Julie Rocton’s paper examines the hypotheses of the French anthropologist Alain Testart regarding women and martial practices through an episode of the Mahābhārata, the two-generation narrative of Ambā and Śikhaṇḍinī. Iva Patel’s paper discusses how she teaches undergraduate students in a course on the Mahābhārata, aiding them in examining complex situations in life with consideration for ethical dilemmas and problem-solving, so that the narratives, especially those about “underdogs”, connect with their own experiences.
This paper attempts to test hypotheses of the French anthropologist Alain Testart, for whom women have been almost universally excluded from martial practices involving bloodshed due to an unconscious law consisting of an avoidance of blood accumulation (blood from a wound and menstrual blood), on the basis of Ambā’s episode in the Mahābhārata. The study of this literary example reveals that Ambā reincarnated as a woman under the name of Śikhaṇḍinī, then cross-dressed and transformed into a man under the name of Śikhaṇḍin, can express her desire of death and her warrior-like anger, can receive a martial initiation, can become an excellent warrior described as “man-woman” but will act merely as a protective shield during the final battle. Moreover, the analysis of Bhīsma’s discourse shows a new line of research not noted by Testart: the warrior act toward a woman is likened to an act of sexual nature.
This paper is a discussion of the pedagogical utility of the Mahābhārata beyond captivating undergraduate students with stories of love and war or an introduction to several key aspects of Hindu beliefs, sociality, and literary fecundity. As students grapple with the turbulence of their local and global lived reality and desire to engage with contested issues, the epic holds a unique promise. It allows for a pedagogy for problem-solving that moves students beyond reacting to problems to critically assessing the tensions that constitute a problem in order to then think of perspectives to understand or solutions to solve them. Through examples from classroom, I illustrate the strong appeal for students to have a venue to grapple with their personal stake in an issue and to articulate and refine their ethics for uncertain, chaotic, or “messy” situations as they increasingly feel pressured to take and declare their stance on a matter.