Technical issue: I am unable to log in, keep getting thrown back to the log in screen after eating user name and password.
DaThang
4 years ago
Nothing new, but still interesting to note. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/bf0e/7fd2da5ba1bf3c9b5638f93b6dd561bc66ee.pdf
Serbians have more mtDNA U4 and U5 while Montenegrins have more mtDNA U6.
I am not well acquainted with U6 subclades. Though I do know that it was present in prehistoric, late paleolithic (and perhaps even earlier) north Africa. But then there was that very early sample from Romania as well: Peştera Muierii 1 (35,000 BP). U6b is found in both southern Europe (including Montenegro) and north Africa. A back-movement from north Africa to southern Europe at some point of time perhaps?
Are there any known U6 carriers/instances from south Asia in general? Like even a single case?
U8 is very different from U6. Last common ancestor probably lived ~50,000 years ago. I know that there are K carriers among south Asians, but I have never heard of a south Asian U6 carrier.
IDK about my own haplogroups, and I am almost certain that I am not a U6 carrier either, but it would have been interesting (to me) if I were one, given that I don’t have any record of north African or southern European ancestry.
Riding through the city by auto rickshaw, she passed an enormous slum. But after arriving at the outsourcing center, she found a staff of educated middle-class workers. Few, if any, of the nearby poor were employed there.
It proved to be a galvanizing moment for Ms. Janah, who called the intellect of the poorest people in the world “the biggest untapped resource” in the global economy.
Aim of employing poor people, for a living wage, in digital jobs like photo tagging and image annotation at what she called delivery centers in Kenya, Uganda and India. The workers generate data that is used for projects as diverse as self-driving cars, video game technology and software that helps park rangers in sub-Saharan Africa prevent elephant poaching.
Do y’ll think Coronovirus and its fallout would perhaps be the first real internal challenge , Communist party would face in decades (after Tienanmen Square)
No, it won’t be. CPC has seen off far more grave issues. After all , the outbreak cannot be ascribed directly or indirectly to CPC. There is no opposition in China to take up these issues. And the Chinese govt is doing their best to contain it. After this I hope they ban all unauthorized abattoirs and meat markets. Banning and implementing bans is something they are very good at.
“Really fascinated by this new phenomenon of white people telling me I have caste privilege or that I’m a “Brahmin”. Folks, you only kinda learned what that means yesterday and can’t pronounce those words, so maybe don’t hurl them as insults quite yet.”
Brahmin-American gets pissed off at whites finally catching up to her immense caste privilege, it’ll be harder and harder for the priest-descendants in America to cast themselves as poor brown victims, as if they were poor Honduran fruit pickers and not the beneficiaries of thousands of years of unearned privilege.
Realistically a Brahmin American does not have any sort of caste privilege in America.
I am not a Brahmin, but Indian fobs can tell my caste from my last name. And then have a complex set of stereotypes which then colors their perception of me.
Americans don’t care and think I am Muslim or Arab most of the time. So caste has no bearing. lol
Why would they move to the ideology that wants to repatriate them? The Republican party’s entire outreach strategy towards Asian Americans now is basically “You don’t belong here, Go Home.”
Yes, but they don’t have to move to the Republican side. Instead, they can help move the Democrats to the center, which would be a welcome change (for both practical and idealistic reasons).
Sorry, but that’s nuts, if you have any experience of America and any understanding of its politics. This sounds more like a caricature of what the parties are like through the limited vision of international (read: left-leaning) newspapers.
The Democratic party would be a center-right political party in any other developed country on the planet. Hell, they’re almost certainly to the right of some center-right parties. The Democratic establishment doesn’t support universal healthcare, ending the endless wars, taxing the rich at New Deal era rates, etc.
The Democratic Party is more of a centrist party than a left-wing one (while the Republican Party is clearly right-wing). It is a “big tent” and therefore includes centrists as well as progressives. As AOC said recently in an interview, in any other country she and Biden would be in two different parties. The current primaries reveal sharp cleavages between the “moderates” (Biden, Klobuchar and Mayor Pete) and the leftists/progressives (Warren and Bernie). It will be interesting to see which direction the party ultimately goes in. Young voters seem to be mainly attracted to Bernie and Warren, while older ones are more comfortable with people like Biden.
Here’s something relevant from Wiki:
“Social scientists Theodore Caplow et al. argue that “the Democratic party, nationally, moved from left-center toward the center in the 1940s and 1950s, then moved further toward the right-center in the 1970s and 1980s”.[92] According to historian Walter Scheidel, both major political parties shifted towards promoting free market capitalism in the 1970s, with Republicans moving further to the political right than Democrats to the political left. He contends Democrats played a significant role in the financial deregulation of the 1990s and have pushed social welfare issues to the periphery while increasingly focusing on issues pertaining to identity politics.[93]” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party_(United_States)
@Indo-Carib,”Why would they move to the ideology that wants to repatriate them? The Republican party’s entire outreach strategy towards Asian Americans now is basically “You don’t belong here, Go Home.””
This is a complete lie. No, Republicans says they want to send Asian Americans back to Asia. Literally, no Republican has said this.
Listen to what Republican actually say, not what you imagine they secretly think.
As a conservative, I’m really getting fed up with these bogus accusations of racism. I am also fed up by the fact, many racial minorities seem to side with liberals only because of race.
I think you’ll see you have a lot more in common with American conservatives than you do with liberals once you overlook race.
I was a conservative for most of my life. Grew up in a conservative household. Fox News was on almost constantly. At one time I was even reading Sailer’s blog.
I know what conservatives really think about people like me. Conservative ideology does not stand up to more than a few minutes of serious scrutiny.
Whether or not conservatives are driven by racism is debatable and subjective. Some are, and some aren’t.
From the point of view of people not of fully European descent, ideological issues may seem trivial when one issue (immigration) threatens to create an existential crisis for them. If the dominant forces in the Republican Party try to make people’s very presence (or the presence of their friends and relatives) in the country precarious, tax policy or opinions on abortion may feel quite unimportant in comparison. So, just like many people who comment on Steve Sailer’s site are single issue immigration voters, so would most Asian-Americans likely be, except they are on the other side of the issue.
To right-wing Indians, this should be an important lesson on why Muslims may feel like they face an existential crisis in Modi’s India. And why your assurances to them may feel as inadequate as Sam’s are to Asian-Americans (and Indian-Americans).
@Indo-Carib,”I know what conservatives really think about people like me”
Like I said, listen to what conservatives actually say not what you imagine they think. Because, literally no mainstream conservatives say they want to send Asian Americans back to Asia as you claimed. Literally no one. You are just imagining what they “really think.”
How tolerant are Pakistani Muslims towards Indians? Or towards Westerners? How tolerant are Indians towards foreigners? I’m pretty sure much less tolerant than white Americans are towards Asian Americans.
Do they perceive you as foreign or as different? Oh, my goodness what oppression? That’s 1st world problems.
@Numinous,”From the point of view of people not of fully European descent, ideological issues may seem trivial when one issue (immigration) threatens to create an existential crisis for them. ”
If you already immigrated here, are a citizen or on track on becoming one, how is immigration an existential crisis? If people were trying to send you back sure.
America has one of the most open immigration policies in the world. No existential crisis is going on.
thewarlock
4 years ago
I have noticed Brahmin descendent Americans tend to be more of leftists than Vaishya and Shudra descendent Indian Americans. Elitist self righteousness, especially in the kids of the rich white collar Brahmin descendent workers, is an interesting phenomena.
They are also more likely to refer to themselves as “people of color.” Alas, all anecdote
// I have noticed Brahmin descendent Americans tend to be more of leftists than Vaishya and Shudra descendent Indian Americans. Elitist self righteousness, especially in the kids of the rich white collar Brahmin descendent workers, is an interesting phenomena. //
They exchange ‘some’ privilege points for ‘extreme’ wokeness & by being woke they hope to make broadest coalition possible to maintain their power & privilege by having multiple woke groups as well as oppressed groups supporting them.
It also helps them in academia because it is academia that accepts ‘positions’ & ‘arguments’ and pushes govt.’s to create policies along academic beliefs. – That’s the raw power game of ‘Institutions’.
When their papers are cited & their arguments, their books gains sells, they earn financial & academic respect {by conforming to ‘academia’}. – This is power & privilege they create for themselves in the name of truth, Justice & Institutions.
Due to above reasons you will find woke people discussing human interaction in always 2 terms – Oppressor & oppressed.
They do this because it allows them to become allies of similar woke privileged people & at the same time become allies of all types of oppressed people as ‘Empathetic masters’.
Search this paper –
Institutionalized Organizations Formal Structure as Myth & Ceremony
To me what is more hilarious is all these woke UC liberals (in the wake of recent events in India) have started asserting their Hinduism/Indian-ness so as to combat the “fascist” invader back in their home-land.
Just like UC liberals back in homeland found out that u cant really out-hindu the Hindu right, similarly these woke-sters will discover that quick enuf.
Indian liberals trying to claim “Hinduness” always struck me as a dubious strategy, because it’s very obvious that the BJP has more to offer on that front.
The Democratic party would be a center-right political party in any other developed country on the planet. Hell, they’re almost certainly to the right of some center-right parties. The Democratic establishment doesn’t support universal healthcare, ending the endless wars, taxing the rich at New Deal era rates, etc.
on economic issues. not always cultural ones (e.g., on abortion and immigration it is quite left). until trump the republicans were also to the left of many non-american parties on immigration/race.
By global standards both the Republicans and Democrats are center left parties with respect to economics/business and post modern wokeness social justice warrior subaltern critical race theory.
Both the Republicans and Democrats are far more left than they have ever been in American history.
“The Democratic establishment doesn’t support universal healthcare”
They do. So do many Republicans such as Romney.
“ending the endless wars”
This is a meaningless statement. Most countries around the world are locked into endless wars. The vast majority of these wars relate to the 14 century global Islamic civil war where Islamists have killed over 100 million moderate/minority muslims and over 100 million nonmuslims. These global endless wars that most countries around the world are fighting are beyond the ability of any single country–even America or China–to stop.
If you say that the vast majority of Americans are cognitively challenged with little to no understanding . . . then you have a point.
“taxing the rich at New Deal era rates, etc.”
In 2017 US taxes as a percentage of GDP were at an all time high. Democrats want to sharply increase taxation as a percentage of GDP.
Unfortunately America’s share of global income has collapsed from over half to less than a sixth and continues to drop rapidly. If America increases the top marginal rate too much many or most American rich people will renounce their US citizenship. And good for them.
The Democratic establishment supports universal healthcare? If that were the case, then the entire primary field would not be attacking Bernie and Warren for their advocacy of “Medicare for All”. Universal healthcare is still seen in the US as some sort of “socialist” policy despite the fact that it exists in practically all other developed countries.
You are factually incorrect. Obamacare is not universal healthcare. It requires people to buy into private health insurance. Many people are still unable to afford their copays and deductables. Universal healthcare means “Medicare for All” not Mayor Pete’s “Medicare for All who want it” or any other system that relies on private insurance. The government has a responsibility to provide a minimum level of healthcare to all citizens. The UK has a National Health Service and it is hardly a socialist state. This is what Bernie is advocating for but it is deeply resisted by the Democratic establishment.
Indo-Carib, remember that in 1992 Asian Americans voted for GW Bush by a 25 percentage point margin over Bill Clinton. 49% of Asian Americans voted Republican in 2014. If Bernie or Warren win the nomination, the large majority of Asian Americans are likely to vote for Trump.
If Biden/Bloomberg/Yang/Tulsi win the nomination they are likely to do well among Asian American voters.
Asian American voters are swing voters.
Part of the Republican party has turned against the rich and upper middle class to a degree. Asian Americans are heavily over represented among America’s rich and upper middle class. But remember that money talks in American politics. And Asian Americans (plus Asian European Americans such as Jews, Russians, Lebanese, Syrians, Iranians etc.) have a lot of it.
Saurav
4 years ago
Yang makes me feel the same way Hillary made white woman feel.
Creepy (something seems off) and guilty (for not supporting fellow Asian) at the same time.
I love me some Andrew Yang. Total Yang gang fanboy.
+++++++++++
Indo-Carib,
In America the left (including Bernie and Warren) is (are) against Asian American immigrants and other successful immigrants. So is the right.
The pro capitalist business wing of both parties, centrists, moderates and independents are pro Asian American.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
“white privilege” and “white supremacy” have never existed and do not exist now.
Privilege comes from 4 sources in the following order of importance:
——physical health privilege
——broadly defined mental health privilege
——broadly defined intelligence privilege (defined as general intelligence plus what Dr. Haier calls cognitive abilities beyond general intelligence)
——good company privilege or what Professor Glenn Loury calls “relations before transactions”
FYI:
Physical attractiveness is included as part of physical health privilege.
Who are you supporting then Saurav-bhai? Surely not old geezer senile Biden?
Saurav
4 years ago
I actually quite like Biden, and had i been a democrat would have supported him. He is middle of the road , let-things-tread-along politicians which i like.
“The cultural transformation of India. Elections will come and go. But the BJP will measure its success by a longer-term cultural transformation. The goal of this cultural transformation is twofold. It is to assert Hindu majoritarianism. But it is also to transform Hinduism from a variety of religious practices into a consolidated ethnic identity. This is frankly why the project of “let us teach the BJP the real meaning of our tradition or of Hinduism” so spectacularly misses the point. It assumes that what the BJP is doing is misinterpreting Hinduism to convert it into Hindutva. So, if only we could get the “correct” Hinduism out to people, fill the void that secular deracination produces, all will be good. The BJP is not playing in that corner of the field. It is not engaged in a debate over values or norms or texts of traditions or even cultural identity. It has one raison détre: The consolidation into an ethnic identity.
We are focussed on the moral success of the anti-CAA protest, in lifting the pall of fear. But the ominous news is that there might also be a quiet Hindutva consolidation against the protests happening in places like UP and Rajasthan. ”
The only liberal in India who gets it.
Soon the UC liberal Hindu (who is mostly S-Indian or Bengali at this point) who think that his/her caste privilege can out-Hindu BJP will soon find how wrong they were (like their N-Indian counterpart)
“Soon the UC liberal Hindu (who is mostly S-Indian or Bengali at this point) who think that his/her caste privilege can out-Hindu BJP will soon find how wrong they were (like their N-Indian counterpart)”
I know you’re a status quo-ist but I don’t see any reason why Indian society is supposed to be inevitably headed in this direction.
There are countervailing forces of federalism or sub-nationalism that could emerge. Also, a one-off event like splitting off UP could derail this march.
This is spot on. The opposite of Modiism isn’t liberalism, its as you mention bellow a kind of anti-integrationalism. This is not how I see politics being framed by the english press, domestic and foreign. I wouldn’t be surprised if on average, the BJP base were more socially liberal than the Congress base, in keeping with the former being more urban, UC, and educated. This is the inverse of the way that dems in the USA have control over the educated classes of NYC, Boston, SF (and 80%+ vote share). If you remove the minority, OBC and SC votes, bangalore, mumbai and delhi deliver the bjp crushing victories repeatedly. Indian leftists are just a social elite within the upper classes, with no real numbers of their own and dependent on the patronage of the masses they supposedly advocate for. Which also explains their recent failures, that they lack an aspirational vision for those who are beyond subsistence. Many OBCs already have one foot in middle-class respectability, they would rather be associated with their genteel adversaries than be pulled back into the social morass of the vast underclass.
India has a few thousand liberals and a few *dozen* libertarians. That said, members of these groups are very savvy about marketing themselves to Whites (who don’t care about Indians except as instruments for their own political struggles.)
There are genuine liberals here, and they may number in the hundreds of thousands in a city like bangalore. But with their depressed voter turnout, they probably don’t swing any particular constituency more than 10%. As for anti-integrationism, it may not manifest as principled libertarianism on the ground, but as ethnocentrism. This simmers somewhere in every household, and in the long run hard to imagine some sort of sectional conflict not testing the union.
The Indian union is not as fragile as people perceive it to be. Local disaffection due to increased internal immigration is not likely to manifest itself as secession, at least in mainland India. It typically results in agitations for reservation in jobs, demands that the internal immigrants learn the local language and some occasional threats/attacks against non-locals. The countervailing trends like inter-state marriages/friendships, joint work spaces, shared national narratives are forces that will persist and gain more traction. The desire to be a part of the larger Indian union remains stronger than ever. The desire has deep historical roots and is as a result of a millennia of shared civilizational heritage and shared cultural/religious space. It is also strengthened by historical experience – India is a wounded civilization and centuries of invasions have taught us that unless we unite as a civilizational state, we will continue to remain vulnerable
Saurav
4 years ago
“I know you’re a status quo-ist”
What gave u that idea 😛
But on a more serious note, the reason the forces which u mentioned cant fight back is that they have already exhausted themselves. For example federalist parties have tried all rhetoric (and tricks) , and only real weapon they have now is separatism Same thing with caste-nationalism , Reservation -politics has diminishing return, and whatever they give, BJP is willing to give them more (Maratha reservation). Only real argument left for caste parties is separation from Hindu-ism (like Lingayat card) . I think u know how both strategies will act for the BJPs base (and neutral fence sitters) 😛 .These are only the two real on ground threat for the Hindu right.
The BJP/RSS has fought them and won inspite of them. That does not mean same old politics of caste and sub nationalism wont work for these parties. Actually whatever victories the opposition is achieving in states (Kerala, TN, Bengal, Maharashtra etc) is due to this strategies only. But these are diminishing returns. No new tricks. There is a sublimal ethnic Hindu vote being consolidated even in non-Hindu/less-hindu regions where stuff which would not have been controversial till now has become controversial. Sabrimala, DMK’s anti Hindu past, Telangana and Bengal’s muslim “appeasement” etc, these stuff in the 80s would not have ruffled any feathers, now the opposition seem to mindful of that . They would not have immediate electoral consequence for BJP, but given enough time…..
“We are a long way from the start of this primary campaign, when a half-dozen candidates met with Obama, and went out to try to build a gentler bridge between the political needs of the present day—as the Party sees them—and the coalition of the future. The majority of those candidates—Cory Booker, Julián Castro, Beto O’Rourke, and Kamala Harris—are now out of the race, and two others, Pete Buttigieg and Warren, have seen their prospects weaken. In just a few weeks, Democrats may be left with a simple and stark choice between Biden and Sanders. In Iowa last week, the most powerful forces in the Democratic primary did not seem to be those massing behind Mike Bloomberg and Biden, but those affiliated with the Sanders bus speeding west across Iowa—the ninety-six million dollars and the multiracial coalition of the young behind it, who seemed to want what he was offering, and not, as he might have said, fifty cents on the dollar.”
Bernie becoming American President, will be like Yechury becoming CM of Maharashtra.Both places have resources,money to make Socialism work.
Anyway Bernie i think this time around has a decent shot, the democratic establishment is a bit cagey(from their past mistake) , and perhaps not force Hillary 2.0 upon its voter base.
Bernie has a good shot at winning tomorrow’s Iowa caucuses and he is the front-runner in New Hampshire. If he wins both states, he will be hard to stop (though of course the establishment will desperately try).
I agree with those analysts who think that the primary will essentially become a two person race between Biden and Bernie. Klobuchar and Mayor Pete only have a chance if Biden implodes (which he doesn’t seem likely to do). Elizabeth Warren would have had a chance if Bernie failed.
Saurav
4 years ago
Yeah, Biden is only real contender to Bernie. All these others are jokes. Seems so strange that folks who dropped out earlier looked far more interesting and better challengers than these lightweights.
BTW has it ever happened in US history that the current president has nor run for re-election, or their party has forwarded another candidate?
“In 1952, Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver challenged President Harry S. Truman for the Democratic Party nomination. Even though he didn’t win the nomination, he changed the entire state of the race. When Kefauver won the New Hampshire primary — the first primary of the campaign season — Truman decided not to run for re-election.” https://time.com/5682760/incumbent-presidents-primary-challenges/
Lots of times. The most recent was in 1968, when LBJ decided not to run after he was defeated in the New Hampshire primary by a then obscure Senator named Eugene McCarthy. The latter didn’t have much of a shot though, quickly giving way to Bobby Kennedy, who then got murdered. Finally the VP (Hubert Humphrey) became the candidate almost by default. And he may have pulled it off if George Wallace hadn’t run third-party, siphoning off Democratic votes, especially in the South.
INDTHINGS
4 years ago
Reasonable takes here visa vis the Hindu Right.
Their goal is the same of many nationalist movements in artificial post colonial states. Creation of an actual country comprised of an actual people, rather than a hodge-podge of peoples and states forced to live in one country because that’s where the border was when the Europeans left.
“Hindi, Hindu, Hindustan” is dumb, but its working in India. While the Hindu Right remains confined mostly to the North for now, its making inroads everywhere. I think its possible that only Punjab, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and the 7-sisters will remain immune long term.
Hinduism has assimilated everything thrown at it for centuries (its only real failure being against Islam). Ironic that its final act of assimilation may be to assimilate Indians themselves, wiping away the various ethnicities until the whole country is basically one large Uttar Pradesh.
The sikh orthodoxy and punjab are early movers in acceptance of hindutva (SAD is a long standing constituent of NDA). If punjab is subdued compared to other parts of the north its because there are hardly any minorities. We all know about the thorough ethnic cleansing muslims out of their area during partition, so no exigencies around demographic flux. I know jatt sikhs who maintain enough cultural distance from orthodox hinduism out wariness of brahmin/baniya chicanery, but this is common among cultivator castes elsewhere too.
Being in a coalition with NDA means nothing itself, a number of parties go in and out of the coalition based on what the BJP offers them, despite having widely divergent ideological views.
Hindu Nationalism is extremely unpopular among Sikhs and Christians. Only 10% of both groups voted for the BJP at the last national election, and the figure is even less for state elections. There is nothing that can be done about this. Non-Hindus will never get excited about living in a Hindu Rashtra. Just like non-Muslims, no matter how many incentives they are offered, will always be opposed to living in an Islamist-State. Its natural.
Both groups also have long-standing feuds with the Hindu Right that go back to pre-partition days, so this isn’t just a modern politics issue.
“Hindu Nationalism is extremely unpopular among Sikhs and Christians. Only 10% of both groups voted for the BJP at the last national election”
Bro, you quantitatively challenged?
SouthIndian
4 years ago
India like Hinduism is not only assimilative but also accommodative of diversity. The local identities are inextricably linked to the Indian identity and vice versa. The identities can be best understood as mother-daughter identities exemplified in Karnataka’s state song which refers to Mother Karnataka as the daughter of Mother India. These linkages put natural limits on the extent to which sub-national identities can undermine the national project. Even purely sub-national Kannada patriotic songs use Hindu metaphors or other pan-Indic references and never subvert the larger civilizational identity instead they strengthen the civilizational identity because it is perceived to be authentically Indian. The regional identity cannot be extricated from the mother ship of the Indic civilization.
“These linkages put natural limits on the extent to which sub-national identities can undermine the national project. Even purely sub-national Kannada patriotic songs use Hindu metaphors or other pan-Indic references and never subvert the larger civilizational identity instead they strengthen the civilizational identity because it is perceived to be authentically Indian. ”
1000 times this. But there are exception to the rule. Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala,N-East (East of Assam) and Kashmir.
Agree that some North Eastern states might not have strong civilizational linkages. But the inner-line-permit, constitutional freedoms and generous transfers from the union are incentives to remain with India.
Kerala has deep civilizational linkages with the rest of India. Adi Shankracharya who was a Keralite, travelled all the way up to Kashmir and established mathas in 4 corners of India. If he felt no connection to the larger civilization why would he undertake such a spiritual endeavor? I have also lived in Kerala for about 2 years. While it is not outsider friendly, there is no sense in which they do not consider themselves fully Indian.
Bengal was the center of the Indian renaissance and produced many leaders who shaped the early Indian freedom struggle. It is the land of Tagore who composed the national anthem, Bankim Chandra who composed the national song, Shyama Prasad Mukherjee who founded the Bharatiya Jan Sangh and Vivekanada who established Ramakrishna Ashramas throughout the country, travelling all the way up to Kanyakumari.
While the periyarist/dravidian parties have created an idiosyncratic political culture, the population remains quite religious and conservative from what I have observed in my trips to Chennai. Chennai is also not outsider friendly, though it is more cosmopolitan than Trivandrum especially with the growth of tech parks etc with many non-locals working there.
While many states might not identify with the North Indian culture and may not be outsider friendly, the residents of each Indian state seem to consider themselves more authentically Indian than other states.
Kashmir is a case where there is a loss of civilizational memory and possibly an identity crises that sometimes accompanies conversion. I wonder if similarly changing the demography of Bengal or Kerala will result in a loss of civilizational memory. A natural experiment may demonstrate to us that the boundaries of the constitutional state of India i.e those who identify with the said constitutional nation-state are co-terminus with the civilizational boundaries of India i.e. with those states that have a living memory of the civilizational linkages.
The question is why Shankracharya did not establish the mathas outside of India when there were Hindu populations outside of the Indian sub-continent in South East Asia during his time. This is probably because of the conception of Bharata varsha as a sacred geography which is attested to by multiple scriptures. This is different from the Buddhist travellers who did not consider themselves Indians.
It is difficult to articulate precisely what elements constitute the Indian civilizational identity, religion/culture is one part of it but there are other commonalities. While civilizational boundaries are mutable and its elements are open to change/influence, you can sense some distinctiveness vis-a-vis other civilizations.
At no point in my stay in Kerala did I feel I was not in India, nor did my Malayali friends feel they were not Indian. The food, the temples, the people, the mannerisms, the culture everything felt familiar. Add to the civilization conception of Bharata, the idea of a nation-state as a community, and you feel a sense of connection with India and its people, no matter where you go.
“INDTHINGS
FEBRUARY 3, 2020 AT 4:32 AM
“If he felt no connection to the larger civilization why would he undertake such a spiritual endeavor?”
Why did Buddhist monks travel from China to India? Does this mean India and China were the same civilization?”
Many Indians think so. Or at least mostly so. Taoism is incredibly close to many Sanaathana Dharma Sampradayas–to the point where Taoism is considered by many to be another Sanaathana Dharma Darshana. Many Indians have long believed that:
Bo-Yang = Laozi = the great Siddha Nath master Bhoga Nather or Bhogar Nather.
Know this is a big truth claim. And just because Indians have believed something from 2 1/2 thousand years does not necessarily mean that it is true.
However a lot of Toaists/Acupuncture/Qui Gong/Tai Chi practitioners have collaborated with practitioners of 18 Siddha Siddhanta and Ayurveda to compare the systems together. There are significant similarities between Toiasm and many other Sampradayas.
Perhaps this can be a Brown Pundits Podcast?
Many Indians also believe that Confucius is the same person as the 18 Siddha Siddhanta Sampradaya Nath Siddha Kalangi Nather. Personally I find the connection between Confucianism and many Sanaathana Dharma Sampradayas to be less clear than the connections between Taoism and many Sanaathana Dharma Sampradayas.
The Buddhist monks who traveled between China and India claimed to be Astika Sanaathana Dharma. Greater South Asia and South East Asia at that time had hundreds of major Sampradayas. Buddhist Sampradayas would be respected and regarded as some of them. {Albeit some would call them Astika Sanaathana Dharma while others would call them Nastika Sanaathana Dharma.} Buddhists engaged in many debates with other Sampradayas and collaborated significantly with other Sampradayas.
Personally I believe that Buddhists are Astika Sanaathana Dharma. I have also observed that Dharmic Sampradayas are more focused on competition with Sampradayas that are almost identical to themselves rather than on Sampradayas that are more different from themselves. The Buddhists might fly under the radar to some degree.
+++++++++++++
“the question is why Shankracharya did not establish the mathas outside of India when there were Hindu populations outside of the Indian sub-continent in South East Asia during his time.”
Very simple explanation. Shankaracharya passed away at the age of 32. During this time he debated and defeated the leaders of over a hundred (maybe several hundred?) Sampradayas, wrote many Bhashyas, traveled everywhere, spiritually guided vast numbers of devotees, changed everything. If Shankaracharya had lived longer I think he might have traveled far more broadly.
As an aside, Shankaracharya had very interesting discussions and debates with a great Buddhist master. Many say the winner was unclear between them, which suggests to me that Shankaracharya deeply respected the Buddhist master.
+++++++++++++++++
Another aside. The 5 Shankaracharya Mathas and many indigenous sources from across India say that Shankaracharya was born 509 BC. Wrote about this here:
” Adi Shankracharya who was a Keralite, travelled all the way up to Kashmir and established mathas in 4 corners of India. If he felt no connection to the larger civilization why would he undertake such a spiritual endeavor?
Too easy…he is a brahmin, who belong to a community ultimately orignated from the north, that were able to keep them selves apart using the caste system and continue practicing “Vedic” traditions and the”Vedic” language Sanskrit would easily let him connect with his fellow brahmins in any other part of India. Now show me someone from one of more atavastic communities of Kerala like a puliyan or paniya go to Kashmir and say he feels “connection” to the larger “civilization”, lol, I feel Indians are connect like europeans are connected, we have some similarity in ancestry and culture, but large differences as well, and that should be respected.
” I have also lived in Kerala for about 2 years. While it is not outsider friendly, there is no sense in which they do not consider themselves fully Indian.”
It’s not outsider friendly? Bro we are the friendliest part of India (have a little bias of course), every indian and non-indian visitor I’ve talked has never said otherwise. You actually don’t have to believe me, just go to youtube and look at the travel vlogs, diverse peoples from across the world and India, who are discovering Kerala, have enjoyed their experiences there and rave about the land and people, Why wouldn’t we call ourselves indian? It’s geographically where we are, just like a Italian would call themselves a european. If you’re talking politically (the original vision of India at conception, not the hindutva nationalist wet dream right now), it’s been like 70-80 years we’ve been part of this political construct (USA is only around 200+ years old and I think they were calling themselves american by the 80 year mark), we have a really good civic nature and are one of the most educated and cosmopolitan populations in India, why is that surprising?
//Even purely sub-national Kannada patriotic songs use Hindu metaphors or other pan-Indic references and never subvert the larger civilizational identity instead they strengthen the civilizational identity because it is perceived to be authentically Indian//
These kannada songs were largely composed in the 20th century. We would be projecting our sensibilities quite a bit into past to claim that historic kannadigas felt that being part of a greater bharata was an inextricable part of their identities. The emperors of the middle and classical ages didn’t claim a loyalty beyond their realm. The existence of the “sanskrit cosmopolis” at one point is undisputed, but it really only tells us of the societal elite and not of the folkways. It is not unlike the role of latin which gives, if one’s lens of study is in that language, europe the sense of complete unity, of germany being no different than spain.
I feel we may be overconfidently extrapolating trends from our lifetime regarding the Indian state’s resilience. Our major linguistic boundaries are fairly permanent. Maharashtrians and oriyas (let alone the dravidians regions) are not about to relinquish their mother tongues to hindi, and lingua francas have no permanent homes. As much as it seems that hindi is on the march to bind the nation, it is not hard to imagine its eventual retreat which could be be the outcome of competing globalisms. As such, that ethnic fault-lines and potential nation-states will continue to exist is a certainty.
Even though i am somewhere in middle of these 2 arguments. The examples you have given are a bit off. Actually its growth of Hindi in states like Maharashtra and Orissa that gives Hindi impetus to be the quasi national language. What it shows that in regions where there ambivalent towards Hindi it has only grown, and its only in the regions where it meets active hostility it has somewhat stopped in marches.
I have a different theory that sub nationalism of Kannadiga, MH , Orissa etc which are different from Mallu,Tamil and Bengali sub nationalism. The sub nationalism of the former do see themselves as part of Indian/Hindu.cultural nationalism due to their icons being predominately Hindu. Thats fundamentally different from latter set of sub nationalism who see themselves bound by India thru constitutional nationalism (post 47 India) , see their sub-nationalism as big as Indian nationalism (at best) or opposed (at worst) to cultural nationalism.
The best example in the songs itself, contrast the song of the respective national poets of Kannada and Bengal. While the former is rich of Hindu motifs (even though it doesn’t need to ) while the latter is devoid of any Hindu stuff. The difference couldn’t be starker.
Saurav, thats sort of why I used the examples of Orissa and MH (would be considered success stories), because in spite of the significant uptake of Hindi as a second language there, it will never leapfrog the mother-tongue and hence its status is precarious in the long run, subject to the vagaries of generational fashions. If second languages were cemented in status, then language politics would be lower stakes. Not long ago much of the NE was a Bongo-sphere of sorts, and now the Assamese out of resentment perhaps would much rather engage with Hindi. North Karnataka and bits of Hyderabad state were quite conversant in Marathi 50 years ago. Now, even certain Konkani groups in Goa and coastal Karnataka have abandoned Marathi. Just saying, fashions come and go within the same political frameworks. Hindi is not in endgame mode despite the likelihood that it will continue to expand.
I see your point about the cultural icons of KA and WB being more Hindu, but in the case of the former, I don’t see it as immutable. Hindutva did have firmer footing in the the state than some of its southern neighbours in part because of a more entrenched brahmin community in the larger towns. They are close kin and have a similar outlook as of the MH brahmins. As such, elite Lingayats and Vokkaligas were educated in the same milieu in the mid 20th century. Anti-brahminism is an undercurrent in both communities though, and it tends to concur with regionalist feeling. There is a huge upsurge in interest in history that will end up countering nationalist narratives (both the secular and hindu variety). The sheer variety of resources that people have to explore this is unlike the past and elites won’t be able to frame it for them.
The main issue with your argument is you link the idea of a nation to language which is a European conception. This European ideal isn’t subscribed to by most non-Hindi speakers and many Hindi speakers.
Historically, people in India were part of different empires but shared a common cultural/civilizational space. You are informed by the Westphalian idea of a nation-state which was conceived in 1600 and trying to find it in ancient/medieval India.
Kannada historic literature, common culture, practices are suffuse with Hindu, Jain and Veerashaiva characteristics, all of whom have Indic linkages. There was also a conception of Bharat varsha’s sacred geography. People from these empires venerated both the Ganga and the Kaveri. They visited pilgrimage sites across India. The civilizational space that was shared was common and linked to the idea of sacred geography. But by no means can you look for a nation state which is a modern idea.
The new innovation in modern India is the conception of the heterogeneous civilizational state. It is not a nation-state which depends on a common language like Hindi and it is not a homogeneous civilizational state like China. A civilizational state preserves its all its languages because it is culturally linked by civilizational commonalities and all languages are part of the civilizational heritage. The mother-daughter identities have been organically conceived within this framework and people have composed songs that are suffuse with Indic metaphors even as they praise their local language.
Europe could possibly have been a heterogenous civilizational state prior to 1600. But their identities are strongly shaped by the construct of the nation-state based on language and therefore there is resistance to this idea.
The experience of colonialism made the Indians realize the importance of a united political state. The centuries of invasions prior also informed this sensibility. Indians were already linked by civilizational commonalities and therefore decided to form a common polity. Europeans as colonizers never felt the same need for a common polity because they did not face the brutality that we did over a long period of history.
A purely constitutional state that tries to deny/coverup historic civilizational commonalities will exacerbate regional tensions due to internal immigration. A purely constitutional state informed by Western sensibilities of language based nation state will try to impose hindi. A civilizational nation within the constitutional framework will preserve all its rich identities.
If you are using regionalism in your fight against Hindutva you are making a mistake. A Karnataka which looks into its past will encounter empires Chalukya, Rastrakutas, Vijayanagara which were unapologetically Dharmic be it Jain, Veerashaiva or Vasihnava traditions. It will also remember the destruction of Hampi and Halebidu. A nation-state formed based on this regional identity will be much more unapologetically dharmic than the Indian civilizational state can ever be.
Southindian, my take on this is that we have no reason to treat subcontinental politics as exceptional. It fits well within a broader eurasian sphere and the patterns of civilisational development and later periodization are similar enough. The indian republic, its constitution and attendant traditions are deeply european, and to understand it better one is better suited to studying the history of britain and france than anything asian. I’d be the first to say that some of our monarchies like the wodeyars were still viable and invested with a sacred authority rooted in our own traditions. At this point however, unless there is a wodeyar restoration movement, the society is firmly within the framework of the european idea of nation-states. To say that indians aren’t invested in those ideas or that they aren’t congruent with our societies is neither here nor there. Our own past is more foreign to us than western notions are now, and moreover we vastly overestimate our own civilisational continuity. We are still in our infancy of being able to understand and reimagine these societies 500, let alone 1500 years ago.
Imposing Hindi on Karnataka is madness. Culturally and linguistically kannadigas are unique.
“We would be projecting our sensibilities quite a bit into past to claim that historic kannadigas felt that being part of a greater bharata was an inextricable part of their identities.”
Here I don’t follow. Are you saying that 2.5 thousand years ago kannadigas were not learning the stories of the great Rishis, Buddha, Krishna, Rama . . . performing plays . . . performing music . . . dancing . . . meditating? (Similar to Thailand, Java, Sumatra, Sri Lanka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala) Why do you think this?
Would you agree that kannadigas felt part of the Dharmic parivar (family) since Madhvaacaarya and Sri Sri Paada Sri Vallabha?
One reason I prefer Arya varsha to Bharata is because I suspect (but don’t know) that in the ancient world Arya varsha was more widely identified with, and identified with over a larger area.
+++++++++++++++++++
Some other questions:
—-what are some of the Sampradayas/Paramparas/Panths/Saints are you are interested in, familiar with or have a family/social connection with?
——Around 2 thousand years ago how connected did kannadigas feel to Agastya Rishi?
Agastya Rishi has for thousands of years been the patron saint of the Philippines, Vietnam, Loas, Cambodia, Thailand, Java, Sumatra (Indonesia and Malaysia), Sri Lanka, Tamil Nadu. Buddha and Buddhists honored Agastya highly.
In fact perhaps Agastya Rishi is the locus of “Eastern philosophy” writ large.
As an aside, I am not sure about Agastya’s connection with Burma. Perhaps Burma was a “Brahma” connected area?
Fully agree with AnAn that the stories Kannadigas were hearing for millennia are those of Krishna, Jain tirthankaras etc. That is the civilzational linkage I am talking about.
I disagree that Arya varta refers to a larger region. The Vasistha Dharma Sutra locates the Āryāvarta to the north of the Pariyatra Mountains and the Vindhya Range and to the south of the Himalayas. This means it excludes South India 🙁
Bharata varsha on the other hand is defined in the Vishnu Purana as :
“The varṣam that lies north of the ocean and south of the snowy mountains is called Bhāratam; there dwell the descendants of Bharata”
If a nation is an imagined community, then India was imagined in the Vishnu Purana as a community of common descendants in the 2nd-millennium CE. But then again I want to reiterate that the nation-state as a political entity is a Westphalian idea conceived in 1600.
I identify with Sankracharya’s traditions and appreciate the Advaita philosophy. I also identify with Akka mahadevi, who belongs to the Lingayat Bhakti tradition and is a figure of female emancipation. I especially love one of her vachana sahityas on “The Harassing Maya”. I don’t know much about Agastya Rishi. Our education system is woefully inadequate. Everything that I have learnt about the history of any tradition is through informal means. History text-books have to be re-written to emphasize local histories within the larger context of the civilizational linkages.
Identities like “Marathi” and “Kannadiga” are no less synthetic than “Indian”. The march of modernity (everywhere) is one of continuous consolidation across what were once considered clear boundaries. Good riddance to provincial rubbish, I say, (so long as no one is being steamrollered.)
Arjun, agree to the extent that linguistic identities are modern, and that particularly in the case of kannada and marathi, there are innumerable caste groups that straddle the two zones. Its a bit extreme to say “as synthetic as” though. Unlike the category “Indian”, which doesn’t really determine much about a person between the possibility of them being a Naga and Mallu. Speaking a language is a very specific thing. The state can form very specific relationships using the medium of language, and so it has a great deal of utility.
Girmit, languages are not static. What are considered different languages merge into one under forces of commerce, travel and state patronage. Today the forces of homogenisation and standardisation are vastly more influential than those of linguistic balkanisation. English (and to a lesser extent Hindi) are making inroads into all Indian languages at a pace that was unimaginable barely a generation ago (just as Farsi did a millennium ago).
The Maharashtra of today was far from a single entity in the days of Shivaji – nor in all probability was the Marathi language of today. And this in the mere space of three hundred and fifty years.
Arjun, I don’t know why you’d think I implied that these languages were static. I’m fully aware of the various regional standards and sub-registers of both marathi and kannada, to the point of mutual un-intelligibility. Further to that you’ve got dialects that are in a liminal state of not being easily categorisable between two languages (which is incredible given that they belong to two different families). I agree to your point about standardization, this is a worldwide phenomenon. I can’t however imagine anything but a trivial fraction of people in these states identifying with hindi more than their mother-tongue. The exception being conversion to islam , which in the deccan means eventually becoming a native hindustani speaker. Furthermore the effect of large scale internal migration is that hindi is losing prestige at the same time it is expanding its ambit. When all people knew was bollywood , it was aspiration. Now, among the middle classes, it is not the case.
They may not embrace Hindi. Quite likely the increasing use of English – and yes, Hindi, to a smaller but increasingly significant extent – will result in something new. This is more or less identical to how Urdu was born. And yes, not everyone may join the party at the same time (although the rate at which they do is proportional to the existing state of consolidation analogous to the rate of Facebook membership growth being proportional to how many others are already signed up)
I am not trying to predict the future. But I dont see linguistic identities being permanent in their present state. Mainly because their present state is quite different from what they were in the past.
Sooner or later human beings are going to feel emotionally what they have known for a long time. We are all the same and we benefit by coordinating our lives and living in harmony.
Agree that we need to get rid of parochial ideas of regional separatism. But we need to study the history and preserve the culture/traditions which enriching them with other influences.
Defining oneself solely based on language is extremely parochial. A nation-state in India formed based on such narrow entities will drive away outsiders like North Indians or Tamilians. Bangalore became an IT hub by drawing talent from all across India.
We can define narrower and narrower entities for example language-caste etc which will define people in ever more granular detail but one that is not enriching their identity. A plurality of identities as in the Indian civilization state maintains liberalism and mutual respect.
I’m interested in the preservation of indigenous traditions/customs/languages etc. to the extent possible. This may be Odia or Khasi practices, Jain or Veerashaiva or Donyi-Polo(Arunachali) religious traditions etc. Of course certain customs/structures such as those that might discriminate on the basis of gender or caste have to be entirely discarded. Reformation and preservation of the civilization inheritance have to proceed in tandem. I’m also open to new influences from other societies. For eg: the broad contours of the constitution, institutions of modern democracy etc that are to a great extent foreign imports. Certain changes are also inevitable with economic modernization, which is ok.
However, currently I find extreme leftist positions that demonize all indigenous religious traditions as a whole rather than advocating selective reform. On the other hand, they do not critique non-indigenous religions at all. Combine the forces of modernization( which is necessary) , selective demonization(unnecessary) and demographic change and it could potentially be a lethal mix. Across societies we do find that indigenous religions traditions are eventually wiped out. A lot of the culture such as dance, music etc linked to these indigenous religions will also die out with it. Is this a possibility in India?
A civilization that is heterogeneous and open to influences will not have a problem with non-indigenous religions. In many cases it adds to the richness. However, maintenance of demographic status quo and refraining from selective demonization is important for preservation of indigenous religions.
I wonder if the preservation of culture/traditions is better served in regional nation states especially if there is a extreme leftist takeover of the Indian state? I am deeply troubled by this idea because I am emotionally invested in the Indian identity. While I seek the preservation of the Kannadiga culture or dharmic traditions, I’m not as invested in it from the perspective of identity. I advocate it in a way that I would advocate for the preservation of Arunachali culture and Donyi-Polo religion.
Could somebody help me steel-man the arguments as to why the Indian state is important for the preservation of indigenous traditions, culture and religion. Some arguments follow:
1) Communist/naxal takeover is more likely in small states eg: Nepal. Communism has been corrosive to indigenous culture besides being economically disastrous
2) Indian state has developed the state capacity to prevent large scale religious violence. Individual regional nation states may not have the capacity.
3) Individual kings/rulers in authoritarian regional states may change their religion/cultural expectations and force their new found faith/culture on the masses.
4) The Indian state is powerful enough to prevent wholesale proselytization. For eg: if Arunachal were an individual nation state, Donyi-Polo religion would in all likelihood cease to exist.
5) Basic state services make individuals less economically vulnerable especially in the context of uneven development across states. This prevents fraudulent proselytization through inducement.
I don’t think the rise of sub-nationalism will be for cultural reasons as a lot of people here are trying to argue for or against. No one seriously thinks that their culture is uniquely non-Indic (barring the odd cookie Khalistani or Dravidianist)
IMO Mallus and Bongs are fine being within the Indian fold.
Nor will this rise of sub-nationalism be a reaction to migration.
I think it will be primarily for economic reasons.
There’s a sharp divergence in economic growth between north/east Indian and west/south India. And there’s not enough internal migration to offset this.
” No one seriously thinks that their culture is uniquely non-Indic (barring the odd cookie Khalistani or Dravidianist)
IMO Mallus and Bongs are fine being within the Indian fold.”
They *think* their nationalism/identity is as big, if not bigger than Indian nationalism/identity.
Rise of sub nationalism would still be on cultural issues, considering there are only handful of states in India which have any meaningful economic activity. Almost all states in India are laggard states.
The best example is Gujarati nationalism where sub nationalism only rose post 2002 riots, not due to either economic or migration issues. Ditto with TN with language, long before it was an economic powerhouse. Contrast it to Bengali/ Mallu sub nationalism which have absolutely no economic activity to talk about, possessing the biggest chip on their shoulders.
Shreya Manjunath
4 years ago
As for politics, the BJP has grown in Karnataka by embracing the local identity as much as the national one. Even the schisms of history are localized. The historical debates in Karnataka are about local tyrants like Tipu Sultan and less so about national tyrants like Aurangzeb. The resistance offered by Onake Obavva, a brave dalit women to Hyder Ali which is part of the Kannada folklore, is also highlighted by the BJP. Even the RSS shakas in Karnataka use Kannada.
“literally no mainstream conservatives say they want to send Asian Americans back to Asia as you claimed. Literally no one. You are just imagining what they “really think.”
Shouldn’t we ask Indo-Carib what he means in detail? For example the “conservatives”, “Republicans”, “moderates”, “independents”, “democrats”, “liberals” are all big overlapping tents with hundreds of mini factions within each of them. What are Indo-Carib’s specific observations about each of these mini factions?
We have many close friends and allies within the conservative, Republican, moderate, independent, Democrat and liberal camps. Even many self identified “leftists” are good decent folks with whom we are allied. We don’t need to choose between them. We can be friends with all of them. We can forge coalitions to advance policies and deep cultural trends that we wish. Both intra-American and global.
“How tolerant are Pakistani Muslims towards Indians?”
This is a low resolution question. Many Pakistani liberals, twelvers, sufis, Balochis, Sindhis, Pashtuns, atheists are pro Indian AND pro American. The Pakistani Army deep state isn’t everything.
“Or towards Westerners?”
What is “Western”? Are Aryans western?
“How tolerant are Indians towards foreigners? I’m pretty sure much less tolerant than white Americans are towards Asian Americans.”
Have you been to India? Indians “LOVE” Americans. Forget tolerance. Indians deeply respect, revere and “LOVE” Americans. In general Indians don’t believe in tolerance . . . Indians actually respect, admire, learn from and love foreigners and try to emulate foreigners in everything. When there is an argument between an Indian and a foreigner, Indians side with the foreigner against Indians. In fact the excessive fetish-ization and idealization of foreigners in one of India’s biggest problems.
India might respect, honor and love multiplicity, different cultures and faiths more than any other country on earth. Why do you think so many foreigners fall in love with India?
“Do they perceive you as foreign or as different? Oh, my goodness what oppression? That’s 1st world problems.”
Shouldn’t we ask Indo-Carib what he means? I have some guesses but would prefer that he elaborates.
“@Numinous,”From the point of view of people not of fully European descent, ideological issues may seem trivial when one issue (immigration) threatens to create an existential crisis for them. ”
If you already immigrated here, are a citizen or on track on becoming one, how is immigration an existential crisis? If people were trying to send you back sure.
America has one of the most open immigration policies in the world. No existential crisis is going on.”
Don’t think this is what Numinous and Indo-Carib mean.
In the 1980s there was less discrimination and bigotry towards Asian Americans than today. Today “Asian Americans” are increasingly being treated like Jews by Americans, albeit not as badly as Jews yet. America has a horrible epidemic of anti Jewish bigotry. Not a joking matter.
An Indian friend puts it like this. In most K-12 schools, universities, and increasingly more spheres of the private sectors the top performers are either Asian or “Asian” European American (Russian, East European, Jewish, Israeli, Lebanese, Syrian, Iranian etc.). This is visually true and undeniable. Everyone knows it.
Often the eyes of “non Asian” European Americans hurt when they see this. This often leads to a lot of jealousy, rage and backlash.
Almost every Jewish and Asian American has seen and felt this.
Asian and Asian European culture values excellence, merit, capacity and competence. Once Americans valued these things too. But as excellence, merit, capacity and competence come under attack in America . . . so do Asian Americans and Asian European Americans.
It is normal for Asian Americans and Asian European Americans to look to friends and allies in this environment. For example Glenn Loury, John McWhorter, Coleman Hughes, Kmele Foster, Denzel Washington, Michael Fortner, Ian Rowe.
If Republicans and conservatives want to assuage and win over Asian Americans and Asian European Americans then fight for excellence, merit, capacity and competence.
SouthIndian
4 years ago
India like Hinduism is not only assimilative but also accommodative of diversity. The local identities are inextricably linked to the Indian identity and vice versa. The identities can be best understood as mother-daughter identities exemplified in Karnataka’s state song which refers to Mother Karnataka as the daughter of Mother India. These linkages put natural limits on the extent to which sub-national identities can undermine the national project. Even purely sub-national Kannada patriotic songs use Hindu metaphors or other pan-Indic references and never subvert the larger civilizational identity instead they strengthen the civilizational identity because it is perceived to be authentically Indian. The regional identity cannot be extricated from the mother ship of the Indic civilization.
I could write my understanding of Madhvacharya Sampradaya. But it would probably be wrong. I am not sure Prof Long or Mukunda would be comfortable writing in great detail about Maadvacharya Sampradaya either.
Descriptions by Advaita parampara and Achintya-Bheda-Abheda of Maadvacharya (that I have read or been told) might not be the whole picture.
Should Brown Pundits do a podcast about Maadvacharya Sampradaya with one of the great masters of this order? Could ask Mukunda if he is willing to interview said Maadvacharya.
You can directly read Maadvacharya’s bhashyas line by line in the Bhagavad Gita and for some of the Upanishads. I personally prefer reading other Bhashyas of the Gita and Upanishads.
To massively oversimplify you have likely heard: “Tat Tvam Asi”:
—Tat = “That” (Brahman)
—Tvam = “You”
—Asi = “Are”.
Or “That (Brahman) You Are” or “I am that”.
I don’t understand Maadvacharaya’s interpretation. Maadvacharya said that “Sa atmaa-tat tvam asi” in Sanskrit = “Sa atma-atat tvam asi” or “Atma (not “That” or Vishnu) “You” “Are”.
To quote Wikipedia:
“In refutation of Mayavada (Mayavada sata dushani), text 6, ‘tat tvam asi” is translated as “you are a servant of the Supreme (Vishnu)”
Guess it rests on atmaa-tat = atma-atat. I would seek clarification from Sanskrit scholars.
Here is a long quotation from Quora that covers “Tat tvam Asi” in greater detail:
”
Keshav Kashmiri
Keshav Kashmiri, Knows about Vedic literatures
Updated Oct 18, 2017 · Author has 214 answers and 585.5k answer views
The 13th century saint Madhvacharya in his Book “Tattva ratnavali” also known as “Mayavada sata dushani” gave the explanation for Tat Tvam Asi using the concept of “Tat purusha samasa.”
In Sanskrit grammer a tatpuruṣa compound is a dependent determinative compound, i.e. a compound XY meaning a type of Y which is related to X in a way corresponding to one of the grammatical casesof X. In this case, two nouns combine to create a new noun. This combination is called the compound.
For example:
Yajur-veda = “sacrifice-knowledge” = “the knowledge of sacrifice”
In the above example, the “sacrifice knowledge” in and of itself is meaningless. For it conveys the wrong idea that we should sacrifice knowledge. But when we say using the tat purusha samasa, it becomes “the knowledge of sacrifice”.Now it conveys the right meaning.There are few more examples like
raja-putra = “king-son” = “son of a king”.
indra-satro = “Indra enemy”=”Enemy of Indra”.
svarga-patita = “heaven-fallen” = “fallen from heaven”.
So, we can see from the above words that the word used without tat purusha compound becomes meaningless.And moreover,it gives a wrong interpretation.Like mentioned above,heaven never falls.But by using the tat purusha compound, it is known that svarga patita means someone has fallen from the heaven.
The meaning of the tat purusha is given below:
तस्य पुरुषः → तत्पुरुषः
tasya puruṣaḥ → tatpuruṣaḥ
His servant
Now that I have sufficiently explained the concept of tat purusha, I would now explain the meaning of “Tat Tvam Asi”
In the book “Madhvacharya’s Tattva ratravali” verse 6,following explanation is given.
“Tat-Tvam is a possessive compound word (sasthi-tatpurusa-samasa). According to this explanation, tat means “of the Supreme,” and the entire phrase means “you are the servant of the Supreme.” In this way the proper meaning of the scriptural statement is clearly shown.”
The Mayavadi commentators say that the Vedic statement tat tvam asi concludes that the Para Brahman and the living entities are non different. The word tat means “He,” the word tvam means “you,” and the word asi means “are”; so they wrongly arrive at conclusion that words tat tvam asi means “you are the Para Brahman, there is no difference between you and Him”.
But the Vaishnava commentators have given different meanings of the word tat tvam asi. The word tat means “He who is infallible” and this word has been derived from the word tasya meaning “His.” Therefore, the word tat tvam asi means “you belong to Him.” The word tasya makes the distinction between the Para Brahman and the living entities.
The equivalent of this Mahavakya “tat tvam asi” is “aham tava asmi”. The proper explanation of this mahavakya is given in the following verse of Padma Purana:
Padma Purana,Patala Khanda 82.85
sakrd eva prapanno yas tava asmi iti vedad api
sadhnena vinapya eva mama apnoti na samsayah
“Even if once,if a surrendered soul says to me,”Oh lord,I,am yours”, then even without performing any kinds of sadhana, he attains me,there is no doubt about it.”
Thus the meaning of “Tat tvam Asi” means “I (jivatma) belong to Paramatma. To make us realise the constitutional position of jiva in relation to Lord,this Mahavakya is used in the Chandogya upanishad. The constitutional position means the natural svarupa of the jivatma. This has been explained by Chaitanya Mahaprabhu as follows:
Chaitanya caritamrta, Madhya lila 20.108–109
jīvera ‘svarūpa’ haya — kṛṣṇera ‘nitya-dāsa’
“It is the living entity’s constitutional position to be an eternal servant of Krishna”
Madhvacharya also explains in Tattva ratnavali ,verse 17 as follows:
“The Vedic statement tat tvam asi should be interpreted in the following way: tat means “the Supreme Brahman who is like a nectar ocean of perfect transcendental bliss.” Tvam means “the distressed individual spirit soul, whose mind is anguished by the fears produced by continued residence in the material world.”
The word tat represents supreme lord, who is eternally free from the cycle of birth and death. But tvam(you, we jivatma) identifies our body with the soul. Thus we undergo repeated cycle of birth and death. But our essential nature is sat chit ananda. This nature can be realised when we understand our constitutional position of being an eternal servant of God.Therefore, Tat tvam asi is a warning to the living entity not to mistake the body for the self.
Very much like the terrorist attack few months back, when the attacker attacked public and was killed by public or police. He was taken to Pakistan where he was buried attended by many people
But you’re not talking about religious issues, you’re just talking about political polarization. That’s not an Indian issue, that’s an everywhere issue. What India adds is corruption and squalor that make things worse.
Even if you were to get one political side to shut up for good (Manu would of course prefer it be the nationalists, and I would prefer it be the secularists), nothing would get done, and they would find new things to argue about. Cause that’s just how India is.
In America, political polarization and signaling has also reached a fever pitch. Some of the LEAST successful political movements have been people trying to fix this (eg No Labels).
Basically, India is not sui generics. Complaining about this kind of stuff is a way for the Josephs of the world to bash culturally-minded Hindus, but there’s not much substance to their argument.
“Complaining about this kind of stuff is a way for the Josephs of the world to bash culturally-minded Hindus”
Bro, dont go by the Joseph part. He is more often on our side then not. He actually defended NRC, before it became too hot to handle.
I know i invented this whole guess-the-politics-by-their-surname but there are exception to my rule too ??
Saurav
4 years ago
Yeah Manu is quite on the point.Especially this.
“The exotic issues of Indian politics exist not because Indians so love their culture. They exist because it is easier to demolish a mosque or build a temple than it is to enrich India or even enforce intelligent road design. ”
The whole “why-can’t-we-be-china” folks from both left and right miss this crucial point. Almost all Indian resources is channeled to make different groups to not revolt. And in a heterogeneous democracy u have to. What’s left is used for some “constructive” stuff.
I just got put into the naughty-kids corner on Twitter for the first time, for violating their policies on “hateful content”.
The Tweet, near verbatim, was:
“If you ask the average Mexican what they think about a dumb gringo writing a dumb but sympathetic book about Mexicans, you’ll get an eyeroll at most. Visceral disgust towards this [American Dirt] is the product of a mostly white American subculture to which a few Mexicans have assimilated.”
I wonder if I was hateful for using the words “dumb gringo”, or for the last sentence.
Regardless, I’m not even going to bother putting in my phone number to begin the 12-hour timeout. My investment in Twitter was near zero even before this, so I think this is a good sign that I should find other ways to waste my time.
Brown
4 years ago
the latest indian budget allots money for museums and has given grants to showcase rakhigari.
Saurav
4 years ago
Smart move. Before marxist appropriate Rakhigari, put ur stamp thru, making it center piece of Saraswati Sindhu civ , an alternate historiography, in turn it will bcome radioactive for Left-libs
Looks like having learnt from their earlier (1998-2004) faux passe
A young French girl said Islam is a religion of hate. Immediately Muslims rounded up on her accusing her of racism. Now she and her family are under police protection.
Technical issue: I am unable to log in, keep getting thrown back to the log in screen after eating user name and password.
Nothing new, but still interesting to note.
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/bf0e/7fd2da5ba1bf3c9b5638f93b6dd561bc66ee.pdf
Serbians have more mtDNA U4 and U5 while Montenegrins have more mtDNA U6.
I am not well acquainted with U6 subclades. Though I do know that it was present in prehistoric, late paleolithic (and perhaps even earlier) north Africa. But then there was that very early sample from Romania as well: Peştera Muierii 1 (35,000 BP). U6b is found in both southern Europe (including Montenegro) and north Africa. A back-movement from north Africa to southern Europe at some point of time perhaps?
Are there any known U6 carriers/instances from south Asia in general? Like even a single case?
Im K1a which is related to U8b’c if that helps
U8 is very different from U6. Last common ancestor probably lived ~50,000 years ago. I know that there are K carriers among south Asians, but I have never heard of a south Asian U6 carrier.
IDK about my own haplogroups, and I am almost certain that I am not a U6 carrier either, but it would have been interesting (to me) if I were one, given that I don’t have any record of north African or southern European ancestry.
BTW, what K subclade do you belong to, to the best of your knowledge?
Riding through the city by auto rickshaw, she passed an enormous slum. But after arriving at the outsourcing center, she found a staff of educated middle-class workers. Few, if any, of the nearby poor were employed there.
It proved to be a galvanizing moment for Ms. Janah, who called the intellect of the poorest people in the world “the biggest untapped resource” in the global economy.
Aim of employing poor people, for a living wage, in digital jobs like photo tagging and image annotation at what she called delivery centers in Kenya, Uganda and India. The workers generate data that is used for projects as diverse as self-driving cars, video game technology and software that helps park rangers in sub-Saharan Africa prevent elephant poaching.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/30/business/leila-janah-dead.html?
Do y’ll think Coronovirus and its fallout would perhaps be the first real internal challenge , Communist party would face in decades (after Tienanmen Square)
No, it won’t be. CPC has seen off far more grave issues. After all , the outbreak cannot be ascribed directly or indirectly to CPC. There is no opposition in China to take up these issues. And the Chinese govt is doing their best to contain it. After this I hope they ban all unauthorized abattoirs and meat markets. Banning and implementing bans is something they are very good at.
https://twitter.com/shutupjaya/status/1222359839894011904?s=20
“Really fascinated by this new phenomenon of white people telling me I have caste privilege or that I’m a “Brahmin”. Folks, you only kinda learned what that means yesterday and can’t pronounce those words, so maybe don’t hurl them as insults quite yet.”
Brahmin-American gets pissed off at whites finally catching up to her immense caste privilege, it’ll be harder and harder for the priest-descendants in America to cast themselves as poor brown victims, as if they were poor Honduran fruit pickers and not the beneficiaries of thousands of years of unearned privilege.
Realistically a Brahmin American does not have any sort of caste privilege in America.
I am not a Brahmin, but Indian fobs can tell my caste from my last name. And then have a complex set of stereotypes which then colors their perception of me.
Americans don’t care and think I am Muslim or Arab most of the time. So caste has no bearing. lol
“it’ll be harder and harder for the priest-descendants in America to cast themselves as poor brown victims”
Might be a good thing. They’ll stop acting like sissies and move towards the right.
Why would they move to the ideology that wants to repatriate them? The Republican party’s entire outreach strategy towards Asian Americans now is basically “You don’t belong here, Go Home.”
Yes, but they don’t have to move to the Republican side. Instead, they can help move the Democrats to the center, which would be a welcome change (for both practical and idealistic reasons).
The Democrats are already a center-right party. The American Republican party is far-right.
The Democrats are already a center-right party.
Sorry, but that’s nuts, if you have any experience of America and any understanding of its politics. This sounds more like a caricature of what the parties are like through the limited vision of international (read: left-leaning) newspapers.
The Democratic party would be a center-right political party in any other developed country on the planet. Hell, they’re almost certainly to the right of some center-right parties. The Democratic establishment doesn’t support universal healthcare, ending the endless wars, taxing the rich at New Deal era rates, etc.
The Democratic Party is more of a centrist party than a left-wing one (while the Republican Party is clearly right-wing). It is a “big tent” and therefore includes centrists as well as progressives. As AOC said recently in an interview, in any other country she and Biden would be in two different parties. The current primaries reveal sharp cleavages between the “moderates” (Biden, Klobuchar and Mayor Pete) and the leftists/progressives (Warren and Bernie). It will be interesting to see which direction the party ultimately goes in. Young voters seem to be mainly attracted to Bernie and Warren, while older ones are more comfortable with people like Biden.
Here’s something relevant from Wiki:
“Social scientists Theodore Caplow et al. argue that “the Democratic party, nationally, moved from left-center toward the center in the 1940s and 1950s, then moved further toward the right-center in the 1970s and 1980s”.[92] According to historian Walter Scheidel, both major political parties shifted towards promoting free market capitalism in the 1970s, with Republicans moving further to the political right than Democrats to the political left. He contends Democrats played a significant role in the financial deregulation of the 1990s and have pushed social welfare issues to the periphery while increasingly focusing on issues pertaining to identity politics.[93]”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party_(United_States)
@Indo-Carib,”Why would they move to the ideology that wants to repatriate them? The Republican party’s entire outreach strategy towards Asian Americans now is basically “You don’t belong here, Go Home.””
This is a complete lie. No, Republicans says they want to send Asian Americans back to Asia. Literally, no Republican has said this.
Listen to what Republican actually say, not what you imagine they secretly think.
As a conservative, I’m really getting fed up with these bogus accusations of racism. I am also fed up by the fact, many racial minorities seem to side with liberals only because of race.
I think you’ll see you have a lot more in common with American conservatives than you do with liberals once you overlook race.
I was a conservative for most of my life. Grew up in a conservative household. Fox News was on almost constantly. At one time I was even reading Sailer’s blog.
I know what conservatives really think about people like me. Conservative ideology does not stand up to more than a few minutes of serious scrutiny.
Whether or not conservatives are driven by racism is debatable and subjective. Some are, and some aren’t.
From the point of view of people not of fully European descent, ideological issues may seem trivial when one issue (immigration) threatens to create an existential crisis for them. If the dominant forces in the Republican Party try to make people’s very presence (or the presence of their friends and relatives) in the country precarious, tax policy or opinions on abortion may feel quite unimportant in comparison. So, just like many people who comment on Steve Sailer’s site are single issue immigration voters, so would most Asian-Americans likely be, except they are on the other side of the issue.
To right-wing Indians, this should be an important lesson on why Muslims may feel like they face an existential crisis in Modi’s India. And why your assurances to them may feel as inadequate as Sam’s are to Asian-Americans (and Indian-Americans).
Right. Politics isn’t about problem-solving or debate or ideas. It’s about identity and tribalism and mobilization.
One of the *least* successful organizations in recent American politics has been No Labels, which tried to counter this trend.
—
That’s just how humans are. Smart players don’t try to fight this, they seek to exploit this.
Uh…”other people’s babies”?
I mean I don’t personally care. I view America as a corporate park + shopping mall, a place to make and spend money, but nothing more than that.
But my views are heterodox, and it’s fair if Asians with more affinity for America are put off by the GOP.
@Indo-Carib,”I know what conservatives really think about people like me”
Like I said, listen to what conservatives actually say not what you imagine they think. Because, literally no mainstream conservatives say they want to send Asian Americans back to Asia as you claimed. Literally no one. You are just imagining what they “really think.”
How tolerant are Pakistani Muslims towards Indians? Or towards Westerners? How tolerant are Indians towards foreigners? I’m pretty sure much less tolerant than white Americans are towards Asian Americans.
Do they perceive you as foreign or as different? Oh, my goodness what oppression? That’s 1st world problems.
@Numinous,”From the point of view of people not of fully European descent, ideological issues may seem trivial when one issue (immigration) threatens to create an existential crisis for them. ”
If you already immigrated here, are a citizen or on track on becoming one, how is immigration an existential crisis? If people were trying to send you back sure.
America has one of the most open immigration policies in the world. No existential crisis is going on.
I have noticed Brahmin descendent Americans tend to be more of leftists than Vaishya and Shudra descendent Indian Americans. Elitist self righteousness, especially in the kids of the rich white collar Brahmin descendent workers, is an interesting phenomena.
They are also more likely to refer to themselves as “people of color.” Alas, all anecdote
This shouldn’t surprise us, they basically invented virtue signalling.
// I have noticed Brahmin descendent Americans tend to be more of leftists than Vaishya and Shudra descendent Indian Americans. Elitist self righteousness, especially in the kids of the rich white collar Brahmin descendent workers, is an interesting phenomena. //
They exchange ‘some’ privilege points for ‘extreme’ wokeness & by being woke they hope to make broadest coalition possible to maintain their power & privilege by having multiple woke groups as well as oppressed groups supporting them.
It also helps them in academia because it is academia that accepts ‘positions’ & ‘arguments’ and pushes govt.’s to create policies along academic beliefs. – That’s the raw power game of ‘Institutions’.
When their papers are cited & their arguments, their books gains sells, they earn financial & academic respect {by conforming to ‘academia’}. – This is power & privilege they create for themselves in the name of truth, Justice & Institutions.
Due to above reasons you will find woke people discussing human interaction in always 2 terms – Oppressor & oppressed.
They do this because it allows them to become allies of similar woke privileged people & at the same time become allies of all types of oppressed people as ‘Empathetic masters’.
Search this paper –
Institutionalized Organizations Formal Structure as Myth & Ceremony
http://courses.washington.edu/ppm504/Meyer_Rowan.pdf – Freely available here.
Those who live by woke-ness ,die by woke-ness
To me what is more hilarious is all these woke UC liberals (in the wake of recent events in India) have started asserting their Hinduism/Indian-ness so as to combat the “fascist” invader back in their home-land.
Just like UC liberals back in homeland found out that u cant really out-hindu the Hindu right, similarly these woke-sters will discover that quick enuf.
Indian liberals trying to claim “Hinduness” always struck me as a dubious strategy, because it’s very obvious that the BJP has more to offer on that front.
one more ‘madrasi’ ceo is born.
It is nothing but a ploy to gain a market share in India.
PS: This is not to undermine any individual’s achievements or hard work.
Nah, India is not that important.
Also, its not like the other Indian CEOs have helped expand their companies in India because of their ethnicity.
The Democratic party would be a center-right political party in any other developed country on the planet. Hell, they’re almost certainly to the right of some center-right parties. The Democratic establishment doesn’t support universal healthcare, ending the endless wars, taxing the rich at New Deal era rates, etc.
on economic issues. not always cultural ones (e.g., on abortion and immigration it is quite left). until trump the republicans were also to the left of many non-american parties on immigration/race.
Indo-Carib,
By global standards both the Republicans and Democrats are center left parties with respect to economics/business and post modern wokeness social justice warrior subaltern critical race theory.
Both the Republicans and Democrats are far more left than they have ever been in American history.
“The Democratic establishment doesn’t support universal healthcare”
They do. So do many Republicans such as Romney.
“ending the endless wars”
This is a meaningless statement. Most countries around the world are locked into endless wars. The vast majority of these wars relate to the 14 century global Islamic civil war where Islamists have killed over 100 million moderate/minority muslims and over 100 million nonmuslims. These global endless wars that most countries around the world are fighting are beyond the ability of any single country–even America or China–to stop.
If you say that the vast majority of Americans are cognitively challenged with little to no understanding . . . then you have a point.
“taxing the rich at New Deal era rates, etc.”
In 2017 US taxes as a percentage of GDP were at an all time high. Democrats want to sharply increase taxation as a percentage of GDP.
Unfortunately America’s share of global income has collapsed from over half to less than a sixth and continues to drop rapidly. If America increases the top marginal rate too much many or most American rich people will renounce their US citizenship. And good for them.
The Democratic establishment supports universal healthcare? If that were the case, then the entire primary field would not be attacking Bernie and Warren for their advocacy of “Medicare for All”. Universal healthcare is still seen in the US as some sort of “socialist” policy despite the fact that it exists in practically all other developed countries.
What do you think the US passed in 2010? Universal health care.
Medicare for all or single payer is only practiced by some countries (Canada comes to mind.) Most European countries do not practice single payer.
The US government spends more per person on health care than any other country on earth.
Thought of writing a multi-article series on health reform. Health care needs to be discussed in detail or not at all.
You are factually incorrect. Obamacare is not universal healthcare. It requires people to buy into private health insurance. Many people are still unable to afford their copays and deductables. Universal healthcare means “Medicare for All” not Mayor Pete’s “Medicare for All who want it” or any other system that relies on private insurance. The government has a responsibility to provide a minimum level of healthcare to all citizens. The UK has a National Health Service and it is hardly a socialist state. This is what Bernie is advocating for but it is deeply resisted by the Democratic establishment.
Indo-Carib, remember that in 1992 Asian Americans voted for GW Bush by a 25 percentage point margin over Bill Clinton. 49% of Asian Americans voted Republican in 2014. If Bernie or Warren win the nomination, the large majority of Asian Americans are likely to vote for Trump.
If Biden/Bloomberg/Yang/Tulsi win the nomination they are likely to do well among Asian American voters.
Asian American voters are swing voters.
Part of the Republican party has turned against the rich and upper middle class to a degree. Asian Americans are heavily over represented among America’s rich and upper middle class. But remember that money talks in American politics. And Asian Americans (plus Asian European Americans such as Jews, Russians, Lebanese, Syrians, Iranians etc.) have a lot of it.
Yang makes me feel the same way Hillary made white woman feel.
Creepy (something seems off) and guilty (for not supporting fellow Asian) at the same time.
Saurav, what is the matter with you?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2jAwiq6YsE
I love me some Andrew Yang. Total Yang gang fanboy.
+++++++++++
Indo-Carib,
In America the left (including Bernie and Warren) is (are) against Asian American immigrants and other successful immigrants. So is the right.
The pro capitalist business wing of both parties, centrists, moderates and independents are pro Asian American.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
“white privilege” and “white supremacy” have never existed and do not exist now.
Privilege comes from 4 sources in the following order of importance:
——physical health privilege
——broadly defined mental health privilege
——broadly defined intelligence privilege (defined as general intelligence plus what Dr. Haier calls cognitive abilities beyond general intelligence)
——good company privilege or what Professor Glenn Loury calls “relations before transactions”
FYI:
Physical attractiveness is included as part of physical health privilege.
Who are you supporting then Saurav-bhai? Surely not old geezer senile Biden?
I actually quite like Biden, and had i been a democrat would have supported him. He is middle of the road , let-things-tread-along politicians which i like.
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/caa-protest-india-bjp-delhi-elections-6244995/
“The cultural transformation of India. Elections will come and go. But the BJP will measure its success by a longer-term cultural transformation. The goal of this cultural transformation is twofold. It is to assert Hindu majoritarianism. But it is also to transform Hinduism from a variety of religious practices into a consolidated ethnic identity. This is frankly why the project of “let us teach the BJP the real meaning of our tradition or of Hinduism” so spectacularly misses the point. It assumes that what the BJP is doing is misinterpreting Hinduism to convert it into Hindutva. So, if only we could get the “correct” Hinduism out to people, fill the void that secular deracination produces, all will be good. The BJP is not playing in that corner of the field. It is not engaged in a debate over values or norms or texts of traditions or even cultural identity. It has one raison détre: The consolidation into an ethnic identity.
We are focussed on the moral success of the anti-CAA protest, in lifting the pall of fear. But the ominous news is that there might also be a quiet Hindutva consolidation against the protests happening in places like UP and Rajasthan. ”
The only liberal in India who gets it.
Soon the UC liberal Hindu (who is mostly S-Indian or Bengali at this point) who think that his/her caste privilege can out-Hindu BJP will soon find how wrong they were (like their N-Indian counterpart)
“Soon the UC liberal Hindu (who is mostly S-Indian or Bengali at this point) who think that his/her caste privilege can out-Hindu BJP will soon find how wrong they were (like their N-Indian counterpart)”
I know you’re a status quo-ist but I don’t see any reason why Indian society is supposed to be inevitably headed in this direction.
There are countervailing forces of federalism or sub-nationalism that could emerge. Also, a one-off event like splitting off UP could derail this march.
This is spot on. The opposite of Modiism isn’t liberalism, its as you mention bellow a kind of anti-integrationalism. This is not how I see politics being framed by the english press, domestic and foreign. I wouldn’t be surprised if on average, the BJP base were more socially liberal than the Congress base, in keeping with the former being more urban, UC, and educated. This is the inverse of the way that dems in the USA have control over the educated classes of NYC, Boston, SF (and 80%+ vote share). If you remove the minority, OBC and SC votes, bangalore, mumbai and delhi deliver the bjp crushing victories repeatedly. Indian leftists are just a social elite within the upper classes, with no real numbers of their own and dependent on the patronage of the masses they supposedly advocate for. Which also explains their recent failures, that they lack an aspirational vision for those who are beyond subsistence. Many OBCs already have one foot in middle-class respectability, they would rather be associated with their genteel adversaries than be pulled back into the social morass of the vast underclass.
India has a few thousand liberals and a few *dozen* libertarians. That said, members of these groups are very savvy about marketing themselves to Whites (who don’t care about Indians except as instruments for their own political struggles.)
There are genuine liberals here, and they may number in the hundreds of thousands in a city like bangalore. But with their depressed voter turnout, they probably don’t swing any particular constituency more than 10%. As for anti-integrationism, it may not manifest as principled libertarianism on the ground, but as ethnocentrism. This simmers somewhere in every household, and in the long run hard to imagine some sort of sectional conflict not testing the union.
The Indian union is not as fragile as people perceive it to be. Local disaffection due to increased internal immigration is not likely to manifest itself as secession, at least in mainland India. It typically results in agitations for reservation in jobs, demands that the internal immigrants learn the local language and some occasional threats/attacks against non-locals. The countervailing trends like inter-state marriages/friendships, joint work spaces, shared national narratives are forces that will persist and gain more traction. The desire to be a part of the larger Indian union remains stronger than ever. The desire has deep historical roots and is as a result of a millennia of shared civilizational heritage and shared cultural/religious space. It is also strengthened by historical experience – India is a wounded civilization and centuries of invasions have taught us that unless we unite as a civilizational state, we will continue to remain vulnerable
“I know you’re a status quo-ist”
What gave u that idea 😛
But on a more serious note, the reason the forces which u mentioned cant fight back is that they have already exhausted themselves. For example federalist parties have tried all rhetoric (and tricks) , and only real weapon they have now is separatism Same thing with caste-nationalism , Reservation -politics has diminishing return, and whatever they give, BJP is willing to give them more (Maratha reservation). Only real argument left for caste parties is separation from Hindu-ism (like Lingayat card) . I think u know how both strategies will act for the BJPs base (and neutral fence sitters) 😛 .These are only the two real on ground threat for the Hindu right.
The BJP/RSS has fought them and won inspite of them. That does not mean same old politics of caste and sub nationalism wont work for these parties. Actually whatever victories the opposition is achieving in states (Kerala, TN, Bengal, Maharashtra etc) is due to this strategies only. But these are diminishing returns. No new tricks. There is a sublimal ethnic Hindu vote being consolidated even in non-Hindu/less-hindu regions where stuff which would not have been controversial till now has become controversial. Sabrimala, DMK’s anti Hindu past, Telangana and Bengal’s muslim “appeasement” etc, these stuff in the 80s would not have ruffled any feathers, now the opposition seem to mindful of that . They would not have immediate electoral consequence for BJP, but given enough time…..
“We are a long way from the start of this primary campaign, when a half-dozen candidates met with Obama, and went out to try to build a gentler bridge between the political needs of the present day—as the Party sees them—and the coalition of the future. The majority of those candidates—Cory Booker, Julián Castro, Beto O’Rourke, and Kamala Harris—are now out of the race, and two others, Pete Buttigieg and Warren, have seen their prospects weaken. In just a few weeks, Democrats may be left with a simple and stark choice between Biden and Sanders. In Iowa last week, the most powerful forces in the Democratic primary did not seem to be those massing behind Mike Bloomberg and Biden, but those affiliated with the Sanders bus speeding west across Iowa—the ninety-six million dollars and the multiracial coalition of the young behind it, who seemed to want what he was offering, and not, as he might have said, fifty cents on the dollar.”
https://www.newyorker.com/news/campaign-chronicles/on-the-eve-of-the-iowa-caucuses-bernie-sanders-is-the-democratic-front-runner?
Bernie becoming American President, will be like Yechury becoming CM of Maharashtra.Both places have resources,money to make Socialism work.
Anyway Bernie i think this time around has a decent shot, the democratic establishment is a bit cagey(from their past mistake) , and perhaps not force Hillary 2.0 upon its voter base.
Bernie has a good shot at winning tomorrow’s Iowa caucuses and he is the front-runner in New Hampshire. If he wins both states, he will be hard to stop (though of course the establishment will desperately try).
I agree with those analysts who think that the primary will essentially become a two person race between Biden and Bernie. Klobuchar and Mayor Pete only have a chance if Biden implodes (which he doesn’t seem likely to do). Elizabeth Warren would have had a chance if Bernie failed.
Yeah, Biden is only real contender to Bernie. All these others are jokes. Seems so strange that folks who dropped out earlier looked far more interesting and better challengers than these lightweights.
BTW has it ever happened in US history that the current president has nor run for re-election, or their party has forwarded another candidate?
“In 1952, Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver challenged President Harry S. Truman for the Democratic Party nomination. Even though he didn’t win the nomination, he changed the entire state of the race. When Kefauver won the New Hampshire primary — the first primary of the campaign season — Truman decided not to run for re-election.”
https://time.com/5682760/incumbent-presidents-primary-challenges/
Lots of times. The most recent was in 1968, when LBJ decided not to run after he was defeated in the New Hampshire primary by a then obscure Senator named Eugene McCarthy. The latter didn’t have much of a shot though, quickly giving way to Bobby Kennedy, who then got murdered. Finally the VP (Hubert Humphrey) became the candidate almost by default. And he may have pulled it off if George Wallace hadn’t run third-party, siphoning off Democratic votes, especially in the South.
Reasonable takes here visa vis the Hindu Right.
Their goal is the same of many nationalist movements in artificial post colonial states. Creation of an actual country comprised of an actual people, rather than a hodge-podge of peoples and states forced to live in one country because that’s where the border was when the Europeans left.
“Hindi, Hindu, Hindustan” is dumb, but its working in India. While the Hindu Right remains confined mostly to the North for now, its making inroads everywhere. I think its possible that only Punjab, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and the 7-sisters will remain immune long term.
Hinduism has assimilated everything thrown at it for centuries (its only real failure being against Islam). Ironic that its final act of assimilation may be to assimilate Indians themselves, wiping away the various ethnicities until the whole country is basically one large Uttar Pradesh.
The sikh orthodoxy and punjab are early movers in acceptance of hindutva (SAD is a long standing constituent of NDA). If punjab is subdued compared to other parts of the north its because there are hardly any minorities. We all know about the thorough ethnic cleansing muslims out of their area during partition, so no exigencies around demographic flux. I know jatt sikhs who maintain enough cultural distance from orthodox hinduism out wariness of brahmin/baniya chicanery, but this is common among cultivator castes elsewhere too.
Being in a coalition with NDA means nothing itself, a number of parties go in and out of the coalition based on what the BJP offers them, despite having widely divergent ideological views.
Hindu Nationalism is extremely unpopular among Sikhs and Christians. Only 10% of both groups voted for the BJP at the last national election, and the figure is even less for state elections. There is nothing that can be done about this. Non-Hindus will never get excited about living in a Hindu Rashtra. Just like non-Muslims, no matter how many incentives they are offered, will always be opposed to living in an Islamist-State. Its natural.
Both groups also have long-standing feuds with the Hindu Right that go back to pre-partition days, so this isn’t just a modern politics issue.
“Hindu Nationalism is extremely unpopular among Sikhs and Christians. Only 10% of both groups voted for the BJP at the last national election”
Bro, you quantitatively challenged?
India like Hinduism is not only assimilative but also accommodative of diversity. The local identities are inextricably linked to the Indian identity and vice versa. The identities can be best understood as mother-daughter identities exemplified in Karnataka’s state song which refers to Mother Karnataka as the daughter of Mother India. These linkages put natural limits on the extent to which sub-national identities can undermine the national project. Even purely sub-national Kannada patriotic songs use Hindu metaphors or other pan-Indic references and never subvert the larger civilizational identity instead they strengthen the civilizational identity because it is perceived to be authentically Indian. The regional identity cannot be extricated from the mother ship of the Indic civilization.
“These linkages put natural limits on the extent to which sub-national identities can undermine the national project. Even purely sub-national Kannada patriotic songs use Hindu metaphors or other pan-Indic references and never subvert the larger civilizational identity instead they strengthen the civilizational identity because it is perceived to be authentically Indian. ”
1000 times this. But there are exception to the rule. Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala,N-East (East of Assam) and Kashmir.
Agree that some North Eastern states might not have strong civilizational linkages. But the inner-line-permit, constitutional freedoms and generous transfers from the union are incentives to remain with India.
Kerala has deep civilizational linkages with the rest of India. Adi Shankracharya who was a Keralite, travelled all the way up to Kashmir and established mathas in 4 corners of India. If he felt no connection to the larger civilization why would he undertake such a spiritual endeavor? I have also lived in Kerala for about 2 years. While it is not outsider friendly, there is no sense in which they do not consider themselves fully Indian.
Bengal was the center of the Indian renaissance and produced many leaders who shaped the early Indian freedom struggle. It is the land of Tagore who composed the national anthem, Bankim Chandra who composed the national song, Shyama Prasad Mukherjee who founded the Bharatiya Jan Sangh and Vivekanada who established Ramakrishna Ashramas throughout the country, travelling all the way up to Kanyakumari.
While the periyarist/dravidian parties have created an idiosyncratic political culture, the population remains quite religious and conservative from what I have observed in my trips to Chennai. Chennai is also not outsider friendly, though it is more cosmopolitan than Trivandrum especially with the growth of tech parks etc with many non-locals working there.
While many states might not identify with the North Indian culture and may not be outsider friendly, the residents of each Indian state seem to consider themselves more authentically Indian than other states.
Kashmir is a case where there is a loss of civilizational memory and possibly an identity crises that sometimes accompanies conversion. I wonder if similarly changing the demography of Bengal or Kerala will result in a loss of civilizational memory. A natural experiment may demonstrate to us that the boundaries of the constitutional state of India i.e those who identify with the said constitutional nation-state are co-terminus with the civilizational boundaries of India i.e. with those states that have a living memory of the civilizational linkages.
“If he felt no connection to the larger civilization why would he undertake such a spiritual endeavor?”
Why did Buddhist monks travel from China to India? Does this mean India and China were the same civilization?
The question is why Shankracharya did not establish the mathas outside of India when there were Hindu populations outside of the Indian sub-continent in South East Asia during his time. This is probably because of the conception of Bharata varsha as a sacred geography which is attested to by multiple scriptures. This is different from the Buddhist travellers who did not consider themselves Indians.
It is difficult to articulate precisely what elements constitute the Indian civilizational identity, religion/culture is one part of it but there are other commonalities. While civilizational boundaries are mutable and its elements are open to change/influence, you can sense some distinctiveness vis-a-vis other civilizations.
At no point in my stay in Kerala did I feel I was not in India, nor did my Malayali friends feel they were not Indian. The food, the temples, the people, the mannerisms, the culture everything felt familiar. Add to the civilization conception of Bharata, the idea of a nation-state as a community, and you feel a sense of connection with India and its people, no matter where you go.
“INDTHINGS
FEBRUARY 3, 2020 AT 4:32 AM
“If he felt no connection to the larger civilization why would he undertake such a spiritual endeavor?”
Why did Buddhist monks travel from China to India? Does this mean India and China were the same civilization?”
Many Indians think so. Or at least mostly so. Taoism is incredibly close to many Sanaathana Dharma Sampradayas–to the point where Taoism is considered by many to be another Sanaathana Dharma Darshana. Many Indians have long believed that:
Bo-Yang = Laozi = the great Siddha Nath master Bhoga Nather or Bhogar Nather.
Know this is a big truth claim. And just because Indians have believed something from 2 1/2 thousand years does not necessarily mean that it is true.
However a lot of Toaists/Acupuncture/Qui Gong/Tai Chi practitioners have collaborated with practitioners of 18 Siddha Siddhanta and Ayurveda to compare the systems together. There are significant similarities between Toiasm and many other Sampradayas.
Perhaps this can be a Brown Pundits Podcast?
Many Indians also believe that Confucius is the same person as the 18 Siddha Siddhanta Sampradaya Nath Siddha Kalangi Nather. Personally I find the connection between Confucianism and many Sanaathana Dharma Sampradayas to be less clear than the connections between Taoism and many Sanaathana Dharma Sampradayas.
The Buddhist monks who traveled between China and India claimed to be Astika Sanaathana Dharma. Greater South Asia and South East Asia at that time had hundreds of major Sampradayas. Buddhist Sampradayas would be respected and regarded as some of them. {Albeit some would call them Astika Sanaathana Dharma while others would call them Nastika Sanaathana Dharma.} Buddhists engaged in many debates with other Sampradayas and collaborated significantly with other Sampradayas.
Personally I believe that Buddhists are Astika Sanaathana Dharma. I have also observed that Dharmic Sampradayas are more focused on competition with Sampradayas that are almost identical to themselves rather than on Sampradayas that are more different from themselves. The Buddhists might fly under the radar to some degree.
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“the question is why Shankracharya did not establish the mathas outside of India when there were Hindu populations outside of the Indian sub-continent in South East Asia during his time.”
Very simple explanation. Shankaracharya passed away at the age of 32. During this time he debated and defeated the leaders of over a hundred (maybe several hundred?) Sampradayas, wrote many Bhashyas, traveled everywhere, spiritually guided vast numbers of devotees, changed everything. If Shankaracharya had lived longer I think he might have traveled far more broadly.
As an aside, Shankaracharya had very interesting discussions and debates with a great Buddhist master. Many say the winner was unclear between them, which suggests to me that Shankaracharya deeply respected the Buddhist master.
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Another aside. The 5 Shankaracharya Mathas and many indigenous sources from across India say that Shankaracharya was born 509 BC. Wrote about this here:
https://www.brownpundits.com/2018/02/03/ancient-arya-culture/
This suggests that Buddha lived at least two centuries before Indologists assert.
@southindian
” Adi Shankracharya who was a Keralite, travelled all the way up to Kashmir and established mathas in 4 corners of India. If he felt no connection to the larger civilization why would he undertake such a spiritual endeavor?
Too easy…he is a brahmin, who belong to a community ultimately orignated from the north, that were able to keep them selves apart using the caste system and continue practicing “Vedic” traditions and the”Vedic” language Sanskrit would easily let him connect with his fellow brahmins in any other part of India. Now show me someone from one of more atavastic communities of Kerala like a puliyan or paniya go to Kashmir and say he feels “connection” to the larger “civilization”, lol, I feel Indians are connect like europeans are connected, we have some similarity in ancestry and culture, but large differences as well, and that should be respected.
” I have also lived in Kerala for about 2 years. While it is not outsider friendly, there is no sense in which they do not consider themselves fully Indian.”
It’s not outsider friendly? Bro we are the friendliest part of India (have a little bias of course), every indian and non-indian visitor I’ve talked has never said otherwise. You actually don’t have to believe me, just go to youtube and look at the travel vlogs, diverse peoples from across the world and India, who are discovering Kerala, have enjoyed their experiences there and rave about the land and people, Why wouldn’t we call ourselves indian? It’s geographically where we are, just like a Italian would call themselves a european. If you’re talking politically (the original vision of India at conception, not the hindutva nationalist wet dream right now), it’s been like 70-80 years we’ve been part of this political construct (USA is only around 200+ years old and I think they were calling themselves american by the 80 year mark), we have a really good civic nature and are one of the most educated and cosmopolitan populations in India, why is that surprising?
//Even purely sub-national Kannada patriotic songs use Hindu metaphors or other pan-Indic references and never subvert the larger civilizational identity instead they strengthen the civilizational identity because it is perceived to be authentically Indian//
These kannada songs were largely composed in the 20th century. We would be projecting our sensibilities quite a bit into past to claim that historic kannadigas felt that being part of a greater bharata was an inextricable part of their identities. The emperors of the middle and classical ages didn’t claim a loyalty beyond their realm. The existence of the “sanskrit cosmopolis” at one point is undisputed, but it really only tells us of the societal elite and not of the folkways. It is not unlike the role of latin which gives, if one’s lens of study is in that language, europe the sense of complete unity, of germany being no different than spain.
I feel we may be overconfidently extrapolating trends from our lifetime regarding the Indian state’s resilience. Our major linguistic boundaries are fairly permanent. Maharashtrians and oriyas (let alone the dravidians regions) are not about to relinquish their mother tongues to hindi, and lingua francas have no permanent homes. As much as it seems that hindi is on the march to bind the nation, it is not hard to imagine its eventual retreat which could be be the outcome of competing globalisms. As such, that ethnic fault-lines and potential nation-states will continue to exist is a certainty.
Even though i am somewhere in middle of these 2 arguments. The examples you have given are a bit off. Actually its growth of Hindi in states like Maharashtra and Orissa that gives Hindi impetus to be the quasi national language. What it shows that in regions where there ambivalent towards Hindi it has only grown, and its only in the regions where it meets active hostility it has somewhat stopped in marches.
I have a different theory that sub nationalism of Kannadiga, MH , Orissa etc which are different from Mallu,Tamil and Bengali sub nationalism. The sub nationalism of the former do see themselves as part of Indian/Hindu.cultural nationalism due to their icons being predominately Hindu. Thats fundamentally different from latter set of sub nationalism who see themselves bound by India thru constitutional nationalism (post 47 India) , see their sub-nationalism as big as Indian nationalism (at best) or opposed (at worst) to cultural nationalism.
The best example in the songs itself, contrast the song of the respective national poets of Kannada and Bengal. While the former is rich of Hindu motifs (even though it doesn’t need to ) while the latter is devoid of any Hindu stuff. The difference couldn’t be starker.
Saurav, thats sort of why I used the examples of Orissa and MH (would be considered success stories), because in spite of the significant uptake of Hindi as a second language there, it will never leapfrog the mother-tongue and hence its status is precarious in the long run, subject to the vagaries of generational fashions. If second languages were cemented in status, then language politics would be lower stakes. Not long ago much of the NE was a Bongo-sphere of sorts, and now the Assamese out of resentment perhaps would much rather engage with Hindi. North Karnataka and bits of Hyderabad state were quite conversant in Marathi 50 years ago. Now, even certain Konkani groups in Goa and coastal Karnataka have abandoned Marathi. Just saying, fashions come and go within the same political frameworks. Hindi is not in endgame mode despite the likelihood that it will continue to expand.
I see your point about the cultural icons of KA and WB being more Hindu, but in the case of the former, I don’t see it as immutable. Hindutva did have firmer footing in the the state than some of its southern neighbours in part because of a more entrenched brahmin community in the larger towns. They are close kin and have a similar outlook as of the MH brahmins. As such, elite Lingayats and Vokkaligas were educated in the same milieu in the mid 20th century. Anti-brahminism is an undercurrent in both communities though, and it tends to concur with regionalist feeling. There is a huge upsurge in interest in history that will end up countering nationalist narratives (both the secular and hindu variety). The sheer variety of resources that people have to explore this is unlike the past and elites won’t be able to frame it for them.
The main issue with your argument is you link the idea of a nation to language which is a European conception. This European ideal isn’t subscribed to by most non-Hindi speakers and many Hindi speakers.
Historically, people in India were part of different empires but shared a common cultural/civilizational space. You are informed by the Westphalian idea of a nation-state which was conceived in 1600 and trying to find it in ancient/medieval India.
Kannada historic literature, common culture, practices are suffuse with Hindu, Jain and Veerashaiva characteristics, all of whom have Indic linkages. There was also a conception of Bharat varsha’s sacred geography. People from these empires venerated both the Ganga and the Kaveri. They visited pilgrimage sites across India. The civilizational space that was shared was common and linked to the idea of sacred geography. But by no means can you look for a nation state which is a modern idea.
The new innovation in modern India is the conception of the heterogeneous civilizational state. It is not a nation-state which depends on a common language like Hindi and it is not a homogeneous civilizational state like China. A civilizational state preserves its all its languages because it is culturally linked by civilizational commonalities and all languages are part of the civilizational heritage. The mother-daughter identities have been organically conceived within this framework and people have composed songs that are suffuse with Indic metaphors even as they praise their local language.
Europe could possibly have been a heterogenous civilizational state prior to 1600. But their identities are strongly shaped by the construct of the nation-state based on language and therefore there is resistance to this idea.
The experience of colonialism made the Indians realize the importance of a united political state. The centuries of invasions prior also informed this sensibility. Indians were already linked by civilizational commonalities and therefore decided to form a common polity. Europeans as colonizers never felt the same need for a common polity because they did not face the brutality that we did over a long period of history.
A purely constitutional state that tries to deny/coverup historic civilizational commonalities will exacerbate regional tensions due to internal immigration. A purely constitutional state informed by Western sensibilities of language based nation state will try to impose hindi. A civilizational nation within the constitutional framework will preserve all its rich identities.
If you are using regionalism in your fight against Hindutva you are making a mistake. A Karnataka which looks into its past will encounter empires Chalukya, Rastrakutas, Vijayanagara which were unapologetically Dharmic be it Jain, Veerashaiva or Vasihnava traditions. It will also remember the destruction of Hampi and Halebidu. A nation-state formed based on this regional identity will be much more unapologetically dharmic than the Indian civilizational state can ever be.
Southindian, my take on this is that we have no reason to treat subcontinental politics as exceptional. It fits well within a broader eurasian sphere and the patterns of civilisational development and later periodization are similar enough. The indian republic, its constitution and attendant traditions are deeply european, and to understand it better one is better suited to studying the history of britain and france than anything asian. I’d be the first to say that some of our monarchies like the wodeyars were still viable and invested with a sacred authority rooted in our own traditions. At this point however, unless there is a wodeyar restoration movement, the society is firmly within the framework of the european idea of nation-states. To say that indians aren’t invested in those ideas or that they aren’t congruent with our societies is neither here nor there. Our own past is more foreign to us than western notions are now, and moreover we vastly overestimate our own civilisational continuity. We are still in our infancy of being able to understand and reimagine these societies 500, let alone 1500 years ago.
girmit
FEBRUARY 3, 2020 AT 9:44 PM
Imposing Hindi on Karnataka is madness. Culturally and linguistically kannadigas are unique.
“We would be projecting our sensibilities quite a bit into past to claim that historic kannadigas felt that being part of a greater bharata was an inextricable part of their identities.”
Here I don’t follow. Are you saying that 2.5 thousand years ago kannadigas were not learning the stories of the great Rishis, Buddha, Krishna, Rama . . . performing plays . . . performing music . . . dancing . . . meditating? (Similar to Thailand, Java, Sumatra, Sri Lanka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala) Why do you think this?
Would you agree that kannadigas felt part of the Dharmic parivar (family) since Madhvaacaarya and Sri Sri Paada Sri Vallabha?
One reason I prefer Arya varsha to Bharata is because I suspect (but don’t know) that in the ancient world Arya varsha was more widely identified with, and identified with over a larger area.
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Some other questions:
—-what are some of the Sampradayas/Paramparas/Panths/Saints are you are interested in, familiar with or have a family/social connection with?
——Around 2 thousand years ago how connected did kannadigas feel to Agastya Rishi?
Agastya Rishi has for thousands of years been the patron saint of the Philippines, Vietnam, Loas, Cambodia, Thailand, Java, Sumatra (Indonesia and Malaysia), Sri Lanka, Tamil Nadu. Buddha and Buddhists honored Agastya highly.
In fact perhaps Agastya Rishi is the locus of “Eastern philosophy” writ large.
As an aside, I am not sure about Agastya’s connection with Burma. Perhaps Burma was a “Brahma” connected area?
I am a HUGE Agastya (or Agastyar) fan.
Fully agree with AnAn that the stories Kannadigas were hearing for millennia are those of Krishna, Jain tirthankaras etc. That is the civilzational linkage I am talking about.
I disagree that Arya varta refers to a larger region. The Vasistha Dharma Sutra locates the Āryāvarta to the north of the Pariyatra Mountains and the Vindhya Range and to the south of the Himalayas. This means it excludes South India 🙁
Bharata varsha on the other hand is defined in the Vishnu Purana as :
“The varṣam that lies north of the ocean and south of the snowy mountains is called Bhāratam; there dwell the descendants of Bharata”
If a nation is an imagined community, then India was imagined in the Vishnu Purana as a community of common descendants in the 2nd-millennium CE. But then again I want to reiterate that the nation-state as a political entity is a Westphalian idea conceived in 1600.
I identify with Sankracharya’s traditions and appreciate the Advaita philosophy. I also identify with Akka mahadevi, who belongs to the Lingayat Bhakti tradition and is a figure of female emancipation. I especially love one of her vachana sahityas on “The Harassing Maya”. I don’t know much about Agastya Rishi. Our education system is woefully inadequate. Everything that I have learnt about the history of any tradition is through informal means. History text-books have to be re-written to emphasize local histories within the larger context of the civilizational linkages.
Identities like “Marathi” and “Kannadiga” are no less synthetic than “Indian”. The march of modernity (everywhere) is one of continuous consolidation across what were once considered clear boundaries. Good riddance to provincial rubbish, I say, (so long as no one is being steamrollered.)
Arjun, agree to the extent that linguistic identities are modern, and that particularly in the case of kannada and marathi, there are innumerable caste groups that straddle the two zones. Its a bit extreme to say “as synthetic as” though. Unlike the category “Indian”, which doesn’t really determine much about a person between the possibility of them being a Naga and Mallu. Speaking a language is a very specific thing. The state can form very specific relationships using the medium of language, and so it has a great deal of utility.
Girmit, languages are not static. What are considered different languages merge into one under forces of commerce, travel and state patronage. Today the forces of homogenisation and standardisation are vastly more influential than those of linguistic balkanisation. English (and to a lesser extent Hindi) are making inroads into all Indian languages at a pace that was unimaginable barely a generation ago (just as Farsi did a millennium ago).
The Maharashtra of today was far from a single entity in the days of Shivaji – nor in all probability was the Marathi language of today. And this in the mere space of three hundred and fifty years.
Arjun, I don’t know why you’d think I implied that these languages were static. I’m fully aware of the various regional standards and sub-registers of both marathi and kannada, to the point of mutual un-intelligibility. Further to that you’ve got dialects that are in a liminal state of not being easily categorisable between two languages (which is incredible given that they belong to two different families). I agree to your point about standardization, this is a worldwide phenomenon. I can’t however imagine anything but a trivial fraction of people in these states identifying with hindi more than their mother-tongue. The exception being conversion to islam , which in the deccan means eventually becoming a native hindustani speaker. Furthermore the effect of large scale internal migration is that hindi is losing prestige at the same time it is expanding its ambit. When all people knew was bollywood , it was aspiration. Now, among the middle classes, it is not the case.
They may not embrace Hindi. Quite likely the increasing use of English – and yes, Hindi, to a smaller but increasingly significant extent – will result in something new. This is more or less identical to how Urdu was born. And yes, not everyone may join the party at the same time (although the rate at which they do is proportional to the existing state of consolidation analogous to the rate of Facebook membership growth being proportional to how many others are already signed up)
I am not trying to predict the future. But I dont see linguistic identities being permanent in their present state. Mainly because their present state is quite different from what they were in the past.
Sooner or later human beings are going to feel emotionally what they have known for a long time. We are all the same and we benefit by coordinating our lives and living in harmony.
Agree that we need to get rid of parochial ideas of regional separatism. But we need to study the history and preserve the culture/traditions which enriching them with other influences.
Defining oneself solely based on language is extremely parochial. A nation-state in India formed based on such narrow entities will drive away outsiders like North Indians or Tamilians. Bangalore became an IT hub by drawing talent from all across India.
We can define narrower and narrower entities for example language-caste etc which will define people in ever more granular detail but one that is not enriching their identity. A plurality of identities as in the Indian civilization state maintains liberalism and mutual respect.
I’m interested in the preservation of indigenous traditions/customs/languages etc. to the extent possible. This may be Odia or Khasi practices, Jain or Veerashaiva or Donyi-Polo(Arunachali) religious traditions etc. Of course certain customs/structures such as those that might discriminate on the basis of gender or caste have to be entirely discarded. Reformation and preservation of the civilization inheritance have to proceed in tandem. I’m also open to new influences from other societies. For eg: the broad contours of the constitution, institutions of modern democracy etc that are to a great extent foreign imports. Certain changes are also inevitable with economic modernization, which is ok.
However, currently I find extreme leftist positions that demonize all indigenous religious traditions as a whole rather than advocating selective reform. On the other hand, they do not critique non-indigenous religions at all. Combine the forces of modernization( which is necessary) , selective demonization(unnecessary) and demographic change and it could potentially be a lethal mix. Across societies we do find that indigenous religions traditions are eventually wiped out. A lot of the culture such as dance, music etc linked to these indigenous religions will also die out with it. Is this a possibility in India?
A civilization that is heterogeneous and open to influences will not have a problem with non-indigenous religions. In many cases it adds to the richness. However, maintenance of demographic status quo and refraining from selective demonization is important for preservation of indigenous religions.
I wonder if the preservation of culture/traditions is better served in regional nation states especially if there is a extreme leftist takeover of the Indian state? I am deeply troubled by this idea because I am emotionally invested in the Indian identity. While I seek the preservation of the Kannadiga culture or dharmic traditions, I’m not as invested in it from the perspective of identity. I advocate it in a way that I would advocate for the preservation of Arunachali culture and Donyi-Polo religion.
Could somebody help me steel-man the arguments as to why the Indian state is important for the preservation of indigenous traditions, culture and religion. Some arguments follow:
1) Communist/naxal takeover is more likely in small states eg: Nepal. Communism has been corrosive to indigenous culture besides being economically disastrous
2) Indian state has developed the state capacity to prevent large scale religious violence. Individual regional nation states may not have the capacity.
3) Individual kings/rulers in authoritarian regional states may change their religion/cultural expectations and force their new found faith/culture on the masses.
4) The Indian state is powerful enough to prevent wholesale proselytization. For eg: if Arunachal were an individual nation state, Donyi-Polo religion would in all likelihood cease to exist.
5) Basic state services make individuals less economically vulnerable especially in the context of uneven development across states. This prevents fraudulent proselytization through inducement.
I don’t think the rise of sub-nationalism will be for cultural reasons as a lot of people here are trying to argue for or against. No one seriously thinks that their culture is uniquely non-Indic (barring the odd cookie Khalistani or Dravidianist)
IMO Mallus and Bongs are fine being within the Indian fold.
Nor will this rise of sub-nationalism be a reaction to migration.
I think it will be primarily for economic reasons.
There’s a sharp divergence in economic growth between north/east Indian and west/south India. And there’s not enough internal migration to offset this.
https://www.business-standard.com/article/economy-policy/low-interstate-migration-is-hurting-india-s-growth-and-states-are-to-blame-119082600099_1.html
” No one seriously thinks that their culture is uniquely non-Indic (barring the odd cookie Khalistani or Dravidianist)
IMO Mallus and Bongs are fine being within the Indian fold.”
They *think* their nationalism/identity is as big, if not bigger than Indian nationalism/identity.
Rise of sub nationalism would still be on cultural issues, considering there are only handful of states in India which have any meaningful economic activity. Almost all states in India are laggard states.
The best example is Gujarati nationalism where sub nationalism only rose post 2002 riots, not due to either economic or migration issues. Ditto with TN with language, long before it was an economic powerhouse. Contrast it to Bengali/ Mallu sub nationalism which have absolutely no economic activity to talk about, possessing the biggest chip on their shoulders.
As for politics, the BJP has grown in Karnataka by embracing the local identity as much as the national one. Even the schisms of history are localized. The historical debates in Karnataka are about local tyrants like Tipu Sultan and less so about national tyrants like Aurangzeb. The resistance offered by Onake Obavva, a brave dalit women to Hyder Ali which is part of the Kannada folklore, is also highlighted by the BJP. Even the RSS shakas in Karnataka use Kannada.
Samuel Isaac Andrews
FEBRUARY 2, 2020 AT 8:37 PM
“literally no mainstream conservatives say they want to send Asian Americans back to Asia as you claimed. Literally no one. You are just imagining what they “really think.”
Shouldn’t we ask Indo-Carib what he means in detail? For example the “conservatives”, “Republicans”, “moderates”, “independents”, “democrats”, “liberals” are all big overlapping tents with hundreds of mini factions within each of them. What are Indo-Carib’s specific observations about each of these mini factions?
We have many close friends and allies within the conservative, Republican, moderate, independent, Democrat and liberal camps. Even many self identified “leftists” are good decent folks with whom we are allied. We don’t need to choose between them. We can be friends with all of them. We can forge coalitions to advance policies and deep cultural trends that we wish. Both intra-American and global.
“How tolerant are Pakistani Muslims towards Indians?”
This is a low resolution question. Many Pakistani liberals, twelvers, sufis, Balochis, Sindhis, Pashtuns, atheists are pro Indian AND pro American. The Pakistani Army deep state isn’t everything.
“Or towards Westerners?”
What is “Western”? Are Aryans western?
“How tolerant are Indians towards foreigners? I’m pretty sure much less tolerant than white Americans are towards Asian Americans.”
Have you been to India? Indians “LOVE” Americans. Forget tolerance. Indians deeply respect, revere and “LOVE” Americans. In general Indians don’t believe in tolerance . . . Indians actually respect, admire, learn from and love foreigners and try to emulate foreigners in everything. When there is an argument between an Indian and a foreigner, Indians side with the foreigner against Indians. In fact the excessive fetish-ization and idealization of foreigners in one of India’s biggest problems.
India might respect, honor and love multiplicity, different cultures and faiths more than any other country on earth. Why do you think so many foreigners fall in love with India?
“Do they perceive you as foreign or as different? Oh, my goodness what oppression? That’s 1st world problems.”
Shouldn’t we ask Indo-Carib what he means? I have some guesses but would prefer that he elaborates.
“@Numinous,”From the point of view of people not of fully European descent, ideological issues may seem trivial when one issue (immigration) threatens to create an existential crisis for them. ”
If you already immigrated here, are a citizen or on track on becoming one, how is immigration an existential crisis? If people were trying to send you back sure.
America has one of the most open immigration policies in the world. No existential crisis is going on.”
Don’t think this is what Numinous and Indo-Carib mean.
In the 1980s there was less discrimination and bigotry towards Asian Americans than today. Today “Asian Americans” are increasingly being treated like Jews by Americans, albeit not as badly as Jews yet. America has a horrible epidemic of anti Jewish bigotry. Not a joking matter.
An Indian friend puts it like this. In most K-12 schools, universities, and increasingly more spheres of the private sectors the top performers are either Asian or “Asian” European American (Russian, East European, Jewish, Israeli, Lebanese, Syrian, Iranian etc.). This is visually true and undeniable. Everyone knows it.
Often the eyes of “non Asian” European Americans hurt when they see this. This often leads to a lot of jealousy, rage and backlash.
Almost every Jewish and Asian American has seen and felt this.
Asian and Asian European culture values excellence, merit, capacity and competence. Once Americans valued these things too. But as excellence, merit, capacity and competence come under attack in America . . . so do Asian Americans and Asian European Americans.
It is normal for Asian Americans and Asian European Americans to look to friends and allies in this environment. For example Glenn Loury, John McWhorter, Coleman Hughes, Kmele Foster, Denzel Washington, Michael Fortner, Ian Rowe.
If Republicans and conservatives want to assuage and win over Asian Americans and Asian European Americans then fight for excellence, merit, capacity and competence.
India like Hinduism is not only assimilative but also accommodative of diversity. The local identities are inextricably linked to the Indian identity and vice versa. The identities can be best understood as mother-daughter identities exemplified in Karnataka’s state song which refers to Mother Karnataka as the daughter of Mother India. These linkages put natural limits on the extent to which sub-national identities can undermine the national project. Even purely sub-national Kannada patriotic songs use Hindu metaphors or other pan-Indic references and never subvert the larger civilizational identity instead they strengthen the civilizational identity because it is perceived to be authentically Indian. The regional identity cannot be extricated from the mother ship of the Indic civilization.
Samuel Isaac Andrews and Indo-Carib, would be curious to get your perspectives on:
https://www.brownpundits.com/2019/12/19/american-caste-b/
Do you think that if average American math proficiency improved it would help improve American intra caste relations?
A video about how much indians love, respect and worship americans and Europeans.
https://youtu.be/lyNNUzwNIPo
good to see a number of kannadigas on this site including girmit .
can someone write about Madhvacharya’s philosophy as it is supposed to be radically different from Shankara’s.
good to see a number of kannadigas on this site including girmit .
can someone write about Madhvacharya’s philosophy as it is supposed to be radically different from Shankara’s.
I could write my understanding of Madhvacharya Sampradaya. But it would probably be wrong. I am not sure Prof Long or Mukunda would be comfortable writing in great detail about Maadvacharya Sampradaya either.
Descriptions by Advaita parampara and Achintya-Bheda-Abheda of Maadvacharya (that I have read or been told) might not be the whole picture.
Should Brown Pundits do a podcast about Maadvacharya Sampradaya with one of the great masters of this order? Could ask Mukunda if he is willing to interview said Maadvacharya.
You can directly read Maadvacharya’s bhashyas line by line in the Bhagavad Gita and for some of the Upanishads. I personally prefer reading other Bhashyas of the Gita and Upanishads.
To massively oversimplify you have likely heard: “Tat Tvam Asi”:
—Tat = “That” (Brahman)
—Tvam = “You”
—Asi = “Are”.
Or “That (Brahman) You Are” or “I am that”.
I don’t understand Maadvacharaya’s interpretation. Maadvacharya said that “Sa atmaa-tat tvam asi” in Sanskrit = “Sa atma-atat tvam asi” or “Atma (not “That” or Vishnu) “You” “Are”.
To quote Wikipedia:
“In refutation of Mayavada (Mayavada sata dushani), text 6, ‘tat tvam asi” is translated as “you are a servant of the Supreme (Vishnu)”
Guess it rests on atmaa-tat = atma-atat. I would seek clarification from Sanskrit scholars.
Here is a long quotation from Quora that covers “Tat tvam Asi” in greater detail:
”
Keshav Kashmiri
Keshav Kashmiri, Knows about Vedic literatures
Updated Oct 18, 2017 · Author has 214 answers and 585.5k answer views
The 13th century saint Madhvacharya in his Book “Tattva ratnavali” also known as “Mayavada sata dushani” gave the explanation for Tat Tvam Asi using the concept of “Tat purusha samasa.”
In Sanskrit grammer a tatpuruṣa compound is a dependent determinative compound, i.e. a compound XY meaning a type of Y which is related to X in a way corresponding to one of the grammatical casesof X. In this case, two nouns combine to create a new noun. This combination is called the compound.
For example:
Yajur-veda = “sacrifice-knowledge” = “the knowledge of sacrifice”
In the above example, the “sacrifice knowledge” in and of itself is meaningless. For it conveys the wrong idea that we should sacrifice knowledge. But when we say using the tat purusha samasa, it becomes “the knowledge of sacrifice”.Now it conveys the right meaning.There are few more examples like
raja-putra = “king-son” = “son of a king”.
indra-satro = “Indra enemy”=”Enemy of Indra”.
svarga-patita = “heaven-fallen” = “fallen from heaven”.
So, we can see from the above words that the word used without tat purusha compound becomes meaningless.And moreover,it gives a wrong interpretation.Like mentioned above,heaven never falls.But by using the tat purusha compound, it is known that svarga patita means someone has fallen from the heaven.
The meaning of the tat purusha is given below:
तस्य पुरुषः → तत्पुरुषः
tasya puruṣaḥ → tatpuruṣaḥ
His servant
Now that I have sufficiently explained the concept of tat purusha, I would now explain the meaning of “Tat Tvam Asi”
In the book “Madhvacharya’s Tattva ratravali” verse 6,following explanation is given.
“Tat-Tvam is a possessive compound word (sasthi-tatpurusa-samasa). According to this explanation, tat means “of the Supreme,” and the entire phrase means “you are the servant of the Supreme.” In this way the proper meaning of the scriptural statement is clearly shown.”
The Mayavadi commentators say that the Vedic statement tat tvam asi concludes that the Para Brahman and the living entities are non different. The word tat means “He,” the word tvam means “you,” and the word asi means “are”; so they wrongly arrive at conclusion that words tat tvam asi means “you are the Para Brahman, there is no difference between you and Him”.
But the Vaishnava commentators have given different meanings of the word tat tvam asi. The word tat means “He who is infallible” and this word has been derived from the word tasya meaning “His.” Therefore, the word tat tvam asi means “you belong to Him.” The word tasya makes the distinction between the Para Brahman and the living entities.
The equivalent of this Mahavakya “tat tvam asi” is “aham tava asmi”. The proper explanation of this mahavakya is given in the following verse of Padma Purana:
Padma Purana,Patala Khanda 82.85
sakrd eva prapanno yas tava asmi iti vedad api
sadhnena vinapya eva mama apnoti na samsayah
“Even if once,if a surrendered soul says to me,”Oh lord,I,am yours”, then even without performing any kinds of sadhana, he attains me,there is no doubt about it.”
Thus the meaning of “Tat tvam Asi” means “I (jivatma) belong to Paramatma. To make us realise the constitutional position of jiva in relation to Lord,this Mahavakya is used in the Chandogya upanishad. The constitutional position means the natural svarupa of the jivatma. This has been explained by Chaitanya Mahaprabhu as follows:
Chaitanya caritamrta, Madhya lila 20.108–109
jīvera ‘svarūpa’ haya — kṛṣṇera ‘nitya-dāsa’
“It is the living entity’s constitutional position to be an eternal servant of Krishna”
Madhvacharya also explains in Tattva ratnavali ,verse 17 as follows:
“The Vedic statement tat tvam asi should be interpreted in the following way: tat means “the Supreme Brahman who is like a nectar ocean of perfect transcendental bliss.” Tvam means “the distressed individual spirit soul, whose mind is anguished by the fears produced by continued residence in the material world.”
The word tat represents supreme lord, who is eternally free from the cycle of birth and death. But tvam(you, we jivatma) identifies our body with the soul. Thus we undergo repeated cycle of birth and death. But our essential nature is sat chit ananda. This nature can be realised when we understand our constitutional position of being an eternal servant of God.Therefore, Tat tvam asi is a warning to the living entity not to mistake the body for the self.
Source:
CC Madhya 20.108-109
Ved Puran
Thank You
Hare Krishna
“
Another terrorist attack in London
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51356447
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51351885
Very much like the terrorist attack few months back, when the attacker attacked public and was killed by public or police. He was taken to Pakistan where he was buried attended by many people
Someone (I believe HMBrough) asked a few posts ago why our governments couldn’t focus both on temporal and religious matters (when I complained about the latter.) Here’s one argument for why: https://www.livemint.com/opinion/columns/india-s-immense-political-stamina-for-useless-issues-11580661893305.html
But you’re not talking about religious issues, you’re just talking about political polarization. That’s not an Indian issue, that’s an everywhere issue. What India adds is corruption and squalor that make things worse.
Even if you were to get one political side to shut up for good (Manu would of course prefer it be the nationalists, and I would prefer it be the secularists), nothing would get done, and they would find new things to argue about. Cause that’s just how India is.
In America, political polarization and signaling has also reached a fever pitch. Some of the LEAST successful political movements have been people trying to fix this (eg No Labels).
Basically, India is not sui generics. Complaining about this kind of stuff is a way for the Josephs of the world to bash culturally-minded Hindus, but there’s not much substance to their argument.
“Complaining about this kind of stuff is a way for the Josephs of the world to bash culturally-minded Hindus”
Bro, dont go by the Joseph part. He is more often on our side then not. He actually defended NRC, before it became too hot to handle.
I know i invented this whole guess-the-politics-by-their-surname but there are exception to my rule too ??
Yeah Manu is quite on the point.Especially this.
“The exotic issues of Indian politics exist not because Indians so love their culture. They exist because it is easier to demolish a mosque or build a temple than it is to enrich India or even enforce intelligent road design. ”
The whole “why-can’t-we-be-china” folks from both left and right miss this crucial point. Almost all Indian resources is channeled to make different groups to not revolt. And in a heterogeneous democracy u have to. What’s left is used for some “constructive” stuff.
https://bluetoad.com/publication/?i=588816&pre=1#{%22issue_id%22:%22642989%22,%22publication_id%22:%2245852%22,%22page%22:8}
Can folks please discuss the 50 K year old DNA?
I just got put into the naughty-kids corner on Twitter for the first time, for violating their policies on “hateful content”.
The Tweet, near verbatim, was:
“If you ask the average Mexican what they think about a dumb gringo writing a dumb but sympathetic book about Mexicans, you’ll get an eyeroll at most. Visceral disgust towards this [American Dirt] is the product of a mostly white American subculture to which a few Mexicans have assimilated.”
I wonder if I was hateful for using the words “dumb gringo”, or for the last sentence.
Regardless, I’m not even going to bother putting in my phone number to begin the 12-hour timeout. My investment in Twitter was near zero even before this, so I think this is a good sign that I should find other ways to waste my time.
the latest indian budget allots money for museums and has given grants to showcase rakhigari.
Smart move. Before marxist appropriate Rakhigari, put ur stamp thru, making it center piece of Saraswati Sindhu civ , an alternate historiography, in turn it will bcome radioactive for Left-libs
Looks like having learnt from their earlier (1998-2004) faux passe
Saraswati Sindhu civ I keep forgetting Hindus call it that ???.
Typical Muslim/Islamic discussion in the west.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51369960
A young French girl said Islam is a religion of hate. Immediately Muslims rounded up on her accusing her of racism. Now she and her family are under police protection.
“15 crore Muslims can dominate over 100 crore Hindus, we will snatch away our ‘Azadi’: Waris Pathan in Karnataka
https://www.opindia.com/2020/02/aimim-asaduddin-owaisi-hate-speech-inciting-violence-communal-hatred-anti-caa-protests-muslims/“