Journal of Hindu Studies - Oxford University Press

Critical Connections in Hindu Culture

The Journal of Hindu Studies is committed to a critical approach to Hindu Studies, focusing on annual themes that address overarching issues within the field. The journal aims to create a forum for constructive interdisciplinary discourse by linking the wider community of scholars in an exploration of key questions and meta-issues, through the lens of their own research.

It will be a fully refereed journal to be published by Oxford University Press beginning with two issues available free for the first year online in 2008, and available by subscription both online and in print thereafter.

The Journal of Hindu Studies publishes two issues a year, one guest-edited and one open for submissions, both on the same broad annual theme. These themes focus on theoretical meta-issues that are relevant to all fields within Hindu Studies, thus linking scholars in interdisciplinary dialogue. The themes are aimed at integrating articles from diverse disciplines and will include topics such as: ‘Hermeneutics and Interpretation’, ‘Aesthetics and the Arts’, ‘Text and Textuality’, ‘Reason and Rationality’, ‘Religious Discourse’, ‘Modernity’, ‘Archaeology and Artefact’, ‘Diaspora’, and ‘Cultural Geography’.

Through this unique approach the journal serves the needs of Hindu Studies as a vibrant and emerging discipline. Contributions aim to make concrete advances in the current debates and reflect the contemporary focus on methodology, comparativism, and the constructive resolution of critical issues in the field.

Readership

The Journal of Hindu Studies will be of interest to libraries in universities teaching and researching any area related to Hindu culture, including Indian history, language, religion, the arts, archaeology, society, literature, and philosophy. Readers will be drawn from a cross-disciplinary range of students and scholars, engaged in the study of all periods, geographical regions, and languages relating to Hindu culture.

Editors

  • Consulting Editor: Gavin Flood, Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies
  • Managing Editor: Jessica Frazier, Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies
  • Associate Editor: Ravi Gupta, Centre College, Kentucky
  • Associate Editor: Deepak Sarma, Case Western Reserve University
  • Reviews: Rembert Lutjeharms, Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies

Call for Submissions

The Journal of Hindu Studies welcomes submission of articles and reviews from all disciplines in the study of Hindu culture, particularly those responding to the annual themes. All submissions will receive double-blind peer-review.

The Critical Connection theme for 2008 is ‘Hermeneutics’. Hermeneutics is the science of discovering new meanings and interpretations in ‘all those situations in which we encounter meanings that are not immediately understandable but require interpretive effort’ (Gadamer 1976:xii). Hindu culture adopts and demands an array of approaches to interpretation of its many types of ‘text’. Hermeneutic practice raises a range of questions over issues such as the social context and implicit power of hermeneutic rules, the inter-weaving of different traditions and methods in interpretive practice, the position of the observer in respect to both created and lived Hindu ‘texts’, the application of contemporary hermeneutic theory to Indian culture, and the history of its different discourses (linguistic, visual, social, etc.).

Contributors

The Journal of Hindu Studies welcomes an international range of contributors working on all periods and geographical regions, and coming from all relevant disciplines, including History, Philology, Literature and the Arts, Philosophy, Anthropology, Sociology, Archaeology, and Religious Studies.

We welcome you to submit your papers and proposals for consideration to the editors at:jhs@oxfordjournals.org.

Author guidelines and paper specifications will be available via the Oxford University Press website.

Advisory Board

  • Daud Ali
  • Mandakranta Bose
  • John Brockington
  • Gudrun Buhnermann
  • Francis X. Clooney
  • Jonardon Ganeri
  • John Stratton Hawley
  • Will Johnson
  • Richard King
  • Shashiprabha Kumar
  • Julius Lipner
  • Angelika Malinar
  • Vasudha Narayanan
  • Patrick Olivelle
  • Laurie Patton
  • Arvind Sharma
  • Ted Proferes
  • Himanshu Prabha Ray
  • T. S. Rukmani
  • Somdev Vasudev
  • David Washbrook
  • Richard Freeman