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The Relic State

St Francis Xavier and the Politics of Ritual in Portuguese India

  • Hardback
  • 304 pages
  • Publisher: Manchester University Press
  • 15.6 x 23.4 x 2 cm

£73.40

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This book is a study of the complex nature of colonial and missionary power in Portuguese India. Written as a historical ethnography, it explores the evolving shape of a series of Catholic festivals that took place throughout the duration of Portuguese colonial rule in Goa (1510-1961), and for which the centrepiece was the 'incorrupt' corpse of Sao Francisco Xavier (1506-52), a Spanish Basque Jesuit missionary-turned-saint. Using distinct genres of source materials produced over the long duree of Portuguese colonialism, the book documents the historical and visual transformation of Xavier's corporeal ritualisation in death through six events staged at critical junctures between 1554 and 1961. Xavier's very mutability as a religious, political and cultural symbol in Portuguese India will also suggest his continuing role as a symbol of Goa's shared past (for both Catholics and Hindus) and in shaping Goa's culturally distinct representation within the larger Indian nation-state.

  • Title

    The Relic State

  • Author

    Pamila Gupta

  • Book Format

    Hardback

  • Publisher

    Manchester University Press

  • Published

    August 2014

  • Weight

    591g

  • Page Count

    304

  • Dimensions

    15.6 x 23.4 x 2 cm

  • ISBN

    9780719090615

  • ISBN-10

    071909061X

  • Eden Code

    4271514

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