Header Image Credit : Till Credner - Own work: Visual Constellations, a photographic field guide, CC BY-SA 4.0
I’m starting a post series about the night sky on this blog! I’m calling it Akashvani (pronounced AA-kAAsh-vAAnEE), which means ‘voice of the sky’ in Sanskrit and has been mentioned in many stories in the Hindu mythology. This post is the first one in the series! All posts in this series will be under the tag #akashvani or #sky talks on this blog.
Ever wondered what exactly is a zodiac sign? Does any science go into astrology? How are Chinese zodiac different from non-East Asian Zodiac? Then you are in the right place! Keep reading under the cut to find out more about zodiacs, and the path of the Sun, the moon, and the planets in the night sky!
The Zodiac Belt - The Sun, moon, and the planets move in a certain path in the sky. Their motions are constricted to a band. This band is known as the Zodiac Belt and it is composed of 13 constellations. These 13 constellations, in order of appearance in the night sky (starting with Aries), are -
Aries
Taurus
Gemini
Cancer
Leo
Virgo
Libra
Scorpius
Ophiuchus
Sagittarius
Capricorn
Aquarius
Pisces
You may recognize the 12 bold ones as the 12 Zodiac signs! The Sun, the moon, and the planets move approximately through the center of this belt in a line called the Ecliptic, which gets it’s name from the fact that eclipses (both lunar and solar) happen on this line.
Now, you may be wondering why Ophiuchus isn’t a Zodiac sign? The answer is related to the fact that ecliptic is a ‘line’, but not on a flat surface. Because Earth is round and the sky appears like a dome above us, ecliptic is on a sphere! And a line on a sphere isn’t a straight line at all, it is a circle! (Try drawing a straight line all around a tennis ball to find out!)
To go around a circle, you need to turn by 360 degrees. 360 is a difficult number to divide by 13 isn’t it? But not by 12! So what astrology does, is it tries to divide the ecliptic into 12 equal parts and each of those parts corresponds to a zodiac sign. In this kinda division, poor Ophiuchus gets divided between Sagittarius and Scorpius but most of it lies in the Sagittarius section. These sections are also called ‘houses’ in astrology sometimes.
What is a horoscope? A horoscope is generated based on the position of planets, the Sun, and the moon in the Zodiac belt at the time of one’s birth. Position of the Sun during a person’s birth decides the ‘Sun Sign’ and position of the moon decides the ‘Moon Sign’. The calendar we follow (Gregorian calendar) is a solar calendar, which means its basis is the motion of Earth around the Sun. Which is why, most solar signs can be determined based on what month you were born in, without looking at a star chart. Moon signs are tricky unless you are following a lunar calendar, which is based on moon’s orbit around the Earth. Chances are, most cultures that emphasize moon signs traditionally follow a lunar calendar (like most South Asian cultures!).
What are the Chinese Zodiacs? This might need a post of it’s own and I might make one depending on the response to this post. The 12 Chinese zodiac signs are quite different from lunar or solar zodiac. They do not depend on the division of the ecliptic at all. Instead, they depend on the time JUPITER takes to go around the Sun! That, to me, is extremely cool. It takes about 12 years for Jupiter to go around the Sun. So the cycle gets divided into 12 parts where each part corresponds to an year (not a month!). However, the Chinese calendar is most definitely a lunar calendar and has nothing to do with Jupiter. We are now reaching the limits of my knowledge on this subject and I see this as a sign to stop this fairly long post. I do want to leave you with some questions about the Chinese zodiac system that I currently cannot answer and welcome people who know about this to add to this post if they can and want to. Why does the Chinese zodiac system use Jupiter instead of the Sun or the moon? The brightest planet in the sky is Venus not Jupiter. In fact, Jupiter isn’t that bright since it is so far. So what is the cultural reason behind it? Is their an astronomical reason for the ‘Zodiac of the Cat’ being the 13th disputed zodiac ‘sign’? The existence of a 13th sign, to me, sounds very similar to the Ophiuchus issue, but I haven’t found an astronomical reason for it. How did the Chinese find out that it takes 12 earth years for Jupiter to go around the Sun when most of the world at the time didn’t even know the planets were orbiting the Sun and not Earth? Please add to this post or send me an ask/message if you know!
I want to end this post on the note that a fair bit of science and math does go into astrology. This is the astronomy of the ancient times. Our ancestors could not have come up with this stuff without knowing how to draw a star chart or without knowing about spherical geometry or not knowing math. Accuracy was of utmost importance and precision was valued as these concepts were also going into making agricultural almanacs, a very important aspect for the society back then. However, the divination part of astrology does not have a basis in modern astronomy. That still doesn’t make the science part of it any less interesting and should most definitely be talked about more!
#Repost @tvally ・・・ #MidweekBlues? No worries! #ClassicalMusic is all you need to keep your cool. Listen to @meri_awaz_hi_pehchan_hai #songs now on tvally.in. Do you know, he has won the #AllIndiaRadio #MusicCompetition in #Ghazal in 2009. This gave him #NationalRecognition. He is also performing in #Akashvani #Kolkata on a regular basis. For Desktop - https://tvally.in/user/738 For Mobile - https://tvally.in/m/user/738 #HindiSongs #BengaliSongs #MaithiliSongs #NewMusic #NewMusicAlert #MusicIsLife #IndieMusic #IndieInIndia #IndieOnTVAlly https://www.instagram.com/p/Bu8F3HeAe53/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=1eb0dickcd5gu
Mmmm.....where do i start to describe this charming, elegant, beautiful, down to earth, kind-hearted angel??? p/s: i could go on and on praising her but still it wont be enough i guess 😋😋
Fatima Sana Shaikh aka cutely known as Fatty was born on 11th January 1992. She is an Indian actress. Many must have known her through her role as Geeta Phogat in 2016 blockbuster, Dangal which had touched so many hearts and also the highest grossing Indian movie ever!! At first, many had thought that Dangal was her debut, but it was not. In fact, she had been in the industry since she was small. Remember the scene in Ishq (1997) where Ajay Devgn walk on the pipe when he see Kajol on the opposite building? If you notice, Kajol is holding a cute little girl at the same time, and yes, the cute little girl was none other than the beautiful Fatima. Or if you can remember the girl that played the chirpy baby Bharti in Chachi 420 (1997)? yes, it was also her. She also played one of Jackie Shroffs’ daughter in Shah Rukh Khan-Juhi Chawla starrer One 2 Ka 4 (2001). She left acting for a while as she missed studying, and as she grew up, she started to miss acting again. She started her comeback as supporting/extras in soap dramas; Agle Janam Mohe Bitiya Hi Kijo (2009), and Ladies Special (2009) and also in movies; Bittoo Boss(2012) and Akash Vaani (2013). During her early career as an adult, luck was not in her favor though as she was just getting small/extra role and she also unable to land in any tvc eventhough she will go auditioning almost everyday for around 3 years! So, to earn some money, she worked as an assistant photographer. But everything had changed, and her life took a turning point after Dangal (2016) happened and I must say that all her hard work pays off. Now, there is no turning back. She also had bagged the main role in YRF movie, Thugs of Hindostan alongside Aamir Khan, Amitabh Bachchan and Katrina Kaif. Thugs of Hindostan directed by Vijay Krishna Acharya is one of he most anticipated Bollywood movie this year, and can you imagine we just only 2 months +++ far from it!! Honestly I can’t contain my excitement anymore. As a fan, I think not only me, but all Fatima’s fan had been waiting to see her again in the big screen, almost 2 years after Dangal..And I hope she will conquer 2018 and years to come. Go Fatima 👊👊👊👊👊👊
Earth is a spinning top! It’s rotating about an axis and that’s why we have day and night. But like every spinning top, Earth wobbles a little on it’s axis. What are the effects of Earth’s wobble on the night sky? Here’s the second Akashvani post with an answer to that!
Akashvani (pronounced AA-kAAsh-vAAnEE), is a series of posts on this blog about the night sky. All posts in this series will be under the tag #akashvani or #sky talks on this blog. Check out the tag to learn more about the night sky!
The Earth rotates around an axis. We are introduced to this concept pretty early in school aren’t we? After all, Earth’s rotation is what causes day and night! It is a super important concept to grasp. But, that’s not all there is to Earth’s rotation.
Precession: When you spin a top, it usually looks like this -
Notice, the top is not vertically straight, it’s tilted. And the top is wobbling. The wobble and tilt are pretty noticeable in the gif above but even a comparably stable top like the one below, also shows some tilt and wobble -
If there was no tilt, the long pointy thing in the middle would stay put. The Earth is exactly like that wooden wobbly top. We call this wobble Precession. If you imagine a stick protruding from Earth’s north pole, very much like that wooden top, the star placed right on top of it would be the North Star or the Pole Star.
You may have heard this before that the North Star is the only star that doesn’t move in the sky. And that is true to an extent. If the top in the picture didn’t wobble, then the wooden pole would stay exactly where it is. If you were on the surface of an un-wobbling Earth, you would see everything in the sky above you circle one single point in the sky. Earth takes it’s sweet time to complete one full precession cycle - about 26,000 years for one wobble! That is much much longer than a human life isn’t it? So to us, it does definitely look like the whole sky is going around one point. But, humans have been around for thousands of years to be able to notice slight changes in the location of the sky’s immovable north pole, and many ancient civilizations have records of the effects of Earth’s precession on the North Star and other stars.
The North Star right now is Polaris in the Ursa Minor constellation. But in the past, various stars in the Cepheus, Draco, Cygnus, and Lyra constellations, have been Earth’s pole star. If you are a regular stargazer, you know how far apart these constellations appear in the sky! If you are not well-versed in constellation positions, check these out on Stellarium to see how drastic of an effect this can be. But as I mentioned, this happens over the course of millenia so Polaris will probably remain the North Star in our lifetimes.
Next time you’re out stargazing, look up and try spotting the North Star! (Do practice social distancing when doing so!)
Akashvani Speech Contest Held at Karim City College
Akashvani Speech Contest Held at Karim City College
Students Highlight Akashvani’s Role in Society and Culture
Key Points:
Karim City College Hosted Akashvani Speech Competition
Students Spoke on Broadcasting and Public Awareness
Nandini Dutta Secured First Position in Contest
JAMSHEDPUR – Jamshedpur witnessed a speech competition at Karim City College celebrating 90 years of Akashvani.
Karim…
आकाशवाणी केरलम द्वारा आयोजित अखिल केरल रेडियो नाटक महोत्सव कल से शुरू होने जा रहा है, जिसमें कला और संस्कृति का शानदार संगम देखने को मिलेगा।
ऐसी ही सांस्कृतिक और ताज़ा खबरों के लिए अभी ऐप डाउनलोड करें 👉 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.yoga.yogaforpregnantladies
B.P. hair dressers, Lanka, Varanasi, A place I am paying my loyalty to for almost two decades. It's been around 15-17 years since I am 95% going to.. next clip is a lovely scene from a class Tamil Romantic film, though I am not much into movies but such films are ❤️, well, Janu wished relive the nostalgia to see the old Ram from 96 batch, to get the old look Janaki and K Ramachandran visits this place always relates and connects me 😌 I wash shy to ask them to get a picture anyway I got one #PeopleofVaranasi #PeopleOfIndia, watch I like about this place is orthodox old hair artists serving for many decades and their old architecture and ambience which is now partially compromised in adaptation of current trend but anyway.. then their #vividhbharati and #akashvani #allindiaradio @airnewsalerts I am very particular about things. #96movie (at Varanasi, India) https://www.instagram.com/p/CpGH5I4qzEL/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=
