Western Scholars Reignite Indian Interest in India

[Guest guest]

But mimicry can also be used strategically to revive non-white

cultures.

Here are two examples:

 

IIT Kharagpur, one of India's most prestigious scientific

institutions,

applied to my foundation some years ago for a grant to celebrate its

50th

anniversary. They wanted to hold various conferences, including one

on

Sciences of Mind. I noticed that they had listed only Western

theories of

mind in their plans. So I suggested that they should also add Indian

theories, such as those which inform yoga, meditation, Tantra and

other

sophisticated philosophies across the spectrum.

 

 

The Indians' reaction was something like this: "We are scientific

and not

some primitive or chauvinistic people."

 

 

So I got hold of five white academic scholars of Yoga, Buddhism,

Tantra and

related systems from India that have made major impacts on Western

thought

and practice in the cognitive sciences. Naturally, when they saw the

resumes

of these eminent scholars from Western institutions, they got very

interested to invite them. I requested these white scholars not hide

the

Indian sources of their work, and to openly state the Sanskrit

origins and

Indian schools concerned.

 

 

What happened was amazing: each of them got a standing ovation in

India!

After all, if the whites were saying positive things about how Mayo

Clinic,

MIT Labs, US National Institute of Mental Health, and other famous

places

had been scientifically validating these traditions, then it must be

okay to

respect them! These white scholars got many invitations from across

India

and spoke at psychology, cognitive sciences and neuroscience

conferences.

 

 

Today there is a movement in India to introduce a new subject in

psychology

departments, called "Indian Systems of Psychology." The Infinity

Foundation

has started a project to develop three volumes for use in the

curriculum.

There are a dozen scholars involved from India and North America,

and they

hold annual meetings. Additionally, there are now many other related

academic events on Indian Psychology each year. So we thank the

whites for

helping reverse the inferiority complexes among elitist Indians.

 

 

There are a few other similar stories as well, such as bringing back

to

prominence the fact that considerable American thought was developed

based

on Indian thought. In this regard, we have sponsored a major

academic book

on Emerson's debt to India, another reprint of a Cambridge

dissertation on

TS Eliot and Indic Traditions, and so forth.

 

 

Also, it was a white producer-director who made the

powerful "Gandhi" movie,

which shaped a whole generation's ideas about the British in India.