I disagree. A project can be as racist as a person.  I agree however that the battle should be fought on scholarly grounds, yet it is important to maintain a critical awareness that scholarship is not neutral and always maintains political implications. This should be obvious today from the work of (whatever their limitations) Edward Said, Pierre Bourdieu, etc., who conducted thoroughgoing critiques of the notion of neutrality and disinterestedness in scholarship. To identify a thought process or intellectual project as racist does not necessarily imply that it should be censored.  Again it is best combatted on the scholarly-intellectual ground where it is launched. Rather it is about cultivating a critical awareness and perspective, with which empirical research can become less meaningful. 

On Mon, Jun 15, 2015 at 9:41 AM, Dean Michael Anderson <eastwestcultural@yahoo.com> wrote:
I have created this new thread because I will acquiesce to the wishes of those who don't wish to talk more about the IVC. There is, however, a broader methodological issue that I feel needs to be addressed.
Michael Witzel is fond of quoting his teacher "pots don't speak". And, I would add: they don't have a race either.
The main point of which I wish to remind people is well-stated by Stephanie Jamison, Professor of Indo-Iranian Literature, UCLA; translator of Rig Veda (along with Joel Brereton):
"For we must not confuse movements of languages with movements of peoples. Languages can spread to new territories in a number of ways, only one of which is through the migration (or "invasion") of people who speak the language."
As with languages, so with cultures: they don't have a race. The same can be said of academic research: the theorists may be racists but the objects of study are not (languages, cultures, pots) .
Numerous scholars on this list, like Hans Hock, have pointed out quite convincingly the shortcomings of the Out of India theories. Any competing theories will have to address those issues, which has not been done; but they should have the freedom to try. As I mentioned before, the study of the effect of ideology on objective research is a different topic altogether; and a valid one. They should not be conflated.
To brand a particular field of objective academic research off-limits by declaring it racist or chauvinist is not only making this mistake, it is also quite troubling from the viewpoint of academic freedom.
Best,
Dean Anderson
----
Jamison, Stephanie. 2006. “Bryant, Edward F. & Laurie L. Patton, Eds., The Indo-Aryan Controversy: Evidence and Inference in Indian History (2005). Reviewed by Jamison, Stephanie W.” Journal of Indo-European Studies 34: 255ff. Can be downloaded at: http://www.safarmer.com/Indo-Eurasian/Bryant_Patton.review.pdf



From: Jesse Knutson <jknutson@hawaii.edu>
To: Dean Michael Anderson <eastwestcultural@yahoo.com>
Cc: "Hock, Hans Henrich" <hhhock@illinois.edu>; Matthew Kapstein <mkapstei@uchicago.edu>; George Thompson <gthomgt@gmail.com>; Indology List <indology@list.indology.info>
Sent: Monday, June 15, 2015 3:08 AM
Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Article about the politics surrounding Indology at the IHRC

Yet I still think it's correct to call Hindutva and Bharavaj's project racist, albeit implicitly and convolutedly so, because there is an implicit judgment of racial superiority. And chauvinism/triumphalism rarely come in some kind of pure form, free of a racist sediment. Explicit racism is highly tolerated in right-wing political/academic circles in India today as you all know. It might be a more confusing type of racism for us to disentangle because it is not as black and white, involving complex judgments about people's origins via caste, language, and way of life etc.  But racism is very real both in life and "scholarship". 

--
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





--
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