{"product_id":"the-last-brahmin-life-and-reflections-of-a-modern-day-sanskrit-pandit-9788178243641","title":"The Last Brahmin: Life and Reflections of a Modern-day Sanskrit Pandit","description":"\u003cp\u003e • Author(s): Rani Siva Sankara Sarma, D. Venkat Rao( Tr.)\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher: Orient Blackswan Pvt Ltd\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher Imprint: Orient Blackswan Pvt Ltd\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe Last Brahmin\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e is a work of reflection as well as the intellectual quasi-autobiography of a modern-day pandit.  \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eWritten by a schoolteacher of Sanskrit, it embodies an effort to grapple with the enigma of the Brahminical tradition—its spread over long time periods, its forms and transformations, its implications and stakes for the Indian subcontinent’s Hindus and larger world.  Even as it is a philosophical critique of an elite tradition, \u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe Last Brahmin\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e emphasizes the enormity of the tasks involved in finding alternatives to that tradition today.  \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eFrom the core of the surviving realms of the tradition, this work recounts a tale of living on in difficult and adversarial conditions for the sake of learning, scholarship, and the rigours of pedagogical bonding.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThis is also thus a narrative of the pain of discontinuity: it dramatizes the philosophical and historical issues of cultural practice in the form of filial disinheritance and throws up some formidable questions: What is an inheritance? Who inherits tradition?  How may one inherit a tradition?  What are the conditions and consequences of such inheritance?  In the process, this reflective work emerges as the poignant articulation of a Brahmin’s response, and responsibilitiies, in the wake of colonial and postcolonial conditions.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eIts critical unravelling of the Sanskrit tradition sets \u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe Last Brahmin\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e apart from the disciplinary frames of Indology on the one hand, and partisanal Hindu ideological forces on the other. While pitching its tent against Orientalist knowledge on India, it insists equally on the difference and distinction between the Brahmin Sanskrit tradition and ‘so-called Hinduism’.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Orient Blackswan Pvt Ltd","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":45616474423447,"sku":"9788178243641","price":355.0,"currency_code":"INR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0666\/3471\/1191\/files\/9788178243641.webp?v=1769294891","url":"https:\/\/atlanticbooks.com\/products\/the-last-brahmin-life-and-reflections-of-a-modern-day-sanskrit-pandit-9788178243641","provider":"Atlantic Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}