Jain Spirit 2004 10 No 20

Author(s): Jain Spirit UK
Publisher: UK Young Jains

Page 68

Aff photos courtesy of out
Author with child Sheoganj, Rajasthan
Young girl being taken in procession through Saiwara, Rajasthan prior to her initiation ceremony to make her a nun.
THROUGH MY
WINDOW
JOSEPHINE REYNELL DELVED INTO JAIN WORSHIP FOR HER PHD FIELDWORK AT CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY AND DISCOVERED AN INTRIGUING NEW WORLD
Can you imagine a young British student wandering the streets and alleys of Jaipur with a notebook and pen in hand, sitting with the nuns and visiting women in their homes? In 1982, I embarked on an exploratory journey into Jain India, and the experience changed my life. I was touched by the wisdom and the generosity of the community, and the colour and ceremony which is an integral part of this vast tradition.
he first temple visit is still clear in my memory. A young sociology student from the University of Rajasthan accompanied me as a guide. Weaving our
way past the myriad of small vegetable sellers lining the Jauhri bazaar, I felt somewhat disconcerted by the premonsoon oven-like heat. Without Renu's guidance I would not have located the temple, down a narrow alleyway and with a somewhat unprepossessing entrance. Once inside however, a different world was revealed: suffused with the soothing aroma of incense, women and men calmly performing their morning worship in the welcoming cool of the quiet temple.
My fieldwork began over twenty years ago. It was Dr. Caroline Humphreys, my supervisor at Cambridge University, who suggested that I study the Jains. I found accommodation initially with a Punjabi Hindu family in one of the peaceful, bougainvillea-filled suburbs of Jaipur. I can remember my first morning in Jaipur, sitting on their verandah, sipping delicious cardamon chai and feeling a sense of exhilaration mixed with unease. My anthropological education had focused on village studies, where the research community is immediately visible. The questions I had pushed to the back of my mind while in preparations for leaving, now rose starkly to the surface. In this large city how was I to locate the Jain community? Moreover, would I gain access to women secluded within houses by values of purdah? And what right did I have at all to impose on people's private space and take time out of their busy daily routine? Suddenly the whole anthropological enterprise, relying on face-to-face interaction to investigate how Jainism is actually lived, seemed a thoroughly daunting venture.