Devoção e yoga nas camadas médias do Rio de Janeiro: Análise do campo nos estudos da Bhagavad Gita

Abstract

This article portrays the fieldwork of what is now approximately ten years of interaction with a group of Vedanta students in Rio de Janeiro. By attending classes of a course on the Bhagavad Gita, the main studied text in Vedanta, I have observed how students understand the practice of meditation, the ‘I’ consciousness, their role (dharma) in the world, the cosmic ‘order’, the sense of devotion and the changes arising from their projects of searching for ‘liberation’ from samsara, which is a continuous and endless cycle marked by ignorance, illusion and confusion. Above all, I have tried to analyse the meanings of their spiritual searches understood as the ‘ultimate goal’ or life project, which gave rise to the investigation of what they mean when they call themselves ‘seekers’ and what they under-stand by ‘life of yoga’.