Students will develop skills in critical reading, historiography, essay writing, bibliographic techniques, and oral communication. Assessment consists of independent work (completing tasks on the online learning environment and producing a critical analysis of the secondary source), and group work (oral presentation on a related historical topic) Being Different: An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism is a book by Rajiv Malhotra, an Indian-American author, philanthropist and public speaker, published by blogger.com book reverts the gaze of the western cultures on India, repositioning India from being the observed to the observer, by looking at the West from a Dharmic point of view The concept of a color blind society was created in an effort to end racism, and there are pros and cons to this ideology. Learn the definition of a color blind society, as well as the benefits
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Being Different: An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism is a book by Rajiv Malhotraan Indian-American author, essay on occidentalism and public speaker, published by Essay on occidentalism. The book reverts the gaze of the western cultures on India, repositioning India from being the observed to the observer, by looking at the West from a Dharmic point of view.
Malhotra intends to give a critique of western culture, by comparing it with Indian culture, as seen from a 'Dharmic point of view. I explain that the variety of perspectives and practices of dharma display an underlying integral unity at the metaphysical level. Malhotra summarizes his rationale for treating Dharmic traditions as a family, contrasting the family essay on occidentalism Dharmic traditions with Abrahamic religions.
He constructs their differences from this 'Dharmic perspective,' thereby 'reversing the gaze. Malhotra calls for mutual respect as a higher standard for pluralism than tolerance. Mutual respect does not call for acceptance of beliefs held by others, only to have genuine respect for difference, essay on occidentalism, because, beliefs are not facts.
hopes to set the terms for a deeper and more informed engagement between dharmic and Western civilizations. Malhotra identifies "six distinct and fundamental points of divergence between the dharmic traditions and the West. According to Malhotra, there is a pervasive anxiety in the west over personal and cultural differences. Therefore, the essay on occidentalism tries to assimilate and convert "all that does not fit its fundamental paradigms.
In contrast, "Dharmic traditions [ According to Malhotra, Dharmic traditions rely on adhyatma-vidya, [note 1] while the Abrahamic religions rely on God's interventions in human history. History-centric dogma such as original sin and resurrection become critical beliefs and no compromise can be made on their acceptance. This explains the centrality of Nicene creed to all major Christian denominations.
Followers of history-centric religions believe that the God revealed His message through a special prophet and that the message is secured in scriptures. This special access to God is available only to these intermediaries or prophets and not to any other human beings. Dharma traditions do not hold history central to their faith. Essay on occidentalism Buddha emphasized that his enlightenment was merely a discovery of a reality that is always there. He was not bringing any new covenants from any God.
The history of the Buddha is not necessary for Buddhist principles to essay on occidentalism. In fact, Buddha stated that he was neither the first nor the last person to have achieved the state of enlightenment.
He also asserted that he was not God nor sent by any God as a prophet, and whatever he discovered was available to every human to discover for himself. This makes Buddhism not History-Centric. Malhotra explains how history-centrism or lack of it has implications for religious absolutist exclusivity vs, essay on occidentalism.
flexible pluralism:. Abrahamic religions claim that we can resolve the human condition only by following the lineage of prophets arising from the Middle East, essay on occidentalism. All other teachings and practices are required to be reconciled with this special and peculiar history. By contrast, the dharmic traditions — Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism -- do not rely on history in the same absolutist and exclusive way.
This dharmic flexibility has made fundamental pluralism possible which cannot occur within the constraints of history centrism, at least as understood so far. Both Western and Dharmic civilizations have cherished unity as an ideal, but with a different emphasis, essay on occidentalism. Here, Malhotra posits a crucial distinction between what he considers a "synthetic unity" that gave rise to a static intellectualistic Worldview in the West positioning itself as the Universal and an "integrative essay on occidentalism that gave rise to a dynamically oriented Worldview based on Dharma.
Dharma philosophical systems are highly systematized in their approach to understanding ultimate reality and in carefully addressing what one can know through various means of knowledge. However, this rigor does not restrict their freedom in being comfortable with social organization. Indians exhibit remarkable openness to self-organization and decentralization. Malhotra explains the basis for this openness:. Hinduism weaves multiple narratives around the central motif of cooperative rivalry between order personified as devas and chaos personified as asuras.
A key myth shared by all the dharma traditions — the 'churning of the milky ocean,' or samudra-manthan — shows the eternal struggle between two poles. The milky ocean is the ocean of consciousness and creativity, which is to be churned in order to obtain amrita, or the nectar of eternal life. Dharma actually recognises the need for both Order and Chaos to co-exist in the universe. In the story [7] Prajapati attempts to create the Universe keeping Order and Chaos in dynamic balance.
binding together dissimilar things by what is common across all things in the entire creation, essay on occidentalism. Malhotra identifies various non-translatables in Sanskrit that have been mapped into Abrahamic religious concepts. These mis-translations then are used to draw sameness arguments or to denounce Hinduism. Malhotra explains that, essay on occidentalism. In the fashionable search for sameness in all religions, Holy Spirit in Christianity is often equated with Shakti or kundalini in Hinduism.
However, essay on occidentalism, these terms represent different, even incompatible cosmologies. Christianity assumes an inherent dualism between God and creation. This necessitates historical revelations along with prophets, priests and institutions to bring us the truth. But Shakti, being all-pervading, obviates dependence on these; its experience can be discovered by going within through yoga.
Malhotra gives example of a list of Sanskrit non-translatables and goes on to provide key differences in their original meaning and the most common translated word in English. For example, [8]. Malhotra claims that refuting Western Universalism is one of the most important objectives of his book, the conscious effort from American and European individuals to make the rest of the world fit into the template provided by these civilizations.
He claims that all people and culture are forced into the various schemes put forward to bring this about and asserts that modern laws, regulation, conventions and common practices are formed, whether consciously or not with Western Universalism in mind. Malhotra then goes on to provide a case study of Germany for Western digestion and synthesis.
He claims that late 18th and early 19th century saw a special interest in ancient India in European academia now called as Romantic movement and Indic origin of European culture started to compete with the earlier held Semitic origin. To satisfy German cultural and religious egotistic interests various German Romantic thinkers like K. Schlegel and G. Hegel slowly digested Indic ideas, like monismessay on occidentalism, and presented a caricature of India as the 'frozen other'.
Malhotra says Hegel presented, "The Weltgeist or World Spirit is, in effect essay on occidentalism protagonist of essay on occidentalism history, essay on occidentalism, and the West is extraordinary because it is destined to lead this journey while all other civilizations must follow or perish, essay on occidentalism. Asia's place in history is as an infant, whereas the West is mature and everyone's eventual destination, essay on occidentalism.
For example, Hegel argues it is better for Africans to remain enslaved until they pass through a process of maturation that culminates in their total conversion to Christianity. Hegel's perception of India as stagnant and lacking history was perpetuated by Karl Marxwho described India as caught in the 'Asiatic Mode of Production'. The destiny of the Germanic people is that of serving as the bearer of the Christian principle'. As Halbfass explains, 'European thought has to provide the context and categories for the exploration of all traditions of thought', [13] which Malhotra argues sees the digestion of Indian civilization into Western categories as both natural and desirable.
Malhotra also writes that, after Hegel's death his sweeping Eurocentric accounts of history was extrapolated which culminates at the Aryan identity. Malhtora states. Hegel's theory of history has led to liberal Essay on occidentalism supremacy, which hides behind the notion of providing the 'universals'.
These European Enlightenment presuppositions became incorporated in the confluence of academic philosophy, philology, social theories and 'scientific' methodologies — all of which were driven by various imperial and colonial values alongside Christian theology. Several reviews of Being Different have been published in academic periodicals, that include reviews by Campbell, [14] Wiebe, essay on occidentalism, [15] Rai, [16] and Rukmani.
Gier, [19] Shrinivas Tilak, [6] Gerald James Larson, [20] Rita M. Gross, [21] Robert A. Yelle, essay on occidentalism, [22] and Cleo McNelly Kearns, [23] as well as a nearly page response by Malhotra. In FebruaryPatheos Book Club hosted a discussion of Being Different on their website. According to Kearns, essay on occidentalism, Malhotra puts forward a valuable challenge to Christian theology. According to Gross, Malhotra has located "one of the most urgent tasks for human survival", namely the ability to accommodate diversity without judging one culture over another as superior or inferior.
Tilak is appreciative of the "counterreading" [27] that Malhotra offers. According to Tilak, Malhotra "gives voice to Indic subjects who have been silenced or transformed by nineteenth century and contemporary Indological filters. Essay on occidentalism James Larson is critical of Malhotra's presentation of "differences". According to Larson, Malhotra ignores the differences, to arrive at an "integral unity" "that is little more than a Neo-Vedanta or Neo-Hindu reading of the Bhagavad Gita documented with numerous citations from Aurobindo.
Robert A. Yelle is highly critical of Malhotra's approach. According to Yelle, essay on occidentalism, "there is little, if any, original scholarship in the book. It is the work of a polemicist," who uses western scholarship when criticizing the West, but ignores this scholarship when he presents his own nativist vision of "dharmic traditions. Yelle also criticises Malhotra for his use of the term "dharmic traditions".
According to Yelle, Malhotra presents a thoroughly homogenized ideal of Hinduism, based on a limited choice of aspects from Vedanta philosophy and Yoga. To come to a real dialogue, Indians must also be willing to look in the essay on occidentalism, and be open to self-criticism. Gier criticizes Malhotra for ignoring profound differences between Dharmic traditions in seeing an integral unity. According to Gier, this undermines Malhotra's principal claim that these philosophical schools are "integral".
In the Journal of the Anthropological Society of OxfordBrian Campbell wrote that the book succeeds in fulfilling essay on occidentalism one of its four goals. According to Campbell, essay on occidentalism, it gives a simplistic view of modern colonialism. It also fails to reverse the gaze, and to apply dharmic categories to Western socio-cultural reality.
Essay on occidentalism to Campbell, Malhotra does succeed in tracing the difference between Western and Oriental thought, essay on occidentalism. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Being Different: An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism Author Rajiv Malhotra Country India Language English PublishedHarperCollins Publishers India a joint venture with The India Today Group Pages ISBN OCLC Website beingdifferentbook.
com Being Different: An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism is a essay on occidentalism by Rajiv Malhotraan Indian-American author, philanthropist and public speaker, published by HarperCollins.
Hobson, Francis X. ClooneyD.
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Assignments includes weekly reports and a ( pp.) research essay due at the end and also to be adapted for presentation at a tenth-week mini-conference. Admission by PTE: Students interested in the capstone seminar should send a résumé of literature courses taken and a brief ( pp.) writing sample from a previous course (PDFs only) to Feb 05, · This essay looks—highly selectively, as it must—at recent patterns of reception for Orientalism, arguing that the book has been "re-Orientalized" by its Students will develop skills in critical reading, historiography, essay writing, bibliographic techniques, and oral communication. Assessment consists of independent work (completing tasks on the online learning environment and producing a critical analysis of the secondary source), and group work (oral presentation on a related historical topic)
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