Sikhism

This volume offers a comprehensive overview of Sikhism, which originated in India's Punjab region five hundred years ago. As the numbers of Sikhs settling outside of India continues to grow, it is necessary to examine this religion both in its Indian context and as an increasingly global tradition. While acknowledging the centrality of history and text in understanding the main tenets of Sikhism, Doris Jakobsh highlights the religion's origins and development as a living spiritual tradition in communities around the world. She pays careful attention to particular events, movements, and individuals that have contributed to important changes within the tradition and challenges stereotypical notions of Sikh homogeneity and stasis, addressing the plurality of identities within the Sikh tradition, both historically and within the contemporary milieu. Extensive attention is paid to the role of women as well as the dominant social and kinship structures undergirding Punjabi Sikh society, many of which have been widely transplanted through Sikh migration. The migration patterns are themselves examined, with particular focus on Sikh communities in the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. Finally, the volume concludes with a brief exploration of Sikhs and the Internet and the future of Sikhism.

Writing Pregnancy in Low-Fertility Japan is a wide-ranging account of how women writers have made sense (and nonsense) of pregnancy in postwar Japan. While earlier authors such as Yosano Akiko had addressed the pain and emotional complexities of childbearing in their poetry and prose, the topic quickly moved into the literary shadows when motherhood became enshrined as a duty to state and sovereign in the 1930s and '40s. This reproductive imperative endured after World War II, spurred by a need to create a new generation of citizens and consumers for a new, peacetime nation. It was only in the 1960s, in the context of a flowering of feminist thought and activism, that more critical and nuanced appraisals of pregnancy and motherhood began to appear.

In her fascinating study, Amanda C. Seaman analyzes the literary manifestations of this new critical approach, in the process introducing readers to a body of work notable for the wide range of genres employed by its authors (including horror and fantasy, short stories, novels, memoir, and manga), the many political, personal, and social concerns informing it, and the diverse creative approaches contained therein. This "pregnancy literature," Seaman argues, serves as an important yet rarely considered forum for exploring and debating not only the particular experiences of the pregnant mother-to-be, but the broader concerns of Japanese women about their bodies, their families, their life choices, and the meaning of motherhood for individuals and for Japanese society. It will be of interest to scholars of modern Japanese literature and women’s history, as well as those concerned with gender studies, feminism, and popular culture in Japan and beyond.

Contents......Page 6 Editor’s Preface......Page 8 Acknowledgments......Page 14 Chronology......Page 16 Introduction......Page 18 Chapter 1 The Sources of the Sikh Tradition......Page 24 Chapter 2 Sikh History......Page 31 Chapter 3 Sikh Beliefs, Institutions, and Rituals......Page 71 Chapter 4 Sikh Society......Page 95 Chapter 5 The Sikh Diaspora......Page 107 Chapter 6 Sikh Diversity......Page 128 Chapter 7 Conclusion: Sikhs in the Twenty-first Century......Page 135 Sources Cited and Recommended Readings......Page 142 Index......Page 148 About the Author ......Page 158