Dr. Wendy Doniger’s On Hinduism is a sort of captstone on an epic career exploring Hindu literature, religion, and history. In this conversation we discuss a number of themes from the book, including her own religious background, common misconceptions about Hinduism, the caste system, orientalism, the so-called “Hindu Trinity,” Hindu nationalism, a controversy in India over the charge that she committed blasphemy, goddess worship and its relationship to the status of women, non-violence, how Western cultures have influenced recent Hindu thought, and reincarnation.

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Dr. Wendy Doniger @ The University of Chicago

On Hinduism

The Hindus: An Alternative History

To The Point: The controversy with Wendy Doniger’s book ‘The Hindus’

The Doniger Affair: Censorship, Self-Censorship, and the Role of the Academy in the Public Understanding of Religion

The Origins of Evil in Hindu Mythology

Other Peoples’ Myths: The Cave of Echoes

Karma and Rebirth in Classical Indian Traditions

“Glossing Anti-Dharma with Dharma”

the problem of evil

Hindu Philosophy

pantheism