Aryans, Jews, Brahmins

Dorothy M. Figueira

Description

In Aryans, Jews, Brahmins, Dorothy M. Figueira provides a fascinating account of the construction of the Aryan myth and its uses in both India and Europe from the Enlightenment to the twentieth century. The myth concerns a race that inhabits a utopian past and gives rise first to Brahmin Indian culture and then to European culture. In India, notions of the Aryan were used to develop a national identity under colonialism, one that allowed Indian elites to identify with their British rulers. It also allowed non-elites to set up a counter identity critical of their position in the caste system. In Europe, the Aryan myth provided certain thinkers with an origin story that could compete with the Biblical one and could be used to diminish the importance of the West's Jewish heritage. European racial hygienists made much of the myth of a pure Aryan race, and the Nazis later looked at India as a cautionary tale of what could happen if a nation did not remain "pure."

As Figueira demonstrates, the history of the Aryan myth is also a history of reading, interpretation, and imaginative construction. Initially, the ideology of the Aryan was imposed upon absent or false texts. Over time, it involved strategies of constructing, evoking, or distorting the canon. Each construction of racial identity was concerned with key issues of reading: canonicity, textual accessibility, interpretive strategies of reading, and ideal readers. The book's cross-cultural investigation demonstrates how identities can be and are created from texts and illuminates an engrossing, often disturbing history that arose from these creations.

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Shared Myths
The Aryan Canon
Methodology and Plan

Part I. The Authority of an Absent Text

1. The Enlightenment and Orientalist Discourse on the Aryan

The Enlightenment Background
Voltaire and the Search for Authority
Locus of Poetic Inspiration or Site of Cultural Decay?
Conclusion

2. The Romantic Aryans

Romantic Myth Theory
Friedrich Schlegel and the Foundations of Romantic Linguistics
Romantic Mythographers and the Upnekhata
Romantic Indology: The Case of Max Müller
Conclusion

3. Nietzsche's Aryan Übermensch

Introduction
Reading Nietzsche Reading India
Manu as a "Semitized" Aryan Sourcebook
The Aryan as Übermensch
Christianity, an Anti-Aryan Outcaste Religion
The Jew and the Aryan
Conclusion

4. Loose Can[n]ons

Racial Theory: An Overview
Gobineau and the Aryan Aristocrat
Houston Stewart Chamberlain: Aryan Publicist
Alfred Rosenberg and the Nordic Aryan
Conclusion

Part II. Who Speaks for the Subaltern?

5. Rammohan Roy

Reading Reform
The Complexity of the Colonial Subject
Scriptural Authority and the Hermeneutics of Sati
Misreading Monotheism: Idolatry and Brahmin Perfidy
Rammohan Roy's Syncretism and Its Challenge to Postcolonial Theory

6. Text-based Identity: Dayanand Saraswatı's Reconstruction of the Aryan Self

Introduction
Dayanand's Canon and Hermeneutical Strategies for Reading the Aryan World
Aryan Masculinity and the Teleology of Decay
Conclusion

7. Aryan Identity and National Self-Esteem

Introduction
Justice Ranade and Lokamanya Tilak
Swami Vivekananda
Conclusion

8. The Anti-Myth

Introduction
The Aryan and Its Other
Mahatma Phule
Dr. Ambedkar
Conclusion

Afterword

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Sujets

• History of Asia
• Hinduism
• History of Europe
• Europe

Informations

• Publié par: State University of New York Press
• Date de parution: 01 février 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780791487839
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

ARYANS, JEWS, BRAHMINS

SUNY series, The Margins of Literature Mihai I. Spariosu, editor

A RYANS , J EWS , B RAHMINS

Theorizing Authority through Myths of Identity

D OROTHY M. F IGUEIRA

STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK PRESS

Published by State University of New York Press, Albany

© 2002 State University of New York

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.

For information, address State University of New York Press, 90 State Street, Suite 700, Albany, NY 12207

Production by Marilyn P. Semerad Marketing by Michael Campochiaro

Library of Congress CataloginginPublication Data

Figueira, Dorothy Matilda, 1955– Aryans, Jews, Brahmins : theorizing authority through myths of identity / Dorothy M. Figueira. p. cm — (SUNY series, the margins of literature) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0–7914–5531–9 (HC : alk. paper) — ISBN 0–7914–5532–7 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Indo-Aryans. 2. India—Civilization. 3. Vedic literature–History and criticism 4. Racism—Europe—History—19th century. 5. Antisemiticism. I. Title. II. Series

DS425 .F57 2002 934—dc21

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

2002024176

I dedicate this volume to my daughter, Lila, and in loving memory of my mother, Marion Gentile Figueira

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Acknowledgments

Contents

Introduction Shared Myths The Aryan Canon Methodology and Plan

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Part I. The Authority of an Absent Text

The Enlightenment and Orientalist Discourse on the Aryan The Enlightenment Background Voltaire and the Search for Authority Locus of Poetic Inspiration or Site of Cultural Decay? Conclusion

The Romantic Aryans Romantic Myth Theory Friedrich Schlegel and the Foundations of Romantic Linguistics Romantic Mythographers and theUpnekhata Romantic Indology: The Case of Max Müller Conclusion

Nietzsche’s AryanÜbermensch Introduction Reading Nietzsche Reading India Manuas a “Semitized” Aryan Sourcebook The Aryan asÜbermensch Christianity, an Anti-Aryan Outcaste Religion The Jew and the Aryan Conclusion

Loose Can[n]ons Racial Theory: An Overview

vii

i

x

1 1 1 2

7

8 8 10 18 25

27 27

28 31 34 47

50 50 52 54 55 57 58 61

64 64

144 144 145 147 150 157

120 120 121 133 139

The Anti-Myth Introduction The Aryan and Its Other Mahatma Phule Dr. Ambedkar Conclusion

203

165

Chapter 5

67 73 80 86

Gobineau and the Aryan Aristocrat Houston Stewart Chamberlain: Aryan Publicist Alfred Rosenberg and the Nordic Aryan Conclusion

90 90 92 94 96

Afterword

Index

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Part II. Who Speaks for the Subaltern?

Chapter 8

Text-based Identity: Daya¯nand Saraswatı¯’s Reconstruction of the Aryan Self Introduction Day¯anand’sCanonandHermeneuticalStrategies for Reading the Aryan World Aryan Masculinity and the Teleology of Decay Conclusion

100

105 105

Aryan Identity and National Self-Esteem Introduction JusticeRanadeandLokam¯anyaTilak Swami Vivekananda Conclusion

viii

107 112 117

Rammohan Roy Reading Reform The Complexity of the Colonial Subject Scriptural Authority and the Hermeneutics ofSat¯ı Misreading Monotheism: Idolatry and Brahmin Perfidy Rammohan Roy’s Syncretism and Its Challenge to Postcolonial Theory

Contents

Bibliography

Notes

160

189

89

Acknowledgments

am grateful to several organizations without whose funding this volume I would not have been possible. I thank the American Institute for Indian Studies for a Senior Research grant to Poona in 1992–1993. I am also grate- ful to the Fulbright Foundation as well as the National Endowment for the Humanities. I also thank the Center for Advanced Studies of the University of Illinois for their support. Material adapted from “Aryan Aristocrats and Übermenschen: Nietzsche’s Reading of theLaws of Manu,” which appeared inThe Comparatist23 (May 1999): 5-20, is reprinted by permission of John Burt Foster, editor.