Womanhood and Female Agency in Bengali Vaishnava Sahajiya Tradition

Presenter:

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Abstract

This paper examines how Vaishnava [Sahajiya] female renouncers exercise their power and agency within Vaishnava patriarchal framework. The Vaishnava tradition is the bhakti tradition blended together with tantric practices, believing that an esoteric ritual (yugal sadhana) is a way to liberation in which a joint renunciation of female-male pairs (yugal sadhu) is highly required. That said, unlike the Brahmanical renunciation, Vaishnava accepts women as a legitimate renouncer. Drawing on a well-grounded ethnography of Bengal Vaishnava renouncers, I suggest that one way in which Vaishnava female renouncers try to find advantage in their way of life is to align themselves with the conventional Hindu and Vaishnava male-confined tradition. Accordingly, in contrast to the Western Feminist discourse, the female agency that we will see in this paper is not described in terms of resistance to male domination. It is not about women marching on the road to protest against patriarchy. It is also not about women wanting to become like men and take over their privileged position. For Vaishnava practitioners, female agency is about how to live harmoniously by following virtues constructed under the ideal of ‘womanhood’. Yet, to a degree, it is these women who actively maintain and sustain the patriarchal system.