LEADER 04127nam 2200661Ia 450 001 9910815102403321 005 20200520144314.0 010 $a0-7914-8783-0 010 $a0-585-48923-8 035 $a(CKB)111087027856372 035 $a(OCoLC)61367533 035 $a(CaPaEBR)ebrary10587206 035 $a(SSID)ssj0000106230 035 $a(PQKBManifestationID)11128652 035 $a(PQKBTitleCode)TC0000106230 035 $a(PQKBWorkID)10109474 035 $a(PQKB)10433904 035 $a(MiAaPQ)EBC3408007 035 $a(OCoLC)53956520 035 $a(MdBmJHUP)muse5928 035 $a(Au-PeEL)EBL3408007 035 $a(CaPaEBR)ebr10587206 035 $a(DE-B1597)681349 035 $a(DE-B1597)9780791487839 035 $a(EXLCZ)99111087027856372 100 $a20020220d2002 uy 0 101 0 $aeng 135 $aurcn||||||||| 181 $ctxt 182 $cc 183 $acr 200 10$aAryans, Jews, Brahmins $etheorizing authority through myths of identity /$fDorothy M. Figueira 210 $aAlbany $cState University of New York Press$dc2002 215 $a1 online resource (218 p.) 225 0 $aSUNY series, the margins of literature 300 $aBibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph 311 $a0-7914-5531-9 320 $aIncludes bibliographical references (p. 165-202) and index. 327 $tFront Matter -- $tContents -- $tAcknowledgments -- $tIntroduction -- $tThe Authority of an Absent Text -- $tThe Enlightenment And Orientalist Discourse On The Aryan -- $tThe Romantic Aryans -- $tNietzsche?s Aryan Übermensch -- $tLoose Can[n]ons -- $tWho Speaks For The Subaltern? -- $tRammohan Roy -- $tText-based Identity: Daya¯nand Saraswat?¯?s Reconstruction of the Aryan Self -- $tAryan Identity and National Self-Esteem -- $tThe Anti-Myth -- $tAfterword -- $tNotes -- $tBibliography -- $tIndex 330 $aIn Aryans, Jews, Brahmins, Dorothy M. Figueira provides a fascinating account of the construction of the Aryan myth and its uses in both India and Europe from the Enlightenment to the twentieth century. The myth concerns a race that inhabits a utopian past and gives rise first to Brahmin Indian culture and then to European culture. In India, notions of the Aryan were used to develop a national identity under colonialism, one that allowed Indian elites to identify with their British rulers. It also allowed non-elites to set up a counter identity critical of their position in the caste system. In Europe, the Aryan myth provided certain thinkers with an origin story that could compete with the Biblical one and could be used to diminish the importance of the West's Jewish heritage. European racial hygienists made much of the myth of a pure Aryan race, and the Nazis later looked at India as a cautionary tale of what could happen if a nation did not remain "pure."As Figueira demonstrates, the history of the Aryan myth is also a history of reading, interpretation, and imaginative construction. Initially, the ideology of the Aryan was imposed upon absent or false texts. Over time, it involved strategies of constructing, evoking, or distorting the canon. Each construction of racial identity was concerned with key issues of reading: canonicity, textual accessibility, interpretive strategies of reading, and ideal readers. The book's cross-cultural investigation demonstrates how identities can be and are created from texts and illuminates an engrossing, often disturbing history that arose from these creations. 606 $aIndo-Aryans 606 $aVedic literature$xHistory and criticism 606 $aRacism$zEurope$xHistory$y19th century 606 $aAntisemitism 607 $aIndia$xCivilization 615 0$aIndo-Aryans. 615 0$aVedic literature$xHistory and criticism. 615 0$aRacism$xHistory 615 0$aAntisemitism. 676 $a934 700 $aFigueira$b Dorothy Matilda$f1955-$01650390 801 0$bMiAaPQ 801 1$bMiAaPQ 801 2$bMiAaPQ 906 $aBOOK 912 $a9910815102403321 996 $aAryans, Jews, Brahmins$93999741 997 $aUNINA