Beyond Mother Goddesses

Beyond Mother Goddesses: Mothers, Motherhood and Mothering at the Intersection with Religions introduces key scholars in the study of mothers, maternal figures, and motherhood at the intersection with religion and spirituality, as well as new paths for research.

It features interviews with significant authors in religious studies and closely related disciplines and offers a reflexive stance on theory and methodology. The scholars whose interviews are gathered in this volume study different traditions, including Greco-Roman religions, Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, contemporary cultures, and time periods from Antiquity and Ancient India to contemporary cultures. Although they also represent different disciplines and draw on different methodologies, they all examine the intersection of mothers, motherhood, and mothering with religion and spirituality.

With its introduction and its conclusion, which together provide a description of the state of the field and new avenues for research, this volume offers a thorough examination of the emerging subfield of study on mothers, motherhood, mothering, and religion.

Florence Pasche Guignard is a professor in the study of religions at the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, Université Laval, Quebec City, Canada. Her research explores the intersection of religions with gender, women’s history, motherhood, ritual, and material culture.

Pascale Engelmajer is a professor of religious studies at Carroll University. She researches and publishes widely on Buddhism, with a focus on ancient Buddhist conceptualizations of motherhood and mothering.

Sucharita Sarkar is a professor of English at D.T.S.S. College of Commerce, Mumbai, a member of the Board of Studies in English at the University of Mumbai, and an invited member of the Faculty of Humanities at Dr. Homi Bhabha State University, Mumbai. Her doctoral thesis investigated mothering narratives in contemporary India.

Giulia Pedrucci is a researcher in the history of religions and classical archaeology, holding degrees from the Universities of Bologna and Parma and a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology of the Ancient World from the University of Siena. Currently a postdoctoral fellow at Comenius University in Bratislava, she investigates the religious dimensions of motherhood in ancient Mediterranean societies.