<Articles>Purity and Impurity on Residential Space of Hindu Temple Priests

Abstract

This article examines the residential space of Hindu temple priests, called Dikshitars, inSouth India. I will clarify how purity and impurity have an influence on their residence. In previousstudies, the concepts of purity/impurity have been discussed in relation to social structure based onan ideological schema, a comprehensive argument concerning the status and hierarchy of the dualisticsymbolism (Dumont 1980; Harper 1964; Mikame 1991). The everyday life of Hindu temple priestsunfolds on a boundary between that of the otherworldly priest and of the ordinary man; Even thoughpriests embody the concept of religious purity, they generate organic pollutions as human beings intheir residential space.In this article, I refer to Bourdieu’s viewpoint on residential space. He saw architecture as an unconsciouscollection of tendencies that construct the interaction between us and our environment that wehave created. Then, he saw architecture as an object-embodied habitus. I consider Dikshitar’s houseas the place where the practice regarding purity/impurity is created. Moreover, I focus on not only thearchitectural feature of Dikshitar’s residence but also their family relations and relationships with outsiders, gender differences on their spatial perception and usage, and its change caused by modernizinginfluences.