BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//jEvents 2.0 for Joomla//EN CALSCALE:GREGORIAN METHOD:PUBLISH BEGIN:VEVENT UID:b1fc9ea0f94c9e1fb156eb7c15953dae CATEGORIES:Lecture / Reading / Talk CREATED:20211120T121114 SUMMARY:“The Indian Woman in the Persianate Literary and Artistic Imagination” - A Talk by Dr. Sunil Sharma, Boston University, USA DESCRIPTION:Dr. Sunil Sharma is Professor of Persian & Indian Literatures at Boston University's Department of World Languages & Literatures. He has autho red a number of books and articles on a broad range of subjects from Indo-P ersian literature, visual cultures, and travel writing. \n\n\nRepresentatio ns of women, both characters from classical Persian romances such as Laila and Shirin, and also actual individuals from various social contexts, forme d an important aspect of literary texts and paintings from Persianate court s in the empires of Mughal India, Safavid Iran, and Ottoman Turkey. When it came to the Indian heroine, there was often a blurring of 'fictional' and 'realistic' modes of representation. Persian poets evinced a particular fas cination for the Indian, specifically Hindu, woman who possessed the best q ualities of a lover: faithfulness and beauty. She became a popular subject of representation in book paintings and narrative poems (masnavis). But in the latter half of the seventeenth century, the Indian woman had taken on a more ambivalent role, not just as a devoted lover but also a temptress and courtesan who posed a potential threat to the moral values of the Persian male. The limits of aesthetic representation of the Indian woman thus allow s for comparative analysis across cultures and artistic forms.\n X-ALT-DESC;FMTTYPE=text/html:

Dr. Sunil Sharma is Professor of Persian & Indian Literatures at Bos ton University's Department of World Languages & Literatures. He has au thored a number of books and articles on a broad range of subjects from Ind o-Persian literature, visual cultures, and travel writing.


Representations of women, both characters from classical Persian romances such as Laila and Shirin, and also actual individuals from various social contexts, formed an important aspect of literary texts and paintings from P ersianate courts in the empires of Mughal India, Safavid Iran, and Ottoman Turkey. When it came to the Indian heroine, there was often a blurring of ' fictional' and 'realistic' modes of representation. Persian poets evinced a particular fascination for the Indian, specifically Hindu, woman who posse ssed the best qualities of a lover: faithfulness and beauty. She became a p opular subject of representation in book paintings and narrative poems (mas navis). But in the latter half of the seventeenth century, the Indian woman had taken on a more ambivalent role, not just as a devoted lover but also a temptress and courtesan who posed a potential threat to the moral values of the Persian male. The limits of aesthetic representation of the Indian w oman thus allows for comparative analysis across cultures and artistic form s.

DTSTAMP:20260501T192403 DTSTART;TZID=Asia/Kolkata:20180110T070000 DTEND;TZID=Asia/Kolkata:20180110T080000 SEQUENCE:0 TRANSP:OPAQUE END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR