[INDOLOGY] More uninformed discussion of ancient India

[Jonathan Silk]

The book is "The Idea of Justice" and it is indeed filled with ignorance
about India, or at least Classical India, let us say. I have to confess I
could not even finish the book, so fed up was I. It is perhaps a bit like
the phenomenon one encounters, e.g., with Richard Dawkins. Were I to start
talking about biology, I expect he would dismiss me in a few words, and
rightly so,  just as Sen should do were I to spout off about economics. Why
is the reverse humility rarely in evidence, I wonder.

Jonathan

On Mon, Jul 13, 2015 at 12:10 PM, <dermot at grevatt.force9.co.uk> wrote:

>  Dear Jonathan,
>
>  Yes, Amartya Sen does seem to project modern ideas of what a university
> is on to what must have been a very different sort of institution, and it
> spoils the case he is defending.
>
>  It's not the first time that he has claimed a specious continuity with
> ancient Indian culture. In a book whose title I forget, he makes great play
> with the terms nyaya and niti, as if they were etymologically related, but
> without indicating how they are used in Sanskrit literature, or anchoring
> his use of them in any earlier use. I was impressed by his arguments on
> economics and ethics, but thought they were let down by his apparent
> assumption that because he is Indian his ideas ought to have Indian roots,
> or be made to look as if they have. I was reminded of the remark of another
> argumentative Bengali, the historian Romesh Chandra Majumdar: "In a
> democratic age, everyone seems to assume that a knowledge of Indian history
> is a birthright of every Indian, and requires no patient study or research"
> (in *Historians of India, Pakistan and Ceylon*, ed. C. H. Philips, p.
> 426).
>
>  Dermot Killingley
>
>  On 12 Jul 2015 at 17:00, Jonathan Silk wrote:
>
>  Dear Friends,
>
>  In a somewhat different vein than the ongoing discussion of a certain
> Hindutva partisan, you might want to take a look at Amartya Sen's piece:
> *http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2015/aug/13/india-stormy-revival-nalanda-university/*
> <http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2015/aug/13/india-stormy-revival-nalanda-university/>
>
>  In my opinion, while his political position seems to be something close
> to 180 degrees the opposite, he is in some ways remarkably similar in his
> almost studied ignorance of classical India. His portrayal of Nalanda is
> nothing short of fantasy, and I confess that I am disappointed and
> depressed to see such fictions repeated by someone who, until recently, was
> actually significantly influential in this 'neo' Nalanda project. That it
> might be advantageous to say certain rosy things in a political context is
> one thing, but the result is, to my mind, an utter misrepresentation of the
> historical truth. A final point is that by portraying Nalanda as an
> international university, using in his description explicitly secular
> categories, the anti-Hindutva Sen succeeds in virtually entirely subverting
> the Buddhist nature of Nalanda.
>
>  I am curious if I am alone in my impressions of this piece.
>
>  Jonathan
>
>
>  --
> J. Silk
> Leiden University
> Leiden University Institute for Area Studies, LIAS
> Matthias de Vrieshof 3, Room 0.05b
> 2311 BZ Leiden
> The Netherlands
>
>  copies of my publications may be found at
>  *http://www.buddhismandsocialjustice.com/silk_publications.html*
> <http://www.buddhismandsocialjustice.com/silk_publications.html>
>
>  --
> Dermot Killingley
> 9, Rectory Drive,
> Gosforth,
> Newcastle upon Tyne NE3 1XT
> Phone (0191) 285 8053
>
>



-- 
J. Silk
Leiden University
Leiden University Institute for Area Studies, LIAS
Matthias de Vrieshof 3, Room 0.05b
2311 BZ Leiden
The Netherlands

copies of my publications may be found at
http://www.buddhismandsocialjustice.com/silk_publications.html


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