Established the Centre for Shaiva Studies in Pondicherry in collaboration with INDICA
Tattva Team — May 22
Tattva Heritage Foundation, in collaboration with INDICA, has established the Centre for Shaiva Studies (www.shaivastudies.in) in Pondicherry. The Centre, inaugurated on 6th May 2022, will be led by Dr. T. Ganesan, former Director of Research at the French Institute, Pondicherry, and a foremost scholar of Śaivism.
The Centre aims to be a premier place of research on Śaivism and its ancillary traditions. The Centre will be a hub for scholars and practitioners to study and conduct research on all aspects of the Śaiva tradition, be it Śaiva philosophy, rituals, literature or visual arts. It plans to train and develop select scholars to undertake philologically rigorous textual, manuscript, and epigraphic studies on the vast Śaiva corpus available in Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu and Kannada languages. It also plans to undertake a detailed study on some of the ancient and important Śiva temples, with a special focus on the architectural, ritual and holy legends (sthalapurāṇa). There are also allied fields associated with Śaivism, such as haṭha yoga, martial arts, siddha tradition, ritual studies, and aesthetics. In the long term, we plan to develop expertise and scholarship in all the above-mentioned areas.
Textual studies will also be complemented by Centre’s endeavour to chronicle and document contemporary forms of Śaivism, be it the thriving temple traditions, Śaiva institutions, siddha traditions, or various forms of Śaiva devotional practices. As an output of the academic study, the Centre will publish critical editions, monographs and books containing original research undertaken at the Centre. The academic department will also organise conferences, talks and seminars on topics related to Śaivism. Eventually, the Centre will also bring out a rolling journal containing the latest research on Śaivism and its allied tradition. The Centre will become a hub of grant-giving activities for Indian scholars who are interested in undertaking research on Śaivism under the supervision of scholars at the Centre.
In the upcoming days, the Centre plans to onboard multiple senior scholars and junior researchers.
