Yoga in Modern India: The Body between Science and Philosophy / Edition 1

Yoga in Modern India: The Body between Science and Philosophy / Edition 1

by Joseph S. Alter
ISBN-10:
0691118744
ISBN-13:
9780691118741
Pub. Date:
09/19/2004
Publisher:
Princeton University Press
ISBN-10:
0691118744
ISBN-13:
9780691118741
Pub. Date:
09/19/2004
Publisher:
Princeton University Press
Yoga in Modern India: The Body between Science and Philosophy / Edition 1

Yoga in Modern India: The Body between Science and Philosophy / Edition 1

by Joseph S. Alter

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Overview

Yoga has come to be an icon of Indian culture and civilization, and it is widely regarded as being timeless and unchanging. Based on extensive ethnographic research and an analysis of both ancient and modern texts, Yoga in Modern India challenges this popular view by examining the history of yoga, focusing on its emergence in modern India and its dramatically changing form and significance in the twentieth century. Joseph Alter argues that yoga's transformation into a popular activity idolized for its health value is based on modern ideas about science and medicine.

Alter centers his analysis on an interpretation of the seminal work of Swami Kuvalayananda, one of the chief architects of the Yoga Renaissance in the early twentieth century. From this point of orientation he explores current interpretations of yoga and considers how practitioners of yogic medicine and fitness combine the ideas of biology, physiology, and anatomy with those of metaphysics, transcendence, and magical power.

The first serious ethnographic history of modern yoga in India, this fluently written book is must reading not only for students and scholars but also practitioners who seek a deeper understanding of how yoga developed over time into the exceedingly popular phenomenon it is today.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780691118741
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Publication date: 09/19/2004
Edition description: New Edition
Pages: 352
Product dimensions: 6.00(w) x 9.25(h) x (d)

About the Author

Joseph S. Alter is Professor of Anthropology and Research Professor at the University Center for International Studies, University of Pittsburgh. He is the author of The Wrestler's Body, Knowing Dil Das, and Gandhi's Body.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations xi

Preface xiii

Acknowledgments xxi

PART 1 INTRODUCTION AND ORIENTATION

chapter 1 Historicizing Yoga: The Life and Times of Liberated Souls 3

CHAPTER 2 Yoga and the Supramental Being: Materialism, Metaphysics, and Social Reality 32

PART 2 YOGA'S MODERN HISTORY AND PRACTICE

CHAPTER 3 Swami Kuvalayananda: Science, Yoga, and Global Modernity 73

CHAPTER 4 Birth of the Anti-Clinic: Naturopathic Yoga in a Post-Gandhian, Postcolonial State 109

CHAPTER 5 Dr. Karandikar, Dr. Pal, and the RSS: Purification, Subtle Gymnastics, and Man Making 142

PART 3 CONCLUSION 6

Auto-Urine Therapy—The Elixir of Life: Yoga, A yurveda, and Self-Perfection 181

CHAPTER 7 Mimetic Skepticism and Yoga: Moving beyond the Problem of Culture and Relativism 211

Notes 247

Glossary 273

References 283

Index 309

What People are Saying About This

Elizabeth De Michelis

This is the first time Indian Modern Yoga has received such sustained, in-depth treatment by a reputable and well-informed scholar. Much of the book is quite accessible to the general reader, and many of Alter's more theoretical and analytical interpretations of modern understandings of yoga, health, medicine, the body, and truth claims are novel and stimulating. Highly recommended.
Elizabeth De Michelis, Director, Dharam Hinduja Institute of Indic Research, Cambridge University

Waltraud Ernst

Yoga in Modern India is a mine of thought-provoking propositions in regard to the historiography of classical and modern writing on yoga. Well written, it provides detailed and frequently provocative analyses of particular yogic ideas and practices that contribute to a more sophisticated discussion about the status of modern yoga in its various guises over the last one-and-a-half centuries.
Waltraud Ernst, University of Southampton, author of "Plural Medicine, Tradition, and Modernity, 1800-2000"

From the Publisher

"This is the first time Indian Modern Yoga has received such sustained, in-depth treatment by a reputable and well-informed scholar. Much of the book is quite accessible to the general reader, and many of Alter's more theoretical and analytical interpretations of modern understandings of yoga, health, medicine, the body, and truth claims are novel and stimulating. Highly recommended."—Elizabeth De Michelis, Director, Dharam Hinduja Institute of Indic Research, Cambridge University

"Yoga in Modern India is a mine of thought-provoking propositions in regard to the historiography of classical and modern writing on yoga. Well written, it provides detailed and frequently provocative analyses of particular yogic ideas and practices that contribute to a more sophisticated discussion about the status of modern yoga in its various guises over the last one-and-a-half centuries."—Waltraud Ernst, University of Southampton, author of Plural Medicine, Tradition, and Modernity, 1800-2000

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