Look up Tara or tara in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Tara may refer to:

Religions and deities[link]

• Tara (Buddhism), is a tantric meditation deity in Tibetan Buddhism, actually the generic name for a set of similar bodhisattvas

• In Hinduism:

• Tara (Devi), a Mahavidya of Mahadevi, Kali or Parvati
• In Indian Hinduism, the star goddess Tara is a manifestation of the queen of time, Kali
• Another name for Taraka, the second wife of Brihaspati
• Tara (Ramayana), the wife of the monkey king Vali, who married Vali's brother and successor, Sugriva, after Vali's death

• Tara, the mother goddess in the Druidic religion
• Tara, a sea goddess in Polynesian mythology

People and characters[link]

• Tara (name), a list of people and characters with the name

Titles[link]

• Baron Brabazon of Tara, UK title
• Baron Tara, Irish title
• Kingship of Tara, a title of authority in ancient Ireland
• Viscount Tara, Irish title

Places[link]

Buildings[link]

• Tara, Cairo, villa in Gezira Island, Cairo, made famous by its inhabitants during World War II
• Tara, Chertsey, Surrey, UK, previously the home of drummer Keith Moon
• Tara Theatre, an art house movie theater in Atlanta named after the plantation in Gone With the Wind

Natural features[link]

• 5863 Tara, an asteroid
• Batu Tara, an island in the Flores Sea in Indonesia
• Hill of Tara, Co. Meath, Ireland, ritual site of ancient High Kings of Ireland
• Salar de Tara, salt pan in Chile
• Tara, County Down, a townland in County Down, Northern Ireland
• Tara Hill, County Wexford, Ireland
• Tara Mountain and Tara National Park in Serbia
• Tara River Canyon in Montenegro
• Tara, Saga, town, mountain and mountain range in Saga Prefecture, Japan

Rivers[link]

• Tara (Drina), in Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Tara (Greece), in Arcadia, Greece
• Tara (Italy), a small river near Taranto
• Tara River (Russia), in Siberia, Russia

Settlements[link]

• Qila Tara Singh, a town and union council of Depalpur Tehsil in the Okara District of Punjab Province, Pakistan
• Tara, Afghanistan, in Wardak Province
• Tara, Ethiopia, a village in the Oromia Region of Ethiopia
• Tara Garh, a village in the Pattoki tehsil of Kasur District in the West Punjab, Pakistan
• Tara Hills, California, USA
• Tara, Ireland, a village in Ireland
• Tara Khēl, a village in Deh Sabz District, Kabul Province, Afghanistan
• Țara Moților, an ethnogeographical region of Romania
• Tara Nagar, a village in Gorkha District in the Gandaki Zone of northern-central Nepal
• Tara, Nepal, a village in Baglung District in the Dhawalagiri Zone of central Nepal
• Tara, Ontario, village in Canada
• Tara, Queensland, town in Australia
• Tara, Russia, town in Omsk Oblast, Russia
• Tara, Saga, town, mountain and mountain range in Saga Prefecture, Japan
• Tara Township, Minnesota (disambiguation), USA; several places
• Tara, Zambia, a village in the Southern Province of Zambia

Other[link]

• Đurđevića Tara Bridge, bridge over the Tara River in northern Montenegro
• Shire of Tara, Queensland, Australia
• Tara Anglican School for Girls, North Parramatta, New South Wales, Australia
• Tara Boulevard, modern name of the road where the fictional Tara Plantation was said to be located.
• Țara Călatei, a region in western Romania
• Tara County, New South Wales, Australia
• Tara Field, airport in Clayton County, Georgia, USA
• Tara High School, Baton Rouge, LA, USA
• Tara Mine, a zinc and lead mine near Navan, County Meath, Ireland
• Tara River Canyon, canyon in Montenegro
• Tara Station in Saga Prefecture, Japan
• Tara Street, a major traffic route in Dublin, Ireland
• Tara Street railway station in Dublin, Ireland

Companies and organizations[link]

• Kiah & Tara Jean, a Canadian radio show in Vancouver, British Columbia
• Ţara, a newspaper from the Republic of Moldova
• Tara Air, Nepalese airline
• Tara Arts, cross-cultural theatre production group in London, U.K.
• Tara expedition, Arctic voyage 2006-08
• Tara Foundation, charity for transgendered people
• Tara Hurdle, a horse race in Ireland
• Tara Institute, a Tibetan Buddhist center located in the suburb of East Brighton in Melbourne
• Tara International, Indian marketer for Tara Green Auto
• Tara (Israel), dairy co-operative
• Tara Labs, manufacturer of high-end audio products
• Tara Newz, Bengali news channel
• Tara (Northern Ireland), loyalist group
• Tara Television (or Tara TV), an Irish cable and satellite channel

Works of fiction[link]

Novels[link]

• Tara Road, a 1998 novel by Irish writer Maeve Binchy

Film and television[link]

• Ballad of Tara, "Cherike ye Tara", an Iranian film directed by Bahram Bayzai
• Nepali Tara, a Nepali television series
• Tara (1992 film), an Indian film directed by Bijaya Jena
• Tara (2001 film), an American film, also known as Hood Rat, directed by Leslie Small
• Tara (TV series), soap opera that aired on Zee TV
• TARA, acronym for The Amazing Race Asia, a reality game show on the AXN network
• Tara Road (film), a 2005 film based on the novel
• Tara Sasankam, a popular Indian play and 1941 and 1969 films
• Tara Tena, a TV program in the Philippines
• United States of Tara, a 2009 US comedy-drama TV series

Settings[link]

• Tara Plantation, fictional home of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind
• Tara, a planet setting of the Doctor Who serial The Androids of Tara
• Tara (Artemis Fowl), a location in the Artemis Fowl series, also a real location in Ireland

Other[link]

• Queen Tara, play by Darrell Figgis. Opened at the Gaiety Theatre, Dublin, February 25, 1913. Produced by Henry Herbert.

Science[link]

• Tara (genus), a genus of jumping spiders
• Tara tree in Peru
• Tara (shrub), a Malagasy name for Lemuropisum edule
• TARA, the acronym for the Timed Antagonistic Response Alethiometer, a type of lie detection technique
• Tara, a theoretical founding ancestor of Haplogroup T
• A Vitis rotundifolia grape variety

Music[link]

• T-ara, a 7-member South Korean girl music group
• Tara (Absu album)
• Tara (Yano album)
• "Tara" (song), a song on Moya Brennan's 2003 album Two Horizons
• Tara Music, a label featuring traditional Irish music
• Tara Perdida, a Portuguese punk rock band

Other[link]

• Battle of Tara (disambiguation), a number of battles in Ireland
• Da' Tara, American thoroughbred racehorse
• Hurricane Tara (disambiguation), name of three tropical cyclones in the Eastern Pacific Ocean
• Kayf Tara, United Kingdom Thoroughbred racehorse
• tārā, Tahitian slang for 5 CFP francs
• Tara Brooch, an artifact from Ireland

See also[link]

• Taras (disambiguation)

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

This article is an orphan, as few or no other articles link to it. Please introduce links to this page from related articles; suggestions may be available. (September 2010)

Tara Leann Stiles (born May 6, 1981)^[1] is an American model turned yoga instructor and founder of Strala Yoga in New York City. She starred in Yoga For, the first instructional on-line yoga video series, produced by Ford Models. Vanity Fair reported on a yoga video that Stiles specifically designed for Sarah Palin; the Vanity Fair reporter commented that "Tara Stiles has got to be the coolest yoga instructor ever."^[2] Stiles is also the personal yoga instructor to Deepak Chopra, with whom she collaborated to create Authentic Yoga for the iPhone.

Early life[link]

Stiles grew up outside Morris, Illinois. Her mother designed, without any professional experience, their passive solar home and built it together with her father, now retired from a career in nuclear power.^[3] She has one sibling, an elder brother, Chad, who is an electrician.

Modeling career[link]

After graduation she studied dance in Chicago, where one of her ballet instructors introduced her to yoga. A local photographer brought her to Marie Anderson Boyd, founder of Aria Models in Chicago, later acquired by Ford Models, who signed her on the spot. Boyd booked Stiles' first casting, an ad campaign for Coca-Cola, and She moved to New York City soon after.^[3] She eventually realized that modeling was not what she was truly interested in. When Ford asked her to start making short promotional yoga videos for the agency and post them to YouTube, it was the beginning of her current career. She took a 200-hour course to become a certified instructor, and continues to make the videos, which have drawn over four million views.^[3]

Stiles was one of the first yoga instructors to use social media to attract students. The YouTube videos led a DVD with fellow model Brooklyn Decker as well as one of her own, Yoga Anywhere: The New York Session. After leaving Ford and modeling in 2007, she blogged for Women's Health and The Huffington Post (HuffPo).

A 2009 post at HuffPo entitled "Help! I'm Addicted to FaceBook",^[4] has received 1.2 million hits, making it one of the most-viewed blogs on the site.^[3] Stiles's first book, Slim Calm Sexy, published by Rodale, rose to the #1 spot on Amazon.com and best-selling status the first week it was released, August 31, 2010.

Stiles has been featured in pictorials for W, Shape Magazine, Self, Marie Claire, Fitness, and appeared on the covers of City, Time Out, and Fit Yoga. Stiles appeared in ads for Nike, Adidas, Reebok, Target Corporation, Gap and American Apparel, as well as numerous TV commercials for the Chrysler PT Cruiser and Avon. Stiles' health and yoga related work has been featured in such magazines as Esquire, Mens Health, Ascent, and Yoga Journal.

Stiles has been the Face of Women's Health, a Rodale, Inc. publication, since April 2009. Stiles is also a spokesperson for Nissan Motors,^[5] along with Ryan Hall and Lance Armstrong.

Strala Yoga[link]

In 2008 Stiles met her husband, Michael Taylor, at the Ananda Ashram in Monroe, New York.^[6] "He was normal, he's straight, he does yoga ... I'm done for", she joked. After a civil ceremony in New York, they honeymooned in Negril, Jamaica.^[3][7]

The couple founded the New York City yoga studio Strala^[8] later that year. They made up the name, which is Swedish for "radiates light". In addition to continuing to make her videos and other media appearances, she currently teaches a quarter of the classes and oversees 13 other instructors at the 3,500 square feet (330 m²) studio, which has become profitable enough for her to consider opening a branch. Deepak Chopra and Jane Fonda are among her students; the former considers her his personal instructor. "I have been doing yoga for 30 years," he says. "I have had teachers of all kinds. Taking lessons from her has been more useful to me than taking yoga from anyone else."^[3]

Stiles does not follow any school of yoga or instructor and focuses purely on its physical aspects and health benefits, with no philosophical or spiritual dimension. She eschews the Sanskrit names for yoga positions and does not ask students to chant. She hires instructors without regard to the certification process normally required elsewhere, preferring to assess them by watching them teach, although Strala does offer a teacher-training program. Strala's per-class fee, $10, is lower than other Manhattan yoga studios.^[3]

Her goal is to make yoga more accessible. "People need yoga, not another religious leader. Quite often in New York, they want to be religious leaders, and it's not useful", she explains. "I was never invited to the party anyway—so I started my own party". Too many people outside yoga, she believes, see it as "something Jennifer Aniston does". Fonda has praised "her ability to make yoga accessible to people who might be scared of it or think it might be too esoteric". Stiles says she receives letters regularly from people, such as military men, who do her videos but are afraid to go to a yoga studio. "This studio is the first place I have felt comfortable", one Strala student told The New York Times. "It doesn't feel like it's all 26-year-old former dancers."^[3]

Stiles' approach to yoga has met with some controversy in the yoga community. Jennilyn Carson of the popular YogaDork blog reports that some practitioners consider it "disrespect to what the practice is" for Stiles to promote it as a weight-loss method. "I don't care what Tara Stiles says yoga is," another yogini says. "It's not about making your body beautiful." Yoga traditionalists have also complained about her willingness to draw on her modeling background and exploit sex appeal in yoga-wear advertisements and her videos, some of which she has appeared in wearing short shorts and a tank top.^[3] "Who made these rules?", Stiles has responded. "I feel like I'm standing up for yoga." To critics of her videos and photo shoots, she says, "We should not be hiding behind our bodies. [They] should be empowering."^[3]

Television[link]

Stiles was a contestant and winner of MTV's Fear episode 9, "Fort Gains". She has also appeared in Matthew Barney's The Cremaster Cycle: Cremester 3. She co-hosted three segments on ^[9] on fitness and fashion with Pedro Andrade, Siafa Lewis, and Margherita Missoni.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Tara Stiles at the Internet Movie Database
• Tara Stiles at the Fashion Model Directory
• Tara Stiles on iTunes
• YouTube
• Tara Stiles
• Tara Stiles on Twitter
• Tara Stiles Video Interview on TDL Profiles