In the introduction to her work on Sītā and Rādhā, Heidi Pauwels details her methodology: “The main question underlying this study … is to summarize to what extent Sītā's example can be said to be empowering or oppressive for women as they cope with love; how that changes at different points in history, and how that contrasts or not with the example of Rādhā” (pp. 45–46). The author uses epic and Puranic descriptions of the two goddesses and considers their treatment in medieval bhakti texts, in teleserials, and in their modern tropes on the Bollywood movie screen. All of the chapters feature numerous tables that aid the reader in following the author's many complex examples, comparisons, and contrasts.

Pauwels establishs early on that the Vālmīki Rāmayana ideal of Sītā is focused on maryādā/dharma, while the medieval texts portray her in terms of bhakti. Ramanand Sagar's teleserial The Ramayan focused especially on the bhakti paradigm, but he freely mixed textual referents with his personal and political inclinations regarding dharmic role models as well. Pauwels's work here on epic and medieval Rādhā demonstrates that this goddess is most often associated historically with a “non-maryadic” but nonetheless powerful bhakti experience. In Shri Krishna, however, Sagar manipulates the story so that Rādhā conforms to both dharma and “mainstream” bhakti, effectively “Sītā-izing” her (p. 81).

Part I, entitled “Getting a Love Marriage Arranged,” consists of three chapters that discuss the textual and television evidence of contrast between Sītā and Rādhā. Each chapter begins with a thorough examination of episodes involving Sītā that can be found in either the Vālmīki Rāmayana or the Tulsīdas Rām Carit Mānas and the portrayal of those episodes, or lack thereof, in Sagars's teleserial. Rādhā then becomes the focus of comparative analysis as she appears in medieval Krishnaite devotional poetry inspired by the Bhāgavata Purāṇa and in the modern teleserial Shri Krishna. At the end of each chapter, Pauwels turns to what are clearly her favorite considerations: modern Bollywood portrayals of the proper and improper authoritative paradigms of Sītā and Rādhā. Pauwels truly excels in these last analyses, carefully reviewing popular movies from several eras of filmmaking in India to find the tropes of Sītā and Rādhā.

Part II, entitled “The Challenges of Married Life,” bears the same pattern of the goddesses' portrayals in comparison and contrast: three chapters focus on the role models of Sītā and Rādhā from textual and television sources, but now as “wives.” Pauwels demonstrates that in marriage, Sītā remains the pativratā of choice for the modern woman. She is the very picture of dharma in the Vālmīki and of dharma and bhakti in the Rām Carit Mānas, following her husband into a difficult exile. In chapter 6, Pauwels does note that even Sītā's actions are not always ideal; she can also, along with Rādhā, serve as the example of modern women who bring down on themselves “eve-teasing,” or sexual harassment, by crossing dharmic boundaries.

Pauwels's stunning conclusions with regard to twentieth- and twenty-first-century Bollywood are that this popular medium portrays feminine role models in terms of a very conservative ideal. The films overwhelmingly favor the Sītā troping as normative for the modern girl/woman. In her premarital and marital choices and as wives, modern women should still “be like Sītā.” “The bhakti tradition privileged love. It is Bollywood that privileges duty” (p. 309). “In the Hindi film world, the path of love—it seems—can be no other than that of dharma” (p. 468).

Pauwels's work complements existing research on goddesses and women in India, but adds some very important and hitherto unexamined details to the textual analyses of the epic, medieval, and television sources. Sītā in particular, and to a lesser extent Rādhā, have been at the center of many scholarly works on Hindu “role models” for the lives and loves of modern Indian women. Both goddesses continue to be at the center of a discourse on their precise and continuing impact. What is novel about Pauwels's research is that she concentrates especially on love and marriage as exemplified by the portrayals in the scriptures and on the different types of screens. No other study has focused on the nuances of both Sītā and Rādhā's premarital and marital adventures and misadventures and how they are rendered in modern day “scripture,” the teleserials of The Ramayan and Shri Krishna. Her work on the prevailing paradigm of Sītā over Rādhā in Bollywood provides an essential tool for interpretations of modern popular culture in India.

The Goddess as Role Model is aimed at advanced graduate students and is valuable to scholars of many disciplines, not the least of which is the growing field of Indian mixed media culture. The deconstruction of television serials and Bollywood films is truly advanced by Pauwels work. While the book is a lengthy and complex study, Pauwels's humor enlivens each page, making it a pleasure to read.