Non-Western Worldview

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abhischekcc
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Post by abhischekcc »

The problem with the west s that it is t he last 'civilisation' to be come civilised. Hence, it can only define itself in opposition to other civilisations.

It is the same problem with Islam in the religious field.

And look how bloody violent and devoid of civilised behaviour they both are.

These babes are still to grow up.

--------------

The west at least used to acknowledge its debt to other, esp Indian civilisations up untilthe middle of the 19th century.

It was India's defeat in the 1857 war, that made Europe aware of the fact that not only would the world be dominated by one civilisation in future - but that the civilisation would be Europe. THAT'S when the land grab really started.

The earlier expoits of the Spaniards, etc were considered excursions - not permanent conquests - this changd after 1858.

Of course, the west is the greatest thieving 'civilisation' ever in teh history of mankind. They not only steal material goods, but credit for other people's work as well.

Just ask them who invented the concept of zero.
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Post by svinayak »

ramana wrote:I have been thinking about Post colonial literature in the West. is is a new form of Orientalism? IOW is the West still dominating the discourse of the ex-colonials? By self abnegating themselves they (West) are denying the voice of the former colonials to complain on their past masters and more importantly to recoup and move on.

And why is the base for these studies in US and not in the former colonial powers- UK, France, Belgium and Holland?
Old Europe - Past colonial countries have accepted the dominance of the new world to create the 'western civilization'. They have relinquished their role to US so that the project can continue for the next 500 years.
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Post by Prem »

Acharya wrote:
ramana wrote:I have been thinking about Post colonial literature in the West. is is a new form of Orientalism? IOW is the West still dominating the discourse of the ex-colonials? By self abnegating themselves they (West) are denying the voice of the former colonials to complain on their past masters and more importantly to recoup and move on.

And why is the base for these studies in US and not in the former colonial powers- UK, France, Belgium and Holland?
Old Europe - Past colonial countries have accepted the dominance of the new world to create the 'western civilization'. They have relinquished their role to US so that the project can continue for the next 500 years.
New world dominance is receeding and the split between old and new is widening . This create oppertunity for mature Eastern Civilizations to assert their traditional dominant role.
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Post by mayurav »

[quote="Kalantak"]Western criticism: Look at the East
By Dipak Basu

The distinguishing virtues of the Western civilizations are not unique; these were there also in the Eastern civilizations.

The problem with the Western intellectuals is that they know very little beyond their own countries but are arrogant enough to make comments about the whole world.

Guy Sorman is one of those Western intellectuals who has taken as his profession denigration of the East or the Eastern civilisations. As a critic of the East he has considered, forgetting India altogether, only the Chinese and the Muslims as the representatives of the East and pointed out some fundamental differences between the East and the West. According to Sorman three major characteristics that separate the East from the West are innovative nature, self criticism and gender equality. According to him the East cannot innovate but is dependent on the West for every scientific innovation. The East cannot criticise the concept of God or deny it. He says the East also discriminates against women.

Similar opinions were expressed by a number of Western intellectuals. Paul Krugman, professor of economics in Harvard in 1995 in the Foreign Affairs magazine also wrote that the Eastern people, including the Russians, couldn’t innovate but depend on the West for every scientific innovation. Another Harvard professor, historian Arthur Schlesinger wrote in a number of articles in the Foreign Affairs that the concept of human rights is purely European; the Asian civilisations have no idea about it.

The first problem is that there is no proper boundary of the Western or the Eastern civilisations. Where exactly the East starts, if the Arab world is the Middle East? If it starts from Constantinople, a fusion of Greek, Roman and Armenian civilisations, then Greek itself is also a part of the East. The Hindu deity Mitra was the principal god in Persian, Roman and Byzantine Empire before Constantine. Ancient temples of Mitra still exist in both Armenia and in Britain, which was a colony of the Roman Empire.

Even before the birth of Gautam Buddha there was a great university in Taxila. After the death of Buddha, several universities were formed in Nalanda, Ujjain, Vikramshila and Paharpur, which received scholars from China, the Arab world; besides South East Asia, until their destruction by the Turkish invasion of India in 12th century. The oldest surviving university of the world today is in Cairo.

Since the days of the invasion of India by Alexander until the Arab invasion in 7th century, Afghanistan had Indo-Greek kingdoms creating fusion of all knowledge from three great civilisations India, Persia and Greece. Since the 7th century, Baghdad became the reservoir of knowledge of the world until it was destroyed by the Mongol invasions in 11th century. Scholars from India were invited to go there and translate books of Indian mathematics and sciences from Sanskrit to Arabic. Several Arab scholars, like Al-Beruni and Iban Batuta, also came to India searching for knowledge.

Modern development of science and mathematics in Europe had started in Italy in 14th century, when Italian and Armenian traders transmitted the knowledge of India translated by the Arab scholars in Baghdad and Constantinople.

Thus, much of what is considered as Western is nothing but recycled Eastern knowledge; that is particularly true about inventions in science, technology and mathematics. That was the reason when the East India Company first came to India, it had nothing new to offer to Asia until they began the industrial revolution with the money brought in from the exploitation of Bengal. However, even then the East had made major contributions in 19th century science, which was not acknowledged by the West.

Radio transmission, for example, was first invented and demonstrated by J C Bose in Calcutta, India in 1896 and in London in 1897 but was copied by Marconi who got all the credit. That was also true about Copernicus who only had repeated the discovery made by Arya Bhatta in the 4th century.

Self-criticism is the fundamental part of Indian philosophy. Thousands of years ago in the Rig Veda, the most important book of the Hinduism and the first book composed in Indo-European language group, it is written, “Only that god in highest heaven knows whence comes this universes. He only knows or perhaps he knows notâ€
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

A blog Chapati Mystery has an article on The decline Scenario

Gives a different take on the Empire/vampire stuff.

And Amratya Sen in The New Republic Imperial Illusions
Raju

Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by Raju »

Market full of oil, price trend "fake": Ahmadinejad

By Hashem Kalentari
Tue Jun 17, 2:59 AM ET

ISFAHAN, Iran (Reuters) - The market is full of oil and the rising price trend is "fake and imposed," Iran's president said on Tuesday, partly blaming a weak U.S. dollar which he said was being pushed lower on purpose.

"At a time when the growth of consumption is lower than the growth of production and the market is full of oil, prices are rising and this trend is completely fake and imposed," President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in a televised speech.

"It is very clear that visible and invisible hands are controlling prices in a fake way with political and economic aims," he said when opening a meeting of the OPEC Fund for International Development in the central Iranian city of Isfahan.

Iran, the world's fourth-largest oil exporter, has repeatedly said the market is well-supplied with crude and blames rising prices on speculation, a weak U.S. currency and geopolitical factors.

"As you know the decrease in the dollar's value and the increase in energy prices are two sides of the same coin which are being introduced as factors behind the recent instability," Ahmadinejad said.

Oil steadied on Tuesday after touching a record near $140 the previous day, with traders caught between a weaker dollar and expectations that top exporter Saudi Arabia will ramp up output to its highest rate in decades.

Iran has often said it sees no need for the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to boost output.

"EVER-INCREASING DECREASE"

Ahmadinejad reiterated his view that oil should be sold in a basket of currencies rather than U.S. dollars, an idea which has failed to win over other OPEC members, except Venezuela.

"The ever-increasing decrease in the dollar's value is one of the world's major problems," he said.

"A combination of the world's valid currencies should become a basis for oil transactions or (OPEC) member countries should determine a new currency for oil transactions," he said.

Iran, embroiled in a standoff with the West over its nuclear program, has for more than two years been increasing its sales of oil for currencies other than the dollar, saying the weak U.S. currency is eroding its purchasing power.

Ahmadinejad, who in the past has called the dollar a "worthless piece of paper," suggested "some big powers" were driving it lower on purpose:

"The planners for some big powers are acting to decrease the dollar's value," he said. "For years they imposed inflation and their own economic problems to other nations by injecting the dollar without any support to the global economy."

Foes since Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution, Tehran and Washington are also at odds over Tehran's disputed nuclear activities as well as over policy in Iraq. Iran says its atomic work is peaceful.

(Additional reporting by Zahra Hosseinian in Tehran; Writing by Fredrik Dahl; Editing by William Hardy)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080617/ts_ ... dinejad_dc
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Post by surinder »

mayurav wrote:
Kalantak wrote:Western criticism: Look at the East
By Dipak Basu

The distinguishing virtues of the Western civilizations are not unique; these were there also in the Eastern civilizations.

The problem with the Western intellectuals is that they know very little beyond their own countries but are arrogant enough to make comments about the whole world.

...

Even before the birth of Gautam Buddha there was a great university in Taxila. After the death of Buddha, several universities were formed in Nalanda, Ujjain, Vikramshila and Paharpur, which received scholars from China, the Arab world; besides South East Asia, until their destruction by the Turkish invasion of India in 12th century. The oldest surviving university of the world today is in Cairo.

Since the days of the invasion of India by Alexander until the Arab invasion in 7th century, Afghanistan had Indo-Greek kingdoms creating fusion of all knowledge from three great civilisations India, Persia and Greece. Since the 7th century, Baghdad became the reservoir of knowledge of the world until it was destroyed by the Mongol invasions in 11th century. Scholars from India were invited to go there and translate books of Indian mathematics and sciences from Sanskrit to Arabic. Several Arab scholars, like Al-Beruni and Iban Batuta, also came to India searching for knowledge.

Modern development of science and mathematics in Europe had started in Italy in 14th century, when Italian and Armenian traders transmitted the knowledge of India translated by the Arab scholars in Baghdad and Constantinople.

Thus, much of what is considered as Western is nothing but recycled Eastern knowledge; that is particularly true about inventions in science, technology and mathematics. That was the reason when the East India Company first came to India, ... ... ..
.. ..

This article has a problem. Best described by Shiv in a pithy phrase: "You farted".

Western intellectuals said something bad about East, and East go into a twist to defend itself. Why? Firstly, denying accusations is always a loosing proposition. Don't do it unless you are forced to in a court of law. The answer to the article should be, to say that the concept of genocide, imperialism, looting, plunder, empires, violence, sexual promiscuity are uniquely Western ideas. Go on to point out Slavery, Bengal famines, Holocaust, Apartheid, Native Americans, Spanish in S. America, WW-1, WW-2, Communism, Fascism, Nazism, as uniqely Western ideas. Case closed.

Better still, ignore and smile because you know only desparate people lob accusations.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

ramana wrote:A blog Chapati Mystery has an article on The decline Scenario

Gives a different take on the Empire/vampire stuff.

And Amratya Sen in The New Republic Imperial Illusions
interesting to and from between Amartya Sen and Niall Ferguson on the British legacy. Shows how the battlefield of ideas is shaping up.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by Paul »

The Aryans of old Iran

The author wrote this piece in the 1920s. While it is defintely infected with the AIT smut, there are some interesting pieces describing the relationship between the Devas and Asuras...
Hard pressed even here they ultimately set sail eastwards, to India. They were well aware that India was the land of brother Aryans, who had religious customs and beliefs very similar to their own. So on account of the love they bore to their religion, and because they wished to be allowed to worship their own God in their own way in complete freedom, these sturdy 'Pilgrim Fathers' deliberately accepted exile in the friendly land of Ind. At first they stayed for a few years in the island of Div, off the coast of Kathiawar. But they found the place inconvenient and therefore they left it and arrived at the port to which they gave the name of Sanjan, in South Gujerat on the western coast of India. Here they were welcomed by the Yadava Prince of that land, who gave them some land to settle down and to build their Fire-temple for the Iran-Shah. This was about one hundred and fifty years after the Arab conquest. In return for this kindness of the Hindu prince the Zoroastrians promised to live at peace with the people of the land, to help the Prince and his successors in time of war, to adopt the dress and the language of the people, and to introduce certain changes in the marriage ceremony. These conditions the Parsis have observed faithfully to this day. When Gujerat was invaded in the beginning of the fourteenth century by the King of Delhi, and Sanjan was attacked, Parsis fought and died for their adopted motherland by the side of their Hindu brothers.
http://www.farvardyn.com/zoroaster8.php

The Zoroaster religion belongs to the Indic pantheon of Vedic, Buddhist, Sikh, and Jain religions. The Brits in their usual divide and rule wisdom, encouraged parsis to consider themselves superior to the Indian/Hindu sea which gave them shelter 10 centuries ago.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

What or where is modern day Sanjan? Is it Surat?
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by sanjaychoudhry »

Western intellectuals said something bad about East, and East go into a twist to defend itself. Why? Firstly, denying accusations is always a loosing proposition.
You are right. The best way to counter an accusation is to hurl an accusation of your own on the accuser.
Raju

Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by Raju »

don't know really where this fits in .. but look at the way these two rattle off in Punjabi ..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdZetONZpAw
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by surinder »

Paul wrote:The Zoroaster religion belongs to the Indic pantheon of Vedic, Buddhist, Sikh, and Jain religions. The Brits in their usual divide and rule wisdom, encouraged parsis to consider themselves superior to the Indian/Hindu sea which gave them shelter 10 centuries ago.
And little did the King who welcomed Parsis know that they would of such tremendous help to their adopted land: They were the pioneers in India who set up huge Industries (Tata), started the Indian film industry, gave IISc to India, gave Nuclear weapons (Bhabha) and also smashed Pakistan into two to give India its biggest victory in recent times (Amritsar-born Sam Maneckshaw).
surinder
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by surinder »

Raju wrote:don't know really where this fits in .. but look at the way these two rattle off in Punjabi ..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdZetONZpAw
I have had the chance to meet this gentlemen. They are children of Whites who converted to Sikhism in the 60s and 70s and studied in Amritsar. They have a Kirtan Jatha and visit around. Pretty inspiring young guys.
Raju

Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by Raju »

Are they originally from Uk or US ?
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

A very good interview on the basis of the East India Company. The movie Mangal Pandey alludes to this but Indian history books hardly menion it or gloss over it as a minor fact. It is because of this that most Chinese have lot of resentment towards India. THey know its the Brits who did it but Indina merchants and sepoys were part of the trade Note I said sepoys of the East India Company. Most of the Indian trading companies of the 19th century were prosperous because of this trade. This is a blot and needs catharisis for rapproachment with the Chinese.
I came to know this in college when a junior told us he was from Neemuch, MP and his father, a chemist, was the mgr of the govt opium factory! We wondered what was the govt doing that for and found out the history of it all. Its used for medicinal precursor products.


Pioneer, 19 June 2008
'India was the biggest opium producing region in the world'

Sea of Poppies, the latest novel by Amitav Ghosh based on the cultivation of poppy along the Ganga in the Bhojpur region to feed East India Company's opium factories and sustain Britain's illicit opium trade with China that left the imperial coffers in London overflowing with wealth, has just been published. It is a fascinating story that unfolds in the 1830s, centred around Deeti, and reminds us of the journey undertaken by 'girmitiyas' -- indentured workers who signed an agreement or 'girmit' -- across the forbidden kala paani to foreign shores to work in sugar plantations. It is about disinherited nobility, disempowered peasantry, caste, community and kin -- the many identities that make up the Indian identity at home and abroad. The following are excerpts from a conversation between Kanchan Gupta and the celebrated writer that took place on a rain-drenched afternoon in Delhi --

Kanchan Gupta: I am sure it feels great to have your tenth book published. Sea of Poppies has made a big entry and been received with rave reviews. The British newspapers have lavished praise on the book, especially The Times. And this is only the first of a trilogy...

Amitav Ghosh: A trilogy, yes...

KG: So, how do you plan to carry forward the story of Sea of Poppies?

AG: You know, I think my approach to it is going to be like driving a car at night. You can't see very far ahead of what you can see in your headlight. You keep driving slowly down the road so someday you will get there. I don't think that one can have a sense of what it is going to be like at the end of it. The interest and pleasure of it will really lie in the writing.

KG: But surely there's a big picture... there could be various routes to reaching the final destination. Even if you are driving at night you do know where you want to go...

AG: Yes, there are various routes, various options. But you know, two or three years down the line I may decide to take a different route... It's impossible to talk about something that's not written yet.

KG: In a recent article you have mentioned how one of your ancestors travelled from East Bengal to Chapra and although there's no conclusive evidence, most probably he was involved in the opium trade... Is that what triggered your interest or is it that you wanted to build a story up to 1857 since it is very much there in our conscience now?

AG: No, it's nothing like that. You know my interest really began while I was writing the Glass Palace. I became very interested in the whole business of indentured workers. The process of indenture and how it happened.

It's a curious thing about indenture... the children of the indentured workers, I mean the great, great grand children, you know, there are some very great writers among them... VS Naipaul, Shiva Naipaul... some of our greatest contemporary writers... and they have given us a very vivid picture of what it was for the descendents of these people to grow up wherever they happened to be.

But from our end, from the Indian end, we really never had any sense of what happened. How those processes came into being, how the indentured labourers left, what was the mechanism by which they left. And for me this had a very personal connection simply because of my family having lived in the Bhojpur region for a long time.

I wanted to write about the early years, when indenture first started, which is actually in the 1830s. Once I started looking into it and researching it, it became pretty inescapable because, I mean, it's a strange thing that we have so completely forgotten it now, but this was the biggest opium-producing region the world has ever known.

KG: Michael Binyon, in his review of Sea of Poppies in The Times, begins his article with a very telling line, "The British version of history glosses over the time when this country was the world's biggest drug pusher." That was 200 years ago...

AG: Not even 200 years, until the 1920s it was the biggest drug pusher in the world.


KG: And now you have Afghanistan growing the poppies and feeding Europe's hunger for heroin!

AG: You know, we can take no pleasure in that, this is one of those stories. The whole business of drugs is quite an incredibly grim and hideous thing. I mean, I don't think it's a pleasurable irony in that sense. You don't want this scourge inflicted upon any nation. It's good to remind ourselves of this history. You know, really it was these drugs grown in India that brought about the downfall of China.

KG: Some Indian authors have written about indentured labour, or mentioned it in their novels. Sunil Gangopadhyay...

AG: Aachchha? I didn't know about this...

KG: Why did you choose poppy cultivation and the opium trade? It could have been indigo. After all, indigo cultivation and the entire process was equally dehumanising and fed imperial coffers, it was equally devastating.

AG: Indigo and opium are not quite similar, you know. Indigo was a plantation crop, opium was not a plantation crop. There was some idea of converting opium into a plantation crop. So, we must resist the temptation of assimilating them, although they were similar in the sense of imposing a monoculture. But the mechanism was quite different.

These (poppy cultivators) were peasant farmer who basically were given advances to work on the land and it was through this mechanism of credit that things intensified.

KG: How did you think up Deeti?

AG: You know, the difference between writing history and writing novels is that history scholars are there already while in novels sometimes you just have an idea or you have an image. All my novels have begun with certain images, certain pictorial or visual images. And that's how it happened with Deeti.

As much as Deeti sees Zachary (who steers Ibis, the ship carrying indentured labourers to Mauritius, in the book) while she is standing in the Ganga, I similarly had a sense of actually being able to see her. She became for me the centre of the book around whom the story unfolds or anchors itself.

It happens like that. You know, you can't plan a book the nuts and bolts way.

I knew Deeti would be an important character right from the start -- all my characters are important -- but I didn't really expect she would become the central figure the way she has. She did become for me, how shall I say, she became the mast...

KG: She carries the book forward, linking the various strands and layers or the story...

AG: That's right.

KG: And then you built the other characters keeping her in mind or they just happened?

AG: No, no. They are completely individual and separate characters.

KG: Kalua, the 'untouchable' bullock cart driver who rescues Deeti, for instance...

AG: Kalua, too. He is a completely individual and separate character. You know what happened with Kalua (laughs) was when I went to the Mahatma Gandhi Institute in Mauritius -- which is a truly marvellous archive and they have preserved all the earliest papers of the indenture, including the immigration slips - I looked through the papers carefully and I came upon one which had this name Kalua!

It's a strange thing, a lot has been written about these indentured labourers and immigration certificates that they took, but I discovered something which I have never seen anyone comment upon. I will tell you what it is.

See the immigration slips are like this (draws a rectangle in the air) and they have a few printed lines for name, age, caste, appearance, weight. Later they began attaching photographs but on the earlier ones there were no photographs.

All of this is written in English. If you turn the thing over, in the corner it's written in Bangla, you know, little notations are written in Bangla. And that was what really caught my attention. The things that were noted on the back of the slips tell a peculiar history. Each of the notations ended with a Dafadar - for example, Ismail Dafadar, Rafiq Dafadar or Lallu Dafadar and so on.

That's one thing you would see on the back of the slips. And also in Bangla you would see a version of the name of the indentured labourer. So, clearly what happened is that these dafadars were the ones who recruited the indentured labourers and brought them to Kolkata. There he went to some gomusta or serishta, a Bengali babu, to whom he would hand over the slips and he would be told to bring his gang. The gomusta or serishta would ask for the names of those seeking indenture, scribble them on the back of the slips and then put down the dafadar's name who would be paid per head. This would be the initial notation.

The slips were then passed on to another gomusta or serishta, also a Bengali clerk, who would then translate the names into English. So, on the back of the slip in Bangla it is written 'Kalua', on the other side it is 'Colver'! When you see that piece of paper you already see such an enormous journey.

KG: In Trinidad I was told that the corruption of names took place when the indentured labourers got off their ships and English clerks entered their names in ledgers. So Basudev became Basdeo ...

AG: This is the mythology. They had to have the migration certificates before they left. The corruption of names was done by Bengalis sitting in Kolkata! That was to me a real discovery.

KG: Why Mauritius and not Trinidad? After all, Trinidad symbolises everything about indentured labour.

AG: Well, the Trinidad indenture began much later. Mauritius indenture is the first. In proportion of numbers, it's the biggest. Also, it is the only place in the world where the descendents of indentured labourers are a numerically preponderant group.

So, in many ways the Mauritius indenture is the most interesting because it establishes the patterns for all the subsequent indentures. Among the girmitya communities around the world, they look upon the Mauritians as the aristocrats!

KG: We have forgotten that Mauritius was also a penal colony where people were despatched as punishment. People only refer to Andaman islands...

AG: Yes, and prisoners would be stripped and photographed. In a way, the penal colony in Mauritius was the original Abu Ghraib. Photographing them naked was an assertion of control and served the purpose of humiliating the prisoners. It remains the metaphor of the imperial experience.

KG: You have used words that we don't come across every day... a language that was spoken during the East India Company days by the sahibs. The reviewer in The Times could not comprehend most of the stuff. He has written, "But the clothes -- zerbaft brocade, shanbaff dhoti, alliballie kurta, jooties and nayansukh -- or the ranks and offices -- dasturi, sirdar, maharir, serishtas and burkundaz -- are frankly incomprehensible. And that is Ghosh's trick: We clutch at what we can, but swaths of narrative wash over us, just as they did over those caught up in a colonial history they could neither control nor understand."

AG: It's all about assimilation of words. I have used words from the Oxford English Dictionary. Today we hear that English is more absorptive and assimilative, that it has become global. But in the 19th century the role played by Asian languages in English was much, much greater than today. In the 20th century what happened, without being stated, is a purification of English where Asian words were dropped or treated as marginal to English language. {Decolonization of English started in 1900s just as assimilation started with the arrival of Sir Thomas Roe in 1600s! Thats why I say the study of humanities is a strategic necessity for it gives precursor or indicators of trends!}

When you read this book, you will find many words that have crept in so completely that they are not even recognised to be foreign. But there's a category of words that even though they are English, appear in the guise of something alien. If they go and look at the Oxford English Dictionary and find these words there, what is The Times going to say? Why are these words any more foreign to English than the other words they are accustomed to? {Because the misson of England has changed. So its suitable for Times to refuse to understand these words which were earlier acquired as part of the colonization project}

We are taught there's a standard English and these are the words that can be used. So, if it's a gun, you can't call it a bandook, although it is in the Oxford English Dictionary. Take for instance balti. If you look up the Oxford English Dictionary, balti is defined as north Indian style of cooking. But actually balti is a Portuguese word which was introduced to Indian languages by the laskars, it meant a ship's bucket. Which Indian will believe balti is not an Indian word?

Languages, for me, are like water, they flow into each other and cannot be distinguished from one another.

KG: You deserve to be complimented for the effortless ease with which you introduce entire phrases and sentences in Bangla and then continue in English. Do you do this because you just take it for granted that the readers will get the hang of it, even if they do not understand Bangla?

AG: Look, when we were kids, we were reading books in English, books which had things like 'potted meat'. I had no idea what potted meat meant, but that didn't stop me from reading the book! You can't expect to understand every word of a book, and why should you? In any book that you are reading there will be things that will elude you, that are going to be outside your comprehensive understanding.

KG: It was a pleasure speaking to you.

AG: We had a very interesting conversation.
Edited out....ramana

I plant to read this book to learn more about that phase of Indian history.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by surinder »

Raju wrote:Are they originally from Uk or US ?
US. Pukka Ameriki. Patriotic to the core.
Raju

Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by Raju »

what are these guys singing surinder ? Can you translate it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LClB52p3BoE
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by Keshav »

Raju wrote:what are these guys singing surinder ? Can you translate it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LClB52p3BoE
You should read the comments for that video. What a doozy.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

More on Amitav Ghosh from BBC:

'Opium financed British rule in India'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7460682.stm

So Lyndon Larouche has a core truth to his dippy tirades! - the British were drug dealer number one till they found other ways to make money.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by John Snow »

deleted
Last edited by John Snow on 24 Jun 2008 21:30, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by John Snow »

Also note the name Sib sagar Ram Gulam
Gumusto ----> is used in Telugu as Gumasta == Clerk in office.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

Comments on Conspiracy Theories are to be limited to the nuke threads olee please.

Meanwhile a criticsim of contemporary art theory by Dr Dipanker Basu of Nagasaki Uty, Japan:

Art, Culture and Society-Baroda Paintings
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by wasu »

Ramana, you refer to this opium thing and also indian troops participation in the british destruction of the old summer palace as major sources of chinese resentment of India. Were u referring to mainland PRC folks or chinese outside PRC?
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

wasu wrote:Ramana, you refer to this opium thing and also indian troops participation in the british destruction of the old summer palace as major sources of chinese resentment of India. Were u referring to mainland PRC folks or chinese outside PRC?

Overseas Chinese. The emigrants after the Mao tookover who belong to all classes. Some of them I interacted were mandrin descent and formerly held high positions in Imperial China. Teir poitn was India should consider that point when dealing with Chinese that they are considered a lackey of the West's imperialism as late as the 19th century. Indian troops were used in the Boxer Rebellion suppression.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by abhischekcc »

ramana wrote:More on Amitav Ghosh from BBC:

'Opium financed British rule in India'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7460682.stm

So Lyndon Larouche has a core truth to his dippy tirades! - the British were drug dealer number one till they found other ways to make money.
Ramana,

Don't be too sure that the opium phase has ended.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by abhischekcc »

ramana wrote:
wasu wrote:Ramana, you refer to this opium thing and also indian troops participation in the british destruction of the old summer palace as major sources of chinese resentment of India. Were u referring to mainland PRC folks or chinese outside PRC?

Overseas Chinese. The emigrants after the Mao tookover who belong to all classes. Some of them I interacted were mandrin descent and formerly held high positions in Imperial China. Teir poitn was India should consider that point when dealing with Chinese that they are considered a lackey of the West's imperialism as late as the 19th century. Indian troops were used in the Boxer Rebellion suppression.
I think that giving consideration to the Chinese POV in this issue is really missing the point - we should really try to convince them that India was as much a victim as China.

Also, I think the Chinese POV hides an unconcious xenophobic attitude - because their government wants a culture of victimhood to prevail in the country - hence does not want any other 'victims' in its vicinity.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by pradeepe »

abhischekcc wrote:
ramana wrote:More on Amitav Ghosh from BBC:

'Opium financed British rule in India'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7460682.stm

So Lyndon Larouche has a core truth to his dippy tirades! - the British were drug dealer number one till they found other ways to make money.
Ramana,

Don't be too sure that the opium phase has ended.

I recently read a review of Amitav Ghosh's "Sea of Poppies" in The Hindu by Priyamvada Gopal. Amitav Ghosh's comments on imperialism, slavery and indenture. I saved the paper. Here are snippets from Amitav Ghosh that reflect Abhischekc's view.
The past cannot, and ought not to, be planed down to one dimension. ...
But to acknowledge that the past is complicated, is not to say that we should turn our backs on it, either in shame or because we just want to move on. One reason for this is that colonialism is not really in the past, even in the Indian sub-continent. Pakistan, for instance, is in a situation where re-colonisation is a real possibility. The present incarnation of the empire is in fact uncannily like the old one, with its island prisons, its vast network of jails, its "canotonments" and most of all its tireless trumpeting of its good intentions. This is why we cant turn away saying "who cares?" Because present-day colonialism derives is charter from the past: it wants us to give our assent to a certain view of history so that this history can be repeated (as in Iraq). There is not so much we can do about the past, but it is certainly within our power to withhold the assent it demands of us in the present day - not in order to seek retribution for what happened, but as Gandhi famously said, to make sure it does not happen again.
Loaded para, the above.

Btw, he also provided snippets on the oft touted cultural exchage that benefited the colonised. He says,
Even within the spectrum of empires, the British Empire was perhaps the least open to "diversity" because race was so central to its functioning. The portugese and dutch empires were no better in other respects, but they certainly allowed a far greater degree of contact and intermixing.
I have only selectively quoted him, but nonetheless they are a good precis of what has been said on BR over the years.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

could you post the whole thing please?

And is Priymavada Gopal related to S. Gopal?
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by amol »

ramana wrote:More on Amitav Ghosh from BBC:

'Opium financed British rule in India'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7460682.stm

So Lyndon Larouche has a core truth to his dippy tirades! - the British were drug dealer number one till they found other ways to make money.
All I can say is "WOW"!! This was a real eye opener.

A few things that stood out for me were:
It is not a coincidence that 20 years after the opium trade stopped, the Raj more or less packed up its bags and left. India was not a paying proposition any longer.
Opium steadily accounted for about 17-20% of Indian revenues.
Why do you think that {the glossing over of this in history books} happened?
I think the reason is some sort of whitewashing of the past.
On the Indian side, there is a sort of shame, I suppose. {nope, whitewashing here too.}
Before the British came, India was one of the world's great economies. For 200 years India dwindled and dwindled into almost nothing. Fifty years after they left we have finally begun to reclaim our place in the world.
All the empirical facts show you that British rule was a disaster for India. Before the British came 25% of the world trade originated in India. By the time they left it was less than 1%.
It is indeed ironic that the chickens have come home to roost for the west.
What caused the opium trade to decline in the 1920s? Was it the freedom movement and the increased spotlight on the country that made it untenable to carry on?
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by abhischekcc »

Amol,
The British are the most shameless race on earth - they would never have left the opum cultivation in India from shame.

The only conclusion I can think of is that they either:
1. found a better exploitative position.
2. lost their market.

Not sure about the first point.

For the second, the Japanese conquered large parts of China (manchuria) in 1931, so the british lost that market then.

This is an open question.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

Looks like the period from 1905 to 1925 saw a moral turn around on the question of selling opium. A League of Nations convention was signed in 1925 leading to the stopping of the trade.

History of opium cultivation

So its not always so dark.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by Kakkaji »

ramana wrote:Edited out...ramana
I am sure I have seen that name on a signboard on either an office building or a shop in Central Kolkata.

Any BRF-ites presently in Kolkata can confirm.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by abhischekcc »

Ramana, thanks for the link.
Will have to spend considerable time studying it. :)
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by abhischekcc »

Ramana, history-buffs:

Here are some links for history texts. I know you will enjoy this.

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/feros-pg.htm

And within that link:
(For India related) http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/india.htm

Interwar priod:
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/interwar.htm
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by ramana »

Thanks.

India Forum has numerous links like this.

It seems in 1924, INC passed a resolution to ban opium cultivation and banned all consumption after 1947. Medicinal cultivation was legalised.

India -A case study
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by Raju »

Results of study done on spread of drugs in Punjab in 2006

http://sikhgiving.com/punjab_drug_report.html

heroin has taken over as #1 drug over there. And drug-running has increased manifold in the region post US invasion of Afghanistan.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by abhischekcc »

Hi Ramana,

Continuing from my previous posts. I couldn't write the whole thing as I was in office.

Opium was the reason the Yanks were in Vietnam, and are in Afghanistan now. The western financial system needs a regular infusion of narco-dollars to stay afloat.

Remember that during the 80s, a powerful Pakistani transnational bank was created - BCCI. The main role of this bank was to launder narc-dollars for remitance to the western financial system. Also recall that this bank 'collapsed' soon after the Soviets withdrew. And further recall that the then ruler of dubai tried to save this bank from going under.

The importance of paki-army to America is because it is the on-ground manager of the opium production.

----------
On Vietnam, it is my gut feeling that US withdrew after making the Chinese responsible for the SEA drug trafficking. Take it FWIW.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by Johann »

Abishek,

In the post-WWII era its the other way around; drugs follow wars, especially irregular wars. War is the most expensive human activity, and drugs are the most lucrative source of income for any irregular army.

That was true of the Meos in Laos, the communist FARC and anti-communist AUC in Colombia, and the Mujaheddin in Afghanistan. It is no different left or right - even Ho Chi Minh did it until the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu led to the creation of North Vietnam.

But the biggest producers in SE Asia was always Burma, particularly the by remains of Chiang Kai Shek's army that fled to northern Burma in 1949 after the PLA victory. Thailand has been the central avenue for the flow of opiates from the golden triangle to the rest of the world, channeling production from the whole area.
ramana wrote:Looks like the period from 1905 to 1925 saw a moral turn around on the question of selling opium. A League of Nations convention was signed in 1925 leading to the stopping of the trade.

History of opium cultivation

So its not always so dark.
That is also the period when most narcotics actually became illegal within Western markets as well - they had been legal up to that point, but heavy dependence was socially frowned upon (remember Sherlock Holmes and his 7% solution of cocaine? Sort of the way that tobacco is heading now.

In just the same way that alcohol prohibition in the US in the 1920s and 1930s fuelled the growth of organised crime, keeping drug consumption as a crime only benefits the global underground economy, and ties it to conflict economy. Legalisation may be the best way to clear out the muck, but social conservatives cant even imagine it.
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Re: Non-Western Worldview - 4

Post by abhischekcc »

About opium trade from India,

I remember kgoan saying long time ago that a particular Parsi businessman became the largst opium exporter from India in the 40s, when it was still legal.

That man's name was Jamshed......

I dont think I need to tell the whole name.

So, perhaps the drug trade was simply 'privatised'.
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