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In this book, we analyze the psycho-social consequences faced by Indian American children after exposure to the school textbook discourse on Hinduism and ancient India. We demonstrate that there is an intimate connection—an almost exact correspondence—between James Mill’s colonial-racist discourse (Mill was the head of the British East India Company) and the current school textbook discourse. This racist discourse, camouflaged under the cover of political correctness, produces the same psychological impacts on Indian American children that racism typically causes: shame, inferiority, embarrassment, identity confusion, assimilation, and a phenomenon akin to racelessness, where children dissociate from the traditions and culture of their ancestors.


This book is the result of four years of rigorous research and academic peer-review, reflecting our ongoing commitment at Hindupedia to challenge the representation of Hindu Dharma within academia.

Vāstuśānti

From Hindupedia, the Hindu Encyclopedia

By Swami Harshananda

When a new house is built, certain religious rites are performed before entering it. One of them is vāstuśānti or vāstuśamana. Rice and barley grains are put into a pot of water. A piece of gold is also deposited into it. The owner now goes round the house three times sprinkling this water on the house, repeating the śāntātīya hymn of the Ṛgveda.[1] It is repeated three more times by pouring the water continuously, chanting three more mantras of the Ṛgveda.[2] This is followed by a homa with ājya[3] using the Rgvedic mantras ‘vāstoṣpate ’.[4]

Preparing food and honoring the brāhmaṇas after feeding them is the last part of the ritual. Some authorities prescribe that this rite can be repeated every month or in every season or every year.


References[edit]

  1. ↑ Ṛgveda 7.35
  2. ↑ Ṛgveda 10.9.1-3
  3. ↑ Ājya means ghee.
  4. ↑ Ṛgveda 8.17.14
  • The Concise Encyclopedia of Hinduism, Swami Harshananda, Ram Krishna Math, Bangalore

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