[INDOLOGY] Thanks and next steps / Caste and Gender

[Roland Steiner]

Dear Colleagues,

It is a good thing that the Indology list has entered into a civilized  
debate about the reported incidents during the last WSC, or in the  
words of Dr. Vajpeyi: “These statements [by Adheesh Sathaye and  
Jayandra Soni] come as an excellent first step towards addressing a  
whole range of simmering issues in Indology, Sanskrit and, I would  
argue, South Asian History as well.”  As far as the role of the local  
hosting team from Vancouver is concerned, Dr. Sathaye’s remarks leave  
nothing to be desired. Everyone with pertinent experience will be able  
to relate to the enormous challenge of organizing such a large  
international conference.

However, I do not intend to comment about single points raised in  
these statements, since I did not attend this WSC. Moreover, the  
situation here in Europe seems to differ from that in India and North  
America in various aspects. Instead, I would like to point towards a  
more fundamental problem which is possibly underlying here. I am  
referring to the anti-academic ideology called “Swadeshi Indology”.

In his email to this list (dated 16 August 2018), Dr. Hanneder  
mentioned “that the Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft (DMG) has  
recently withdrawn its institutional membership in the IASS in  
protest.” For some of you, it might be interesting to hear about the  
background of this decision.

In 2016 the Section “Indology and South Asian Studies” of the Deutsche  
Morgenländische Gesellschaft (German Oriental Society, DMG) discussed  
the consequences of the IASS President’s public support for the  
positions raised in the Petition against Sheldon Pollock as Chief  
Editor of the Murty Classical Library of India. As a result the  
Section’s spokesman wrote a letter (dated 16 October 2016) to the  
Board of the IASS in which he expressed the disconcertment of the  
Section by noting that ideological and national principles as  
represented by the so-called Swadeshi Indology are obviously supported  
by the President of the IASS, whereas a critical  
historical-philological approach as followed by many renowned  
Indologists in India and other countries is apparently discouraged.  
Therefore, he called on the Board of the IASS to clearly express their  
position with regard to these points and ended his letter with the  
remark that a reply to this request “is highly appreciated”.

In his reply (dated 21 November 2016) the Secretary General of the  
IASS only referred to an email already written by himself on 5th March  
2016, sent among others to this Indology discussion forum (see  
http://list.indology.info/pipermail/indology_list.indology.info/2016-March/137434.html ). He ends his letter with the remark that “the IASS Board feels no need to respond specifically to your [= the Section’s] apparent demand about the ‘Position of the [IASS] Board with regard to the Petition against Sheldon  
Pollock.’”

The DMG Section discussed this issue on its subsequent meeting in  
September 2017 in Jena (Germany) at the “Deutsche Orientalistentag”  
(DOT). As a result of this meeting, the Section’s spokesman wrote a  
further letter (dated 10 January 2018) in which he informed the  
Secretary General of the IASS, that in the concluding vote “the  
Section has made the decision that the German national membership in  
the IASS executed by the Section ‘Indology and South Indian Studies’  
of the DMG has to be cancelled as from now. [...] We have to assert  
that a clear statement on the position of the IASS Board with regard  
to the points mentioned above is not only still missing, but also  
considered unnecessary by the Board.” In the Section’s judgement,  
however, “a clarification of this question is essential and still due.  
[...] We must note that, according to your letter, the IASS Board  
apparently seems to be untroubled by their President keeping on  
personally supporting the ideological and national principles as  
represented by the so-called Swadeshi Indology while rejecting the  
critical historical-philological approach of indological studies.”

A clarification of the Board’s position with regard to the IASS  
President’s public support of ideological and nationalist principles  
as represented by the so-called Swadeshi Indology is still due.

Best,
Roland Steiner (Spokesman of the section “Indology and South Asian  
Studies” of the DMG)

--
Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg
Seminar für Indologie
Emil-Abderhalden-Str. 9
D-06099 Halle (Saale)
Germany

Tel.: +49-345-55-23656
Fax: +49-345-55-27211
URL: http://www.indologie.uni-halle.de
E-Mail: roland.steiner at indologie.uni-halle.de