Erasure of lesbian/female-centred sexuality/ancient

representations of female erotic autonomy

February 3, 2008

India has a rich herstory of goddess-worship and varied representations of female power. Sadly,
much of this herstory has been, and is being, erased and destroyed. The autonomy of sacred centres
of female power are being replaced by male gods or dismembered by man/ipulations.
The manipulation of older shaktic histories has severe historical socio-cultural
implications as in this ban by the new practising trust. These trusts far from conserving
these traditions have done a surgical operation. Sometimes, sculptures are taken out,
polished and plastered over or masculinised.

The situation is no different in the disciplines of indology and art history. There is a
sheer gender silence and ignorance propounded in the name of ‘objective scholarship’.
Implicit in this the issue of what may be represented and what may not be. Central to
this is the issue of gender cognition. . This has several social and cultural implications.

Whereas the temples under the Archaeological Survey of India by and large are
preserved, yet some of the temples (particularly yogini have been manipulated). One
example is the cementing of a male bhairav in the open centre of the yogini temple in
Ranipur Jharial. (Orissa)The yoginis are now seen as his servants.

The sculpture [shown below] was found in the open in a a small village in Gujurat. Now
it has been converted into a male god. A new temple has been constructed over it. This
is the only existing documentation. The sculpture also represents an unconsorted Parvati
holding Ganesh in one of her hands. It belongs too to the spectrum of the independent
matrikas (above) in which one of the matrikas is represented with an elephant head.
Matangi (mata – angi. mother’s limb), one of the words for elephant is a marker of a
matriafocal geneology.
Check out Mahamaya. A website dedicated to preserving the archeological herstory of these
fascinating female sculptures. Each page is filled with gorgeous, powerful images of the goddess. It
definitely puts me in mind of Audre Lorde’s The Erotic as Power.
In her paper Heteropatriarchy: Globalisation, the Institution of Heterosexuality and Lesbians, Susan
Hawthorne asks:
Giti Thadani (2004) in her research of ancient lesbian sites in India records the violence
against 5000-year-old sacred stone sculptures. Why have we not heard about how the
breasts of these statues have been cut off? Why is there no international protest? Is it
because the statues are symbolic of lesbian existence, not just now, but back into ancient
history?

Well, the answers are too obvious.

Lesbian
=autonomous, female-centred sexuality
=women who don’t need/want men
=men freaking out
=breasts chopped off statues
=men don’t care about lesbian herstory
=no one cares about lesbian herstory.