destruction at the time of deluge, the mahāpraḷaya ; cf. trees on the banks felled when rivers inundate (PTM 11.8.1). Fire creates when channelised through the oven; for example, Kumāra’s birth as also Mīnākṣī (Figure 16) and Draupadī emerging through yajñas. These ideas are best exemplified by the avatāras, aṃśāvatāras and other emanations of Viṣṇu. Śiva destroys the worlds by the power generated by his third eye (e.g., Sodom and Gomorrah in case of Biblical mythology), the God of Love, Kāmadeva symbolic of the seed of creation (Priapus in Roman mythology; Beard, 2008. Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town. London: Profile Books Ltd: 104, figure 36). We are concerned in this article with water as the creative and destructive force, an idea that is as old as the Vedic and Biblical times. The focus is on the Āḻvārs’ Nālāyirativviyappirapantam. The Biblical myth of ‘Noah’s Ark’ may be of value for inter-religious dialogue. Several hundreds of the Tamil hymns have something to say on the symbolism of water. We cite a few examples hereunder. The emphasis is on water and Viśvarūpa.

A woman with a voice is by definition a strong woman. But the search to find that voice can be remarkably difficult. – Melinda Gates. It is a general notion that there are not many good women speakers. However, on careful scrutiny, one can find that there have been impactful and wonderful women speakers since time immemorial. The world history is a testimony to this fact. Undoubtedly in Hindu mythology ample respect is given to women consorts, people take the name of a Goddess before the name of God which is why people say Radha-Krishna, Sita-Ram, Gauri-Shankar etc. Importance of women can be seen in Mahabharata where Draupadi had an important role to play. Undoubtedly the power of women is quite known to all of us, how they manage and organize everything so well. In the day to day life also, a lot of attention is given to women in every field, many beautiful adjectives are used for describing them. They are the centre of attraction all the time. But it is very surprising that when the discussion on the topic of rhetoric is done only a had full of people are able to remember the names of the women orators. In this context, it is imperative to analyse the following questions: 1. Why do people not remember the names of any woman orator? 2. Are there lesser number of women speakers? 3. Is there gender inequality in this field? 4. Do we have more strong male orators than the female orators? 5. Is it because males are better speakers than females? 6. How different are men and women when it comes to speaking in public?

The objective of this thesis is to isolate the symbolism of ornaments and armaments in the epics and in the rituals of Kannaki and Draupadi A detailed comparison of ornaments and armaments in the Cilappatikaram and in the Mahabharata will be provided, as well as an analysis of the function and meaning of these objects in the ritual traditions of Kannaki and Draupadi A study of the epic and ritual significance of ornaments and armaments will not only contribute tn the understanding of the nature and the role of these symbols, but should also shed light on the interaction between the Tamilian and Sanskritic goddess traditions.
It would appear that ornaments and armaments have religious significance, signaling, by their presence or absence, transitions from auspiciousness to inauspiciousness on individual, social, and cosmic levels. In this respect, they are the vehicles of divine powers and energies.

Notre recherche vise à cerner la quête identitaire de la femme dans les romans d’Ananda Devi, auteur mauricien, d’origine indienne. D’après nos analyses, nous constatons que l’individuation féminine se déploie à travers les trois phases suivantes : « l’identité-idem », l’aspect identitaire qui se fonde sur une identification collective ; « l’identité-ipsé », par opposition à cette quête de similitude, est un élan vers la spécificité personnelle ; et l’ »animus » que nous définissons comme la part de différence ou les désirs les plus refoulés qui sont rejetés par les normes sociales. Parallèlement à ces trois phases identitaires, ce qui caractérise l'évolution féminine chez Devi, c’est que la femme opprimée, dans son effort d’émancipation, s’inspire des figures mythiques hindoues. Au cours de notre recherche nous avons exploité les bribes mythiques, afin de mettre en lumière une communion prédominante entre les femmes de Devi et les figures mythiques hindoues : Sitā, Draupadi et Kālī. Or, cette expérience d’identification avec les figures mythiques recoupe les trois phases identitaires dans la mesure où la femme s’identifie à une figure mythique dans chacune de ces phases d’individuations. L’accouplement figure mythique et phase identitaire se présente ainsi : Sitā-identité-idem, Draupadi-identité-ipsé, et Kālī-animus
The aim of this research is to study the quest of identity in the women characters in Ananda Devi’s novels. Devi is a Mauritian author of Indian origin. Our study reveals that the evolution of the women passes through three major stages : “l’identité-idem” or collective identification, the desire of identifying oneself to a particular group; “l’identité-ipsé” on the contrary is the desire to see oneself as unique within a certain group of individuals; l’”animus”, we define this term as the suppressed desires which are condemned by the society. Along with these three phases of identification, what characterises Devi’s women is that in their serge for emancipation they identify themselves with the Hindu mythical figures. In our study we have explored various images in Devi’s writings in order to reveal the existing links between Devi’s women and the following mythical figures : Sitā, Draupadi, Kālī. In fact, this experience of identification with the mythical figures is closed interlinked with the evolutionary phases defined above. In each of her evolutionary phase the woman identifies to one particular mythical figure : Sitā-identité-idem, Draupadi-identité-ipsé, and Kālī-animus