The first conference of the five-year conference cluster took place in New Delhi, in January 2008. During the first conference, we realised that the need and urgency to develop an alternative theoretical framework for the study of the Indian traditions is acknowledged by many scholars of religious studies. More than anything else, we felt an intellectual enthusiasm among the participating scholars and a willingness to engage in extensive discussions on this topic. Most participants felt part of a larger project that needs to be supported and extended beyond the confines of a conference.
Watch the participants' reactions and thoughts about the first conference on www.youtube.com/cultuurwetenschap
Of course, not all objectives were achieved yet. The programming and organising teams have therefore started to reflect on changes to the format and organisation for the second conference.
To know more about what the conference did and did not achieve,
read the report of the first conference
Brief overview of Rethinking Religion in India I
The first conference Rethinking Religion in India was a success. More information about the first conference will appear soon on this page.
In the Platform sessions three speakers and two respondents compared and discussed their respective answers to the question ‘Are there native religions in India?’
Speakers:
Respondents:
The Platform sessions juxtapose the different approaches to the question 'Are there native religions in India?' The classical study of religion regards entities such as Hinduism and Buddhism as the ancient religions of India. Yet, they face problems in identifying those properties by which to recognise Hinduism and Buddhism as religions. As a reaction to this, several scholars within religious studies have questioned the usefulness of the concept 'religion' as a cross-cultural analytical tool. Authors such as T. Fitzgerald and R. McCutcheon argue that 'religion' is a Christian theological concept and therefore unfit for a scientific study of other cultures. They argue that 'religion' should be replaced by less contested concepts such as 'culture,' 'ritual,' or 'soteriology.' Within the field of postcolonial studies, it is argued that this Western understanding of religion - with its focus on sacred texts, priests, a specific belief in one God, a central church-like structure, etc. - has imposed a unity - conceptual or real - on the multitude of diverse religions that existed in pre-colonial India. Modern Hinduism, they argue, is a construction that did not exist before British colonialism. Authors like D. Lorenzen, however, oppose the postcolonial argument by showing that Hinduism cannot have been constructed by the colonials since the Muslims and European travellers described a Hindu religion long before the British colonisation of India did. A fourth approach to the question of religion in India comes from the field of comparative science of cultures. S. N. Balagangadhara, for example, argues that there has never been any empirical or theoretical proof for the existence of native religions in India. Instead, comparative science of cultures studies 'Hinduism' and related concepts such as 'Vedism,' 'Brahmanism,' 'Buddhism' … as entities of the Western cultural experiences of India.
Three Roundtable sessions took up the issue of ‘Colonialism and Religion in India’. The Roundtable consisted of two groups of participants:
(1) a group of invited speakers who initiated the discussions with a brief presentation:
(2) A group of respondents challenged these different positions:
The Roundtable sessions aimed to generate challenging discussions in the debate on the colonial construction of Hinduism. Today, it is commonly accepted that colonialism has had a profound impact on the development of Indian society. Yet, its impact on religion in India has become a fiercely debated issue. During the last few decades several scholars have argued that modern Hinduism is a colonial construction. Ever since, a debate has been going on about whether Hinduism is an ancient indigenous religion of India or a creation of British colonial writers. On the one hand, the postcolonial studies claim that the colonial descriptions of Hinduism could not have described a reality in pre-colonial Indian society. Authors such as G. Oddie, R. Frykenberg, H. von Stietencron, etc. argue that British colonial scholars constructed one unified pan-Indian religion out of the multitude of diverse religious practices, rituals and doctrines that characterised pre-colonial Indian religion. They argue that because of the imperial need for unity and the Western notion of religion in terms of sacred texts, priests, and doctrines, the British colonials mistook Brahmanism for the Indian religion as a whole. On the other hand, this postcolonial position is contested by the classical field of religious studies. Some authors hold that Hinduism cannot have been constructed by the colonials since the Muslims and European travellers described this religion long before the British colonisation of India did. Others retort that the constructionist argument cannot explain why Indians have never contested the Western conceptualisation of their religion and why today so many Indians themselves speak about Hindu religion.
Even though the postcolonial school touches upon certain fundamental problems in the classical approach to Hinduism, its explanations fail to give a satisfactory answer to an important set of questions: What does it mean to say that Hinduism is a colonial construction? What is said to be constructed: an idea or a real phenomenon? Why did the colonials need to invent religion, rather than something else?
The themes of the Parallel Paper sessions were:
(1) Caste system and Indian religion; (2) Evolutionary explanations of religion; (3)
Colonialism and religion in India; and (4) Indians are Aryans, so what?
Paper presenters:
(1) The special IASR panel on "Approaches to the Academic Study of Religion from within Contemporary India," with a panel consisting of
(2) The special IGNCA panels on "Terminologies, Interpretations and Religious Experiences: Perspectives on the Religion of the Self" with three panels consisting of: