The first session orients us to our subject matter by defining Kuṇḍalinī, situating the concept of Kuṇḍalinī amidst the trope of snakes and Indian mythology on serpent people or nāgas, and overviewing the esoteric body. To aid our understanding of we will define key terms and concepts. Alongside Kuṇḍalinī, literally ‘she who is coiled’, we will set out key terms such as ‘yogic body’, ‘subtle body’ and esoteric anatomy (nāḍīs, cakras, granthis) and review key concepts such as ontology, epistemology and phenomenology. Snake imagery plays an important role in religious contexts, and we will situate Kuṇḍalinī within these wider serpentine tropes and the mythology of serpent people, nāgas, who often dwell in subterranean worlds of water. This session draws on images of Kuṇḍalinī to paint a rich picture as well as textual sources such as the Kaṭha Upaniṣad and Taittirīyopaniṣad, but notably not the Pātañjalayogaśāstra, in an overview of Kuṇḍalinī in yogic sources.  

There is significant material in Śaiva sources on Kuṇḍalinī as a cosmogonic force, a śakti in the heart and an alphabet goddess associated with the subtle sound of creation. This second session traces the emergence of Kuṇḍalinī in Śaiva and Vajrayāna literature. The 6–7^th century Śaiva Sārdhatriśatikālottaratantra has an early reference to Kuṇḍalinī and the 8^th century Tantrasadbhāva may have the first description of Kuṇḍalinī as a snake. In these Śaiva sources Kuṇḍalinī is a key creative or cosmogonic force especially in accounts where the alphabet is understood as a creative sequence. In esoteric Buddhist or Vajrayāna materials Kuṇḍalinī is synonymous with caṇḍālī and we will review a selection of key sources, such as the 10^th century Hevajratantra. 

Kuṇḍalinī plays a key explanatory role in the technique of haṭha yoga in Sanskrit textual sources from the first half of the second millennium. This role increases through the corpus. Unnamed in the 11^th century Amṛtasiddi,  she is the foundation of all yoga teachings by the 15^th century Haṭhapradīpikā. In fact, she is described as the key (kuñcikā) of force in the Vivekamārtaṇḍa and Haṭhapradīpikā. Yet despite her pivotal role her description across the sources is heterogenous. She is awoken by being burnt with fire and experienced as fire or lightening flashing forth. Sometimes she unites with Śiva in the head. It appears that the haṭha sources adopt Kuṇḍalinī from laya yoga, the yoga of dissolution, and adapt her for the purposes of haṭha yoga. This module traces the characterisation of Kuṇḍalinī and the techniques to awaken her in textual sources from first half of the second millennium.  

The final module explores how Kuṇḍalinī has travelled and landed in the contemporary period. Key figures in the popularisation and globalisation of Kuṇḍalinī include John Woodroffe and Pūrṇānanda who published a translation of the Ṣaṭcakranirūpaṇa as The Serpent Power (1918), important psychological innovations were made by Carl Jung (1932), vivid personal experiences were recounted by Gopi Krishna (1971) and an association between Kuṇḍalinī and the vagus nerve was made by Vasant Rele (1931). This session recounts the reception history of Kuṇḍalinī and questions the universality of the concept, suggesting a disjunct between Kuṇḍalinī and Modern Postural Yoga and a reformulation of Kuṇḍalinī and sacred sexuality and spiritual crisis.