[INDOLOGY] Article about the politics surrounding indology at the IHRC

Mon Jun 8 17:49:16 UTC 2015

Jesse atrributes to Bharadwaja the following argument, which I will state formally to facilitate clear analysis. (I believe that Jesse’s argument entails and requires an unstated premise 2.

Premise 1:  Anything good (especially in South Asia) must originate in the womb of Bharata Mata.

Premise 2 (Implied): Old Indo-Aryan culture is the original culture of Bharata Mata.

Premise 3: The Indus Valley Civilization is good.

Conclusion: Therefore the IVC must come from Bharata Mata’s original, defining Vedic culture.

If Bharadwaja makes this argument, then one might describe his view as “extremely racist and chauvanistic.” 

To argue for a greater antiquity for the Vedas, or or to explore possible connections between the IVC and the Vedic civilization, is not in and of itself a racist or chauvanist project, nor is it necessarily a sign of hopeless obscurantism.

Best,
Howard

On Jun 8, 2015, at 8:26 PM, Jesse Knutson <jknutson at hawaii.edu> wrote:
> 
> I think Dilip Chakrabarty is actually thinking about racism from a totally different angle. What is racist is the notion that 'aryans'--the speakers of Old Indo-Aryan, or what have you--originated within the subcontinent, and that they predate and include the Indus Valley Civilization. Bharadvaj clearly wants to demonstrate that the composers of the Vedas were indigenous, and of an antiquity greater than the Indus Valley Civilization. This is racist on many levels. 1. There is a cultural chauvinism that anything good must originate in the womb of Bharata Mātā 2. Bharadvaj wants to say that the Indus Valley Civilization emerged from the Vedic culture, when in fact the IVC was a highly developed civilization, of greater antiquity than the Veda, which did not speak an Indo-Aryan or Indo-European language. To attribute the IVC cultural achievements to the speakers of Vedic is extremely racist and chauvinistic.
> 
> On Mon, Jun 8, 2015 at 8:02 PM, Simon Brodbeck <BrodbeckSP at cardiff.ac.uk <mailto:BrodbeckSP at cardiff.ac.uk>> wrote:
> Dear Howard,
> 
>  
> 
> I think that regardless of any etymological link, we need to apply a semantic distinction between the Sanskrit word arya and the English word Aryan. When the former is translated, it tends to come out as “noble” or something like that (e.g. in truths 1 to 4 of that ilk), rather than as “Aryan”. Under the latter, the OED reads as follows (“arya” has no entry):
> 
>  
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> A. adj.
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>  1.
> 
> a.       Applied by some to the great division or family of languages, which includes Sanskrit, Zend, Persian, Greek, Latin, Celtic, Teutonic, and Slavonic, with their modern representatives; also called Indo-European, Indo-Germanic, and sometimes Japhetic; by others restricted to the Asiatic portion of these. absol., the original Aryan or Arian language.
> 
> b.      spec. Of or pertaining to the ancient Aryan people.
> 
> 2. Under the Nazi régime (1933–45) applied to the inhabitants of Germany of non-Jewish extraction.
> 
>  
> 
> B. n.
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> 1. A member of the Aryan family; one belonging to, or descended from, the ancient people who spoke the parent Aryan language.
> 
> 2. spec. under the Nazi régime (cf. sense A. 2 <http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/11296?redirectedFrom=aryan#eid38293561>).
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>  
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> I think Chakrabarti is probably thinking in terms of meanings A1b and B1. But I can’t speak for him.
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> All the best,
> 
> Simon Brodbeck
> 
> Cardiff University
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> From: INDOLOGY [mailto:indology-bounces at list.indology.info <mailto:indology-bounces at list.indology.info>] On Behalf Of Howard Resnick
> Sent: 08 June 2015 15:10
> To: Geoffrey Samuel
> Cc: Dominik Wujastyk; Indology List
> Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Article about the politics surrounding indology at the IHRC
> 
>  
> 
> As we know, Arya is a Vedic term. In the Telegraph article, Bharadwaj states that he wants to research the notion of Aryan migration. Bharadwaj does not state that he takes ‘Aryan’ as a racial, rather than a cultural, term. So please help me here. Where is the racism?
> 
>  
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> Thanks,
> 
> Howard
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>  
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>  
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> On Jun 8, 2015, at 5:04 PM, Geoffrey Samuel <SamuelG at cardiff.ac.uk <mailto:SamuelG at cardiff.ac.uk>> wrote:
> 
>  
> 
> If you read Dilip Chakrabarti's comment as quoted in the Telegraph article, what he was actually saying was that the concept of Aryans was 'racist and historically puerile' and that research on it was therefore a waste of resources in comparison with other possible uses - he specifically referred to training more palaeographers and epigraphists, 'who will soon be an extinct class of scholars in the country'.
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> That seems a reasonable and defensible position.
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>  
> 
> Geoffrey
> 
> From: INDOLOGY <indology-bounces at list.indology.info <mailto:indology-bounces at list.indology.info>> on behalf of Howard Resnick <hr at ivs.edu <mailto:hr at ivs.edu>>
> Sent: 08 June 2015 09:12
> To: Dominik Wujastyk
> Cc: Indology List
> Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Article about the politics surrounding indology at the IHRC
> 
>  
> 
> "Dilip K. Chakrabarti, emeritus professor of South Asian archaeology with Cambridge University and a member of the council and its research project committee, said the proposal was "racist and historically puerile”.
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> How racist?
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> h.r.
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> On Jun 8, 2015, at 11:00 AM, Dominik Wujastyk <wujastyk at gmail.com <mailto:wujastyk at gmail.com>> wrote:
> 
>  
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> http://www.telegraphindia.com/1150606/jsp/nation/story_24264.jsp <http://www.telegraphindia.com/1150606/jsp/nation/story_24264.jsp>
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> 
> -- 
> Jesse Ross Knutson PhD
> Assistant Professor of Sanskrit and Bengali, Department of Indo-Pacific Languages and Literatures
> University of Hawai'i at Mānoa
> 452A Spalding

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