Colonial Discourse and the Suffering of Indian American Children is now freely available.
Colonial Discourse and the Suffering of Indian American Children Book Cover.webp

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.

Vasantarāja-śakuna

From Hindupedia, the Hindu Encyclopedia

By Swami Harshananda

Vasantarāja-śakuna literally means ‘Vasantarāja’s treatise on prognosticatory signs’.

Significance of Śakunas[edit]

People of all the countries and civilisations have believed in prognostic from ancient times. Such beliefs persist even now. The Sanskrit word for prognostication is śakuna. Though the literature on the śakunas is quite extensive, mostly spread over the purāṇas, there are also works which deal with this subject in a specialized way. Out of these, the Vasantarājaśakuna of Vasantarāja[1] is an independent and elaborate work on this subject. It contains 1520 verses in 20 vargas or chapters. It has a commentary by Bhānucandragaṇi.[2]

Origin of Vasantarāja-śakuna[edit]

Vasantarāja was the son of Vijayarājabhatta and Sarasvatī. He was honored by the king Candradeva of Mithilā and wrote this work at his request. He mentions several works of an earlier period and pays his respects to many of the ancient sages like Atri, Vasiṣṭha and Vyāsa who had declared the knowledge of the śakunas. The following is a brief account of the subjects dealt with:

  • Authenticity of the śakunaśāstra
  • Honoring the guru and the eight lokapālas like Indra
  • Directions and distances of factors associated with śakunas
  • Signs of auspiciousness or otherwise, as applied to men and women
  • Birds and their chirpings
  • Signs as applied to animals
  • Barking of dogs and howling of jackals
  • Importance of the śāstra or science

A notable feature of this work is that 781 verses and more than half of them have been devoted to the sounds of birds.


References[edit]

  1. ↑ He lived in circa A. D. 900.
  2. ↑ He lived in 16th century A. D.
  • The Concise Encyclopedia of Hinduism, Swami Harshananda, Ram Krishna Math, Bangalore

Contributors to this article

Deval Sancheti

Explore Other Articles

Retrieved from "https://hindupedia.com/index.php?title=Vasantarāja-śakuna&oldid=136169"