Andy Rotman

Bio: Andy Rotman is an academic researcher. The author has contributed to research in topics: Buddhism & Agency (philosophy). The author has an hindex of 3, co-authored 6 publications receiving 49 citations.

Thus Have I Seen: Visualizing Faith in Early Indian Buddhism

Abstract: ACKNOWLEDGMENTS INTRODUCTION PART I: THE PRACTICE OF ?RADDH? 1. Seeing and Knowing 2. Getting and Giving PART II: THE PRACTICE OF PRAS?DA 3. Agency and Intentionality 4. Participation and Exclusion 5. Proximity and Presence 6. Politics and Aesthetics PART III: SEEING THE BUDDHA 7. Past and Present 8. Images and Imagination EPILOGUE APPENDIX: CONTENTS OF THE DIVY?VAD?NA BIBLIOGRAPHY

The Erotics of Practice: Objects and Agency in Buddhist Avadāna Literature

Abstract: The collection of Indian Buddhist narratives known as the Divyävadäna posits that there is a class of objects whose sight leads to the arising of prasäda in the viewer and that this mental state of prasäda leads the viewer to make an offering. In this article, I first describe the mechanics of prasäda—why it arises, in whom it arises, and the consequences of it arousal—as well as the various \"agents of prasäda\" (präsädika) and the power they exert when seen. In discussing the field of effects of präsädika objects, I consider Catherine MacKinnon's work on pornography to help clarify the politics of this configuration ofprasäda as well as its ethical implications. Last, I discuss the aesthetics of prasäda and what this suggests about the function of Buddhist narratives known as avadarías.

The Midnight Buffet

Abstract: No one could resist the hard-boiled penguins, the egg fish with fins of carrot, and the fish eggs spooned out to resemble the ship’s pool. Standing between Styrofoam busts of Napoleon and Josephine, the head chef, a Swede, nodded in response to innumerable compliments. His staff had succeeded in creating sculpture from food and in transforming the cruise ship’s dining room into a floating museum. It was the fifth night of our European cruise—a gift from a generous parent— and we were accompanied by more than one thousand merchants who had received the trip as a business incentive. A queue of these passengers, many of whom wore formal attire, began to form by quarter past eleven, though the French doors would not swing open until midnight. Ushers informed them that during the first half hour of the midnight buffet the food was to be seen but not eaten. Inside, a windmill and a cannon fashioned from bread would greet them; so too would a Styrofoam Eiffel Tower and casually leaning Tower of Pisa. There would be vases carved from watermelon rind that resembled pieces of Venetian glass, game fowl carved from apples, Gaudí-inspired pastries, and numerous questions about the tools that had been used to craft the radish mice. It would be a sensorium of edible art, camera flashes, and compulsive eating; a race to consume, both visually and gustatorily, the icons of Europe and la bonne vie. Yet, embedded within this display of European taste and decorum, other flavors were also present. At both ends of the buffet, we detected a bovine presence—namely, matching cow and bull heads carved from butter and garlanded with fruit and vegetable flowers. The Scandinavian cruise ship employed 720 people from over fifty countries, but we had learned that many of the hundreds of members of the kitchen staff hailed from the Indian subcontinent, particularly from Goanese Christian communities on India’s west coast. Though the waiters, servers, sommeliers, and assistants had been hired from port cities throughout Asia, South America, and the poorer countries of Europe, ethnic difference was either put on the proverbial back burner or rendered palatable. During dinner one night, for example, our Romanian waiter and his Indian assistant joined the rest of the kitchen staff to entertain the guests, singing a few lusty verses of “O Sole Mio” in English, in what was described as “fifty-two different accents.” Australian and British staff members, nevertheless, stood closest to the microphones. Despite the multicultural character of the crew, the cruise catered primarily to travelers from the United States. The food presented at most dinners was pseudo-

Marx at the margins : on nationalism, ethnicity, and non-western societies : with a new preface

Abstract: In "Marx at the Margins, " Kevin Anderson uncovers a variety of extensive but neglected texts by Marx that cast what we thought we knew about his work in a startlingly different light. Analyzing a variety of Marx s writings, including journalistic work written for the "New York Tribune, " Anderson presents us with a Marx quite at odds with conventional interpretations. Rather than providing us with an account of Marx as an exclusively class-based thinker, Anderson here offers a portrait of Marx for the twenty-first century: a global theorist whose social critique was sensitive to the varieties of human social and historical development, including not just class, but nationalism, race, and ethnicity, as well. Through highly informed readings of work ranging from Marx s unpublished 1879 82 notebooks to his passionate writings about the antislavery cause in the United States, this volume delivers a groundbreaking and canon-changing vision of Karl Marx that is sure to provoke lively debate in Marxist scholarship and beyond. For this expanded edition, Anderson has written a new preface that discusses the additional 1879 82 notebook material, as well as the influence of the Russian-American philosopher Raya Dunayevskaya on his thinking."

Hundi/hawala: the problem of definition

Abstract: In contemporary times, hundi has collected countless labels; the international press has spurned innumerable villainous descriptions, the bulk of which have helped to perpetuate a dense fog of notoriety. The critical problem lies in definition. As there is an incomplete understanding of hundi's form and remit, there is also a rather limited understanding of why the system persists, set against the backdrop of modern banking. In many ways the problem of definition presented legal and financial authorities of the early and late twentieth century with core issues which remain unresolved and problematic for authorities in the twenty-first century. By drawing on archival and other historical material pertaining to the system's usage amongst Indian merchants, this paper attempts to tackle much of the confusion and many misconceptions surrounding hundi. The discussion explores the idea that hundi is more accurately described as an indigenous banking system endowed with a complex range of functions, but whose central purpose is trade.