"RELIGION / Comparative Religion" . . "ebrary, Inc." . . . . "hindouisme." . . "Hindouisme." . "Tolérance religieuse Hindouisme." . . "hindou identité culturelle." . . "Inde" . . "Hinduismus." . . "Hindouisme et culture." . . "Religiöse Identität." . . "Ethnicité Inde." . . "Hinduism." . . "Hinduism" . "Hindu." . . "Hinduizem." . . . . . . . "Aufsatzsammlung" . . "Rethinking Hindu Identity"@en . "Electronic books"@en . "Electronic books" . . "Livres électroniques" . . . . . . . "Recent years have seen the emergence of a virulent version of Hindu nationalism and fundamentalism in India under the banner of Hindutva. This xenophobic movement has obfuscated and mystified the notion of Hindu identity and reinforced its stereotypes. Its arguments range from the patently unscientific - humankind was created in India, as was the first civilisation - to historical whitewash: Hinduism has continued in one, unchanged form for 5000 years; Hinduism has always been a tolerant faith. 'Rethinking Hindu Identity' offers a corrective based on a deep and detailed reading of Indian histo."@en . . . . . . . . . . "\"This book provides an antidote to the virulent version of Hindu communalism and cultural chauvinism and seeks to expose the hollowness of the xenophobic claims about Hindu religious identity. It identifies some of the stereotypes about Hinduism and shows them to be without any basis in historical evidence. Contrary to the belief popularized by the Hindu jingoists, it shows that Hinduism, far from being eternal and monolithic, is the youngest of religions and that its supposed tolerant nature is a myth. The book also challenges the 'sacredness' of cow as a community identity of the Hindus and draws on a melange of evidence to demonstrate that the ritual killing of this animal was de rigueur much before the arrival in India of Muslims who are stereotyped as kine killers, that its flesh has been very much a part of the early Indian food regimen, and continues to remain so even today in some sections of Hindu society. The story of the cow through the millennia, the author argues, is full of inconsistencies, thus rendering its supposed \"holiness\" elusive, indeed as elusive as Hindu identity itself. Written in a riveting style, the essays in this book are an antidote to the Hindu religious fundamentalist mythomania, and will certainly be of value to those interested in the construction of Hinduism and the politics of Hindu identity in cotemporary India.\"--Pub. desc." . . . . . . . . . . "The book provides an antidote to the virulent version of Hindu communalism and cultural chauvinism and seeks to expose the hollowness of the xenophobic claims about Hindu religious identity. It identifies some of the stereotypes about Hinduism and shows them to be without any basis in historical evidence. Contrary to the belief popularized by the Hindu jingoists, it shows that Hinduism, far from being eternal and monolithic, is the youngest of religions and that its supposed tolerant nature is a myth."@en . . . . "Rethinking Hindu identity" . . . "Indien." . .