Françoise Mallison

Françoise Mallison (born in Lyon, 1940) is a French Indologist specialising in the history and religious traditions of Gujarat. She was the Head of Studies at the École pratique des hautes études, Sorbonne.

Françoise Mallison
Born(1940-11-14)November 14, 1940
Lyon
CitizenshipFrench
Alma materÉcole Nationale des Chartes
Scientific career
FieldsIndology
InstitutionsÉcole française d'Extrême-Orient
Theses
  • Le cartulaire de l'abbaye de Signy, ordre de Cîteaux, au diocèse de Reims (1964)
  • Satî-Gîtâ, le chant de la femme fidèle, traduction de la version gujarati (1969)
Doctoral advisorCharlotte Vaudeville

Life and career

Françoise Mallison was born in Lyon, France in 1940. She read Medieval studies at the École Nationale des Chartes from 1960. After she submitted her thesis, she worked as a curator at the French National Archives between 1964–67, and again between 1969–71.[1]

Mallison also studied the Hindi language at the École nationale des langues orientales vivantes from 1962. Supervised by Charlotte Vaudeville, she defended her dissertation Satî-Gîtâ, le chant de la femme fidèle, traduction de la version gujarati (Sati-Gita: the song of the faithful woman; translated from the Gujarati) in 1969. She was then attached to the École française d'Extrême-Orient (EFEO)'s Pune branch, which she headed between 1971–77.[1]

Returning to France, she lectured at the École pratique des hautes études, and then supervised a research programme on the history and philology of Western India in the Middle Ages at the EFEO. She retired from the EFEO in October 1994.[1]

Religious studies

Mallison's area of research is pre-modern and medieval Gujarati literature. She has rediscovered and analyzed texts from the last thousand years, ranging from hymns such as the Prabhatiyam to the Ginans of the Ismailis, and local interpretations of Sanskrit epics such as the Ramayana.[1]

In her researches into religious sects of Gujarat, she has shown that some hymns (such as the Sant Vani) transcended religious boundaries. She proposed that a Naklamki (the tenth avatar of Vishnu, also known as Kalki) cult in Saurashtra started by Ismaili Khojas in the nineteenth century, using Hindu terms such as avatar and borrowing classical Hindu stories, became a Hindu cult.[2] Another example of transcultural diffusion of religious texts that Mallison uncovered was the Delami Aradh. Between the 13th and 15th centuries, this ritual began with Ismailis and then was adopted by Gujarati Mahamargis, a Tantric sect.[3] The Mahamargis themselves, she showed, was an ecumenical cult but chiefly run by an untouchable caste, the Meghvals.[4]

Mallison investigated the spread of the bhakti teachings of Vallabha, a fifteenth century itinerant saint. She claimed that his doctrines, based on Krishna-worship – already well-established in Gujarat – were especially popular among the merchant bania caste, because he taught that the pursuit of material gain was compatible with bhakti. This was countered by the argument that the Bhagavad Gita already confirmed the consonance between one's faith and one's varna-related calling.[5]

A major religious movement Mallison studied was that of Swaminarayan. She showed that origin stories of its founder Sahajanand Swami, a yogi, resemble those of the Hindu deity Krishna; he is depicted in garb resembling that of the god, and one of the nicknames of Krishna, Ranachhoda, under which he is worshipped at Dwarka was also given to the yogi. These allow the followers of the movement to identify Sahajanand with Krishna.[6]

Cultural traditions

Mallison explored the spread of vernacular culture in Gujarat via dhol songs. These were popular depictions of folklore that were at one time widespread, but later came to be associated with the Vallabha sect.[7]

Mallison reconstructed the history of the Braj Language School in Bhuj, Gujarat, a cultural institution that educated poets and professional writers from 1749–1948. She was able to collect and publish a narrative of the school from widely dispersed technical literature and poetry from the school.[8]

Selected works
  • F. Mallison (2016). "Gujarati Socio-religious Context of Swaminarayan Devotion and Doctrine". In R.B. Williams; Y. Trivedi (eds.). Swaminarayan Hinduism: Tradition, Adaptation, Identity.
  • T.R. Kassam; F. Mallison, eds. (2010). Gināns: Texts and Contexts : Essays on Ismaili Hymns from South Asia in Honour of Zawahir Moir. Primus Books. ISBN 9788190891875.
  • F. Mallison (1998). "Le discours hagiographique dans les biographies du saint-poète gujarati Narasimha Mahetâ (XVe siècle, Inde occidentale)". Bulletin de l'École Française d'Extrême-Orient. 85.
  • F. Mallison (1994). "Early Krsna Bhakti in Gujarat: The Evidence of Old Gujarati Texts Recently Brought to Light". In A.W.Entwistle; F. Mallison (eds.). Studies in Asian Devotional Literature, Research Papers 1988-1991.
  • F. Mallison (1986). Au point du jour : les Prabhâtiyâm de Narasimha Mahetâ, poète et saint vishnouite du Gujarât (XVe siècle).
  • F. Mallison (1980). "Saint Sudama in Gujarat: Should the holy be wealthy ?". Journal of the Oriental Institute. Baroda.
  • F. Mallison (1974). "La secte krichnaïte des Svami-narayani au Gujarat". Journal Asiatique. 262.

References
  1. "Françoise Mallison". École française d'Extrême-Orient. Retrieved 27 July 2019.
  2. P. Granoff; K. Shinohara, eds. (2011). "Introduction". Pilgrims, Patrons, and Place: Localizing Sanctity in Asian Religions. UBC Press. p. 13. ISBN 978-0-7748-4219-8.
  3. H. Pauwels (2009). "Introduction". In H. Pauwels (ed.). Patronage and Popularisation, Pilgrimage and Procession: Channels of Transcultural Translation and Transmission in Early Modern South Asia ; Papers in Honour of Monika Horstmann. Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. ISBN 978-3-447-05723-3.
  4. T. Purohit (31 October 2012). The Aga Khan Case: Religion and Identity in Colonial India. Harvard University. p. 159. ISBN 978-0-674-06770-7.
  5. S. Saha (2007). "The Movement of Bhakti along a North-West Axis: Tracing the History of the Puṣṭimārg between the Sixteenth and Nineteenth Centuries". International Journal of Hindu Studies. 11 (3): 307. doi:10.1007/s11407-008-9050-3.
  6. R.B. Williams (1984). A New Face of Hinduism: The Swaminarayan Religion. Cambridge University. p. 67. ISBN 978-0-521-27473-9.
  7. R. K. Barz; M. Theil-Horstmann, eds. (1989). "Introduction". Living Texts from India. Otto Harrassowitz. p. 3. ISBN 978-3-447-02967-4.
  8. S. Pollock (2011). "Introduction". In S. Pollock (ed.). Forms of Knowledge in Early Modern Asia: Explorations in the Intellectual History of India and Tibet, 1500–1800. Duke University Press. p. 9. ISBN 0-8223-4904-3.
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