Om-line Hinduism
World Wide Gods on the Web
Keywords:
Hinduism, Cultural Resource Theory, Online DarshanAbstract
Dawson and Hennebry have speculated that disembedded online phenomena could be linked to the use of religion as a ‘cultural resource’ (Beckford 1992, 2000, 2001) and that this is likely to result in (unspecified) ‘consequences for the future form and function of religion’ (Dawson and Hennebry 2004: 166). In this article I demonstrate that images of Hindu gods and goddesses on the World Wide Web are not generally indicative of the use of Hinduism as a cultural resource. Despite this, I argue that the presence of images of Hindu deities online is a significant development within popular Hinduism. I recognise that darshan, a form of worship which involves a devotee gazing into a deity’s eyes in order to receive a blessing, is possible via a computer screen, but also reveal the limitations of this practice. I further argue though that online images are important because they have the potential to contribute to the universalisation of Hinduism.
References
Agence France Press 2005 UK Hindus Call for Global French Boycott Over Deity on Shoes (8 June). Online: http://www.wwrn.org/sparse.php?idd=17246 (accessed May 15, 2009).
Apolito, Paulo 2005 The Internet and the Madonna—Religious Visionary Experience on the Web. Translated by Antony Shugaar. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
Beckerlegge, Gwilym 2001a Hindu Sacred Images for the Mass Market. In Beckerlegge 2001: 57-116.
b Computer-mediated Religion: Religion on the Internet at the Turn of the Twenty-first Century. In Beckerlegge 2001: 219-64.
Beckerlegge, Gwilym (ed.) 2001 From Sacred Text to Internet. The Open University, Milton Keynes.
Beckford, James A. 1992 Religion, Modernity and Post-modernity. In Religion: Contemporary Issues—The All Souls Seminars in the Sociology of Religion, edited by Bryan Wilson, 11-23. Bellew Publishing, London.
Religious Movements and Globalization. In Global Social Movements, edited by Robin Cohen and Shirin Rai, 165-83. The Athlone Press, London.
Social Movements as Free-Floating Religious Phenomena. In The Blackwell Companion to Sociology of Religion, edited by Richard Fenn, 229-48. Blackwell, Oxford.
Berger, Helen A., and Douglas Ezzy 2004 The Internet as Virtual Spiritual Community: Teen Witches in the United States and Australia. In Dawson and Cowan (eds.) 2004: 175-88.
Brasher, Brenda 2004 Give Me that Online Religion. Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ.
Bunt, Gary R. 2000a Surfing Islam: Ayatollahs, Shayks and Hajjis on the Superhighway. In Religion on the Internet: Research Prospects and Promises, edited by Jeffrey Hadden and Douglas E. Cowan, 127-51. JAI, New York.
b Virtually Islamic: Computer-mediated Communication and Cyber Islamic Environments. University of Wales Press, Cardiff.
Islam in the Digital Age: E-Jihad, Online Fatwas and Cyber Islamic Environments. Pluto Press, London.
‘Rip. Burn. Pray’: Islamic Expression Online. In Dawson and Cowan (eds.) 2004: 123-34.
Castells, Manuel 2000 The Rise of the Network Society. Blackwell, Oxford.
Clothey, Fred W. 2006 Ritualizing on the Boundaries: Continuity and Innovation in the Tamil Diaspora. The University of South Carolina Press, Columbia.
Cowan, Douglas E. 2005 Online U-Topia: Cyberspace and the Mythology of Placelessness. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 44(3): 257-63. doi:10.1111/j.1468-5906.2005.00284.x.
Dash, Jatindra 2005 Denied Temple Entry, American Woman Gets Support. Indo-Asian News Service. (7 November). Online: http://religion.info/english/articles/article_202.shtml (accessed May 15, 2009).
Dawson, Lorne L. 2005 The Mediation of Religious Experience in Cyberspace. In Højsgaard and Warburg 2005: 15-37.
Dawson, Lorne L., and Douglas E. Cowan 2004 Introduction. In Dawson and Cowan (eds.) 2004: 1-16.
Dawson, Lorne L., and Douglas E. Cowan (eds.) 2004 Religion Online: Finding Faith on the Internet. Routledge, New York.
Dawson, Lorne L., and Jenna Hennebry 2004 New Religions and the Internet: Recruiting in a New Public Space. In Dawson and Cowan (eds.) 2004: 151-73.
Eck, Diana L. 1985 Darsan: Seeing the Divine Image in India. Anima Books, Chambersburg.
Banaras: City of Light. Penguin Books, New Delhi.
Eichinger Ferro-Luzzi, Gabriella 1997 The Polythetic-prototype Approach to Hinduism. In Sontheimer and Kulke 1997: 294-304.
Flood, Gavin 1995 Hinduism, Vaisnavism, and ISKCON: Authentic Traditions or Scholarly Constructions. ISKCON Communications Journal 3(2): 5-15.
Fukamizu, Kenshin 2007 Internet Use among Religious Followers: Religious Postmodernism in Japanese Buddhism. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 12(3). Online: http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue3/fukamizu.html
(accessed May 15, 2009).
Fuller, Christopher J. 1992 The Camphor Flame: Popular Hinduism and Society in India. Princeton University Press, Princeton.
Giddens, Anthony 1990 The Consequences of Modernity. Polity, Cambridge.
Runaway World: How Globalisation Is Reshaping Our Lives. Profile Press, London.
Gupta, Subhadra Sen 2002 Puri: Lord Jagannatha’s Dhaam. Rupa & Co., New Delhi.
Hamilton, Malcolm 1998 Sociology and the World’s Religions. MacMillan Press, Basingstoke and London.
Helland, Christopher 2007 Diaspora on the Electronic Frontier: Developing Virtual Connections with Sacred Homelands. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 12(3). Online: http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue3/helland.html (accessed May 15, 2009).
Hindu Press International 2008 Court Orders Dalit’s Right to Worship in Hindu Temple (9 September). Online: http://www.hinduismtoday.com/hpi/2008/9/9.shtml#2 (accessed May 15, 2009).
Højsgaard, Morten T., and Margit Warburg (eds.) 2005 Religion and Cyberspace. Routledge, Abingdon.
Jackson, Robert 1996 The Construction of ‘Hinduism’ and its Impact on Religious Education in England and Wales. Panorama: International Journal of Comparative Religious Education and Values 8(1): 86-104.
Jacobs, Stephen 2007 Virtually Sacred: The Performance of Asynchronous Cyber-Rituals in Online Spaces. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 12(3). Online: http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue3jacobs.html (accessed May 15, 2009).
Kim, Mun-Cho 2005 Online Buddhist Community: An Alternative Religious Organization in the Information Age. In Højsgaard and Warburg 2005: 138-48.
Kress, Michael 2005 Hare Krishna Comes of Age: The Movement Has Matured into a Mainstream Religion after Years of Tumult and Scandal—But Escaping the Past Is Never Easy. USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education) (July). Online: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1272/is_2722_134/ai_n14814238/ (accessed May 15, 2009).
Lahangir, Sarada 2006 Orissa Dalits Break Age-old Taboo. Indo-Asian News Service (26 July). Online: http://www.dailyindia.com/show/45741.php/Orissa_Dalits_break_age_old_taboo (accessed August 1, 2006).
Laney, Michael J. 2005 Christian Web Usage: Motives and Desires. In Højsgaard and Warburg 2005: 166-79.
Lövheim, Mia 2004 Young People, Religious Identity, and the Internet. In Dawson and Cowan (eds.) 2004: 59-73.
Mannur, Anita 2003 Postscript: Cyberscapes and the Interfacing of Diasporas. In Theorizing Diaspora, edited by Jana Evans Braziel and Anita Mannur, 283-90. Blackwell, Oxford.
Marriott, McKim 1955 Little Communities in an Indigenous Civilization. In Village India: Studies in the Little Community, edited by McKim Marriott, 171-222. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
McKean, Lise 1996 Divine Enterprise. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
Morinis, E. Alan 1984 Pilgrimage in the Hindu Tradition: A Case Study of West Bengal. Oxford University Press, Delhi.
O’Leary, Stephen D. 2005 Utopian and Dystopian Possibilities of Networked Religion in the New Millennium. In Højsgaard and Warburg 2005: 38-49.
Pattnaik, Soumyajit 2005 Dalit Women Pay for Temple Entry. Hindustan Times. (15 December). Online: http://hindustantimes.com/news/181_1573805.000900030010.htm (accessed December 30, 2005).
Pocock, David F. 1973 Mind, Body and Wealth—A Study of Belief and Practice in an Indian Village. Blackwell, Oxford.
Prebish, Charles S. 2004 The Cybersangha: Buddhism on the Internet. In Dawson and Cowan (eds.) 2004: 135-47.
Press Trust of India 2005 Om on Thongs Invites Hindu Ire (7 February). Online: http://www.wwrn.org/sparse.php?idd=13882 (accessed May 15, 2009).
Live Darshan of Kashi Vishwanath Available Online (31 January). Online: http://news.indiainfo.com/2008/01/31/0801312251_kashi_vishwanath.html (accessed May 15, 2009).
Preston, James J. 1980 Cult of the Goddess: Social and Religious Change in a Hindu Temple. Vikas, Ghaziabad.
Rajghatta, Chidanand 2005 Beer ‘Ganesh’ Brews Storm in US. The India Times (18 May). Online: http://www.wwrn.org/sparse.php?idd=16885 (accessed May 15, 2009).
Scheifinger, Heinz 2008 Hinduism and Cyberspace. Religion 38(3): 233-49. doi:10.1080/13537900903080402.
The Jagannath Temple and Online Darshan. Journal of Contemporary Religion 24(3): 277-90.
Internet Threats to Hindu Authority: Puja Ordering Websites and the Kalighat Temple. Asian Journal of Social Science 38(4): 583-610.
forthcoming Hindu Embodiment and the Internet. Online—Heidelberg Journal of Religions on the Internet.
Sekhar, Radhika 1999 Authenticity by Accident: Organizing, Decision Making and the Construction of a Diasporic Hindu Temple in the Nation’s Capital. In Hindu Diaspora: Global Perspectives, edited by Trichur S. Rukmani, 307-28. Chair in Hindu Studies; Concordia University, Montreal.
Singh, Sandeep 2001 Sikhs and the Internet I: Developing a New Global Outlook. Online: http://www.memail.info/gsdno/articles/perspectives/sandeepsingh/sikhsandtheinterneti.html (accessed August 10, 2010).
Smith, David 2003 Hinduism and Modernity. Blackwell, Oxford. doi:10.1002/9780470775707.
Sontheimer, Gunther-Dietz, and Hermann Kulke (eds.) 1997 Hinduism Reconsidered. Manohar, New Delhi.
Srinivas, Mysore N. 1962 A Note on Sanskritization and Westernization. In Caste in Modern India and Other Essays, edited by Mysore N. Srinivas, 42-62. J.K. Publishers, London.
Svarupa-dasa, Ravindra 1996 A Response to Daniel Acharuparambil, ‘Hinduism in Interreligious Dialogue’, IJC Vol. 4, no. 1. ISKCON Communications Journal 4(2): 100-105.
The Times of India 2006 Dalits Build their Own Temple in Orissa (10 April). Online: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1483941.cms (accessed May 15, 2009).
Goa to Crack Down on Beachwear ‘Hurting Religious Sentiments’ (26 March). Online: http://wwrn.org/article.php?idd=30576 (accessed May 15, 2009).
Tripathy, Mahimohan 2003 A Brief Look at Shri Jagannath Temple. SGN Publications, Puri.
Vásquez, Manuel A., and Marie F. Marquardt 2003 Globalizing the Sacred: Religion across the Americas. Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ.
Vertovec, Steven 1997 Hinduism in Diaspora: The Transformation of Tradition in Trinidad. In Sontheimer and Kulke 1997: 265-93.
Vidyarthi, Lalita P. et al. 1979 The Sacred Complex of Kashi. Concept, Delhi.
Waghorne, Joanne Punzo 2004 Diaspora of the Gods: Modern Hindu Temples in an Urban Middle-Class World. Oxford University Press, New York.
Wertheim, Margaret 1999 The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace: A History of Space from Dante to the Internet. Virago Press, London.
Williams, Raymond B. 1996 Sacred Threads of Several Textures: Strategies of Adaptation in the United States. In A Sacred Thread: Modern Transmission of Hindu Traditions in India and Abroad, edited by Raymond B. Williams, 228-57. Columbia University Press, New York.
Yocum, Glenn 1996 The Coronation of a Guru: Charisma, Politics and Philosophy in Contemporary India. In A Sacred Thread: Modern Transmission of Hindu Traditions in India and Abroad, edited by Raymond B. Williams, 68-91. Columbia University Press, New York.
Young, Glenn 2004 Reading and Praying Online: The Continuity of Religion Online and Online Religion in Internet Christianity. In Dawson and Cowan (eds.) 2004: 93-105.
