Heathen, Hindoo, Hindu

Description

Heathen, Hindoo, Hindu is a groundbreaking analysis of American representations of religion in India before the turn of the twentieth century. In their representations of India, American writers from a variety of backgrounds described "heathens," "Hindoos," and, eventually "Hindus." Before Americans wrote about "Hinduism," they wrote about "heathenism," "the religion of the Hindoos," and "Brahmanism." Various groups interpreted the religions of India for their own purposes. Cotton Mather, Hannah Adams, and Joseph Priestley engaged the larger European Enlightenment project of classifying and comparing religion in India. Evangelical missionaries used images of "Hindoo heathenism" to raise support at home. Unitarian Protestants found a kindred spirit in the writings of Bengali reformer Rammohun Roy. Transcendentalists and Theosophists imagined the contemplative and esoteric religion of India as an alternative to materialist American Protestantism, while popular magazines and common school books used the image of dark, heathen, despotic India to buttress Protestant, white, democratic American identity. Americans used the heathen, Hindoo, and Hindu as an other against which they represented themselves. The questions of American identity, classification, representation and the definition of "religion" that animated descriptions of heathens, Hindoos, and Hindus in the past still animate American debates today.

About the Author

Michael J. Altman is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama. His research interests include American religious history, Asian religions in America, colonialism, and critical theory.

Reviews

This book is a valuable contribution to the larger 'What is 'Hinduism'?' question that persists in religious studies. But rather than focusing on the role of European colonialism in the formation of a stable 'ism,' Altman focuses on the US: the literature, and the propagation/replication of particular Orientalist tropes that in turn reified American Protestantism and nationalist identities. The genealogy is thorough and detailed. While such discussions typically focus on the European Orientalists such as Mill, Mueller, or Macauley, tracing the discourse through American writers is both refreshing and insightful.
- Juli L. Gittinger, Reading Religion
This book promises to become an important resource for studies of American Hinduism, American history, and religious studies. Packed with fascinating sources and incisive analysis.... Heathen, Hindoo, Hindu is an excellent history, which will help readers see the nineteenth century precedent for our contemporary politics of Hindu representation.
- Bulletin Book Reviews

Table of contents

Chapter 1: Heathens and Hindoos in Early America
Chapter 2: Missionaries, Unitarians, and Raja Rammohun Roy
Chapter 3: Hindoo Religion in American National Culture
Chapter 4: Transcendentalism, Brahmanism, and Universal Religion
Chapter 5: The Theosophical Quest for Occult Power
Chapter 6: Putting the "Religion" in the World's Parliament of Religion