Decolonizing Yoga Part 4- Decolonizing and Unsettling Yoga

I'll never forget what my yoga teacher, Mona, said to us on the first morning of my 200 hour teacher training: "Your life is never going to be the same. Your life will change, you will change, your relationships will change, your worldview will change and it's going to be difficult." She couldn't have been more right; over the course of the next eight months we were all broken down and built up again as entirely different people. Ask ten different yogis about their journeys with yoga and you will get ten different stories, but every single one of them will involve a profound and intense transformation of the yogi in question. While yoga has changed immensely over the last few thousand years, the key thread that continues throughout most of yoga's history is the understanding that yoga is, as Carol Horton puts it, an "ongoing project of psychological and cultural 'deconditioning'".

If our settler colonial society is going to engage in decolonization, each of us as members of this society will need to engage in a project of psychological and cultural deconditioning. As a university student engaging in discussions about settler colonialism, racism, multiculturalism, sexism among other social justice issues, I've lost count of the times I've wanted to bottle up the intense transformation that yoga provides and hand it out to social justice activists. I can't though, and instead I hopefully watch the yoga community tentatively begin to take yoga 'off the mat and into the world'. From the various initiatives Seane Corn has taken on, to the increased interest in karma yoga, by-donation yoga, and 'conscious consumerism', there are members in the North American yoga community that are beginning to view yoga as a way of living not just exercising. The consequences of this shift is fascinating as Be Scofield explores in her essay, "Yoga for War: The Politics of the Divine":

"In the documentary, YogaWoman, the world-renowned yoga teacher Donna Farhi stated, "Yoga is one of the most politically subversive practices that any person, male or female, could do in our time." With an estimated 15 million yoga practitioners in the U.S., her provocative statement, if true, could mean significant shifts for a world facing complex global challenges."

The moves to bring yoga and social justice work together have had mixed results, but as Be Scofield points out, being mindful and raising consciousness does not automatically equate to the raising of political consciousness. I argue that the North American yoga community needs to make increasing our political awareness part of our yoga practice. Jnana yoga, the yoga of wisdom and learning, needs to be encouraged more, and in turn needs to inform our Karma yoga, the yoga of action. Educating ourselves on social justice and political issues has to be a part of our yoga practice in order for us to decolonize yoga and break the cycle of settler colonial violence that has been incorporated into modern hatha yoga.  

Awareness is key to yoga because, as Frank Jude Boccio writes, "The various yoga traditions all seem to agree that the major cause of dukha (suffering, discontent, unease, etc.) is avidya" which literally translated means not-seeing. "Understood in this way, avidya means to willfully deny or ignore issues, question or even the ambiguities that may have uncomfortable implications for our actions, beliefs and practices. We see only what makes us feel most immediately comfortable, and refuse to contemplate what does not." If something does not fit into the narratives we've heard our entire lives (such as the narrative that Canada was this big open landmass before the Europeans arrived) we choose not to see it (the narrative of a pre-colonial Turtle Island with many, well established nations and international relations).

Having become more politically aware, the path we take to decolonize yoga will largely depend on each individual's relationship to the settler colonialism. For Indigenous yogis and yoginis a decolonized yoga practice may take its cues from Ana Forest, a prominent, Native American yoga teacher, who has incorporated her indigenous spiritual beliefs and healing practices (which the settler colonial State has historically repressed) into her yoga practice.

While 'indigenizing' yoga may seem counter-productive to decolonizing yoga, remember that decolonizing yoga involves recognizing yoga as a far more diverse practice than it has been constructed by Hindu Nationalists. Yoga has ties to many diverse Hindu traditions, Buddhism, Jainism, Sikhism, even Islam. Marrying a yoga practice with practices and beliefs of other traditions is not new, it is not 'unyogic'. What is unyogic is the cultural appropriation that occurs when settlers try to mix yoga practices with Indigenous spiritual practices they know nothing about and have no ties to.

Ana Forest's approach to her yoga practice works for her and is decolonizing for her, but the transformation that settlers need to undergo to encourage decolonization in Turtle Island is quite different than that of Indigenous peoples. My experience is one of being a settler and so that is the transformation I am going to speak to in this last part. My decision is not meant to de-center Indigenous peoples from the decolonization process, rather it is an acknowledgement that I have no right to tell colonized people how to decolonize.  

Essential to my understanding of myself as a white settler has been the yogic concept of samskaras. Samskaras are the psychological, physiological and cultural grooves that get deeper every time you do, think, see someone else do something or hear someone else say something. Deconditioning ourselves through our yoga practice involves questioning our samskaras to determine their value, and, if found to be untruthful or harmful, working to create new, positive samskaras that are in line with the moral code of the yamas and niyamas.  

As a white settler I have samskaras of (cultural) whiteness and settler mentality that have been engrained in me from the time I was a small child that continue to inform what I say, think and do. Some examples would be my sense of entitlement to this land, and my attachment to settler-Canadian nationalist identities: "My family has been here for ______ generations! They came here with nothing and fought for everything we have today, we've earned our privilege" Or my tendency to try and make myself the center of every issue or topic: "Colonialism is awful! I need to do something about that, what can I do?" Or the various stereotypes about Aboriginal people that I've picked up over the years: "They were all killed in a colonial genocide years ago, they belong in museums, the ones that are still around are a tiny minority that are stuck in the past and have a totally hopeless future, etc." These are just some of the negative samskaras that I have become conscious of over the years; one thing that Sri Patanjali teaches in the Yoga Sutras is that becoming aware of a negative samskara is just the beginning. Just because I'm conscious of these samskaras doesn't mean that they're gone, working to decondition myself and create new, not racist, unsettled samskaras requires a dedicated practice off and on my mat.

Also key to my understanding of a decolonized yoga are the first two limbs of yoga, the yamas and the niyamas. Settler colonialism is completely incompatible with a practice of the yamas: 

Ahimsa- Non-harming is easier said than done, but it's more difficult when you're not even aware of the fact that as a settler you're supporting a system of violence against Indigenous nations.

Satya- Similarly, speaking with truthfulness and integrity is easier when you're aware of the false, negative stereotypes that exist about Indigenous people.  

Asteya- Non-stealing goes completely and totally against the whole idea of settler colonialism, how can you engage in asteya if you don't even know what your relationship to the settler colonial state is?

Brahmacharya- Appropriate and wise use of sexual energy or to use Michael Stone's phrase: "Encountering all creatures with respect and dignity." The statistics on Indigenous peoples and gender-based violence are appalling. If we want to practice Brahmacharya it needs to extend to people of all backgrounds, not just those that are valued by settler society.

Aparigraha- Non-clinging or non-possesiveness is so crucial for those of us with settler privilege, because decolonizing requires us to let go of those privileges.

Conversely, the niyamas help us move past the anti-colonial discourse that the yamas encourage, and help to foster decolonization:

Shaucha- To seek nourishment over toxicity requires us to realize how toxic settler society is and then try to find ways to decolonize and create a more nourishing society.

Santosha- Contentment; if colonialism was driven by a desire for more land, more resources, more wealth then Santosha is being content with what we have in the moment.

Tapas- Discipline or embracing transformation is so crucial to the decolonization process, because it's a long process, settler colonialism isn't going to pack up and leave without a fuss.

Svadhyaya- Introspection is also crucial to the decolonizing process, because colonialism affects our external world as well as our internal experiences.

Ishvara Pranidhana- Trusting and embracing uncertainty is also critical to decolonizing, because we cannot actually predict what a decolonized Turtle Island will look like and be like. We have some vague ideas, but otherwise its a commitment to taking a chance and trusting that if we do this with care we won't end up with a mess like the one we're already in. 

The following pieces helped me write this article and are definitely worth checking out:

Yoga PH.D. by Carol Horton

"Questioning the 'Body Beautiful': Yoga, Commercialism and Discernment" by Frank Jude Boccio in 21st Century Yoga

"Yoga for War: The Politics of the Divine" by Be Scofield in 21st Century Yoga

"Our True Nature is our Imagination: Yoga and Non-Violence at the Edge of the World" by Michael Stone in 21st Century Yoga

Decolonizing Yoga Part 3- Settling Yoga

In writing this four part series on decolonizing yoga, I have to admit that this post is the most emotionally difficult for me to write. So I'll begin by giving a trigger warning: The following exploration of modern hatha yoga's relationship with the settler colonial State discusses settler colonialism's relation with patriarchy, the devaluation of Indigenous women's bodies and the subsequent violence that Indigenous women face. I recognize that I as a white, Canadian settler am implicit in that violence, and I argue that recent developments in North American yoga culture further entrench that system.

Colonialism used and continues to use racism as a means of creating a 'biologized' (and therefore natural) Other that the colonizers need to defend themselves against. It then follows that the death and disappearance of the body of the racialized Other will improve 'our' (the colonizers) everyday lives. In a settler colonial context such as the one we have in North America, aka Turtle Island, Indigenous peoples are the ultimate Other that must be erased in order for the colonizers to settle the land and claim all it's resources. Indigenous bodies become a sort of pollution that the settler colonial society must cleanse itself of, however since outright genocide isn't particularly acceptable, a mass extermination of Indigenous bodies isn't an option that the settler colonial State can consider. Cleansing in seemingly isolated incidents, especially those that often go unreported, such as rape, remains a viable possibility. If it sounds absurd, it's because these stories are routinely brushed under the rug, and even, when the story does make it into the media, there are various racist narratives that settlers can employ to dismiss the case as an isolated incident, such as the recent case of Loretta Saunders' murder (one of over 800 missing and murdered Indigenous women in Canada).

How is this even possible? Settlers, and I include myself in that label, have been taught that the time of Indigenous ways of living are over, and any lasting remnants have no hope of survival. And why bother trying to reverse years of social conditioning to devalue Indigeneity when the whole situation seems hopeless and we as settlers benefit from the violence against Indigenous peoples everyday? Because as Darryl Leroux, Loretta's thesis supervisor, points out this is a pattern of violence that has been going on for far too long: Loretta was dumped in a ditch on the side of a highway in a province that use to pay European settlers for the scalps of Mi'kmaq women, children, and men. The 800+ missing and murdered Aboriginal women in Canada are not isolated incidents, they're part of a larger story that settlers play a direct role in. Settler society needs to change or this pattern will continue. The problem does not lie with the Indigenous peoples, although they certainly experience the affects of settler colonialism, the problem lies with the settlers to who continue to support this system of violence.

So what does yoga have to do with this? In the last fifteen years yoga has become increasingly absorbed into mainstream, settler colonial culture, while simultaneously beginning to reflect the toxic values and norms of settler colonial society, including the devaluation of certain bodies in favor of others. Bodies that conform to the image that has become associated with modern hatha yoga are valued: young, white, able-bodied, cis-gendered, unusually flexible women. These are the bodies that are featured in yoga publications, advertisements, art and viral videos. Anyone who does not fit this narrowly constructed mould does not belong in this exclusive club, regardless of whether or not they would benefit from this practice.

The new image of yoga that has internalized the value system of settler colonialism also perpetuates this system by branding yoga as a product that if bought will make one feel happy and peaceful, and be a better, more likeable person (in addition to skinnier, flexible and more "beautiful"). As such, yoga has become a willing accomplice in perpetuating the capitalist consumer culture that is dependent on extracting resources from stolen indigenous land.

Furthermore, this yoga brand completely excludes any conceptualization of yoga as a practice that can be emotionally difficult, that challenges practitioners to think about death and deal with emotional baggage. No, this yoga brand is a sanitized version of modern hatha yoga, itself a product of British colonialism in India, that contains only the aspects that are nonthreatening to settler colonial narratives. While texts going back as far as the Yoga Sutras acknowledge that the physical body internalizes experiences of trauma and violence, that teaching is ignored by the commercial yoga brand.

Some Indigenous women can pass for white women, and may be skinny and cis-gendered and especially flexible and wear Lululemon pants, I have had these women in my classes, and had they not self-identified to me I would not have known their status. However an externally focused conceptualization of race is an outdated and superficial one that degrades the significance of community ties. Loretta Saunders may look white in the pictures, but she was still an Inuit woman, and the violence she experienced as an Inuit woman is not unusual. So even the Indigenous women who can 'pass' as bodies to be valued in yoga classes will not necessarily find a safe space there. While some teachers are aware of the potential for survivors of trauma to attend their classes, the responses are varied. Some teachers ask for permission before touching their students' bodies, others don't. Some acknowledge that certain poses can stimulate a lot of emotions; others focus entirely on making poses look right.

A decolonized yoga practice cannot be all about what that practice looks like. The emphasis has to be on what that practice feels like. Alignment is important in order ensure students' safety in challenging poses, but equally important is supporting the internal practice, and that practice is for anyone regardless of whether or not settler colonial society values their body or not.  

For more information see

"Settler Colonialism and Carceral Control of Indigenous Mothers and their Children: Child Welfare and the Prison System" by Laura Landertinger (forthcoming)

"On Denialand Distraction: Common Responses to Colonial Violence" by Darryl Leroux

"How Yoga Makes You Pretty: The Beauty Myth, Yoga and Me" by Melanie Klein in 21st Century Yoga

"Questioning the 'Body Beautiful': Yoga, Commercialism and Discernment" by Frank Jude Boccio in 21st Century Yoga

"Retailerslike Lululemon know how to make money: make women feel bad" by Heidi Moore

Yoga PH.D by Carol Horton

"Yoga andDiversity" documentary series by Global Mind Body

Decolonizing Yoga Part 2- Extreme Makeover: Yoga in the British Empire Edition

"The colonial world, is a world divided into compartments" - Franz Fanon  

"Recognizing the radical differences that are part of yoga's history can open up new possibilities beyond the limits of our current conceptual categories." - Carol Horton  

While many teachers and practitioners in the North American yoga scene have a very ahistorical understanding of yoga, learning its history, as Carol Horton points out in her book Yoga PH.D, can reveal how diverse yoga practices have been. It's liberating been liberating for my own personal practice to realize that yoga is so much more than physical exercise.   What is typically practiced in North America, or Turtle Island (to use a pre-colonial name for this land) is an extraordinarily different yoga from the practice Sri Patanjali writes about in the Yoga Sutra, or the practices of the early Hatha yogis during the Tantric (medieval) India. The modern hatha yoga that was exported from India to Turtle Island in the twentieth century came into being during British colonial rule in India, and in many ways modern hatha yoga was a response to British colonization.

When Swami Vivekananda, the man credited with bringing yoga to the West, said that all the mud on the bottom of the Indian Ocean could not balance the filth that had been thrown at India, it was not an exaggeration. In order to justify their colonization of India, the British employed racist and orientalist narratives that created a social, cultural, political and religious hierarchy with European Christians on top, and Indian 'heathens' at the bottom. Years of political, cultural and religious humiliation eventually led a number of Indians, including Swami Vivekananda, Ram Mohan Roy and Mohandas K. Gandhi to adopt a Hindu Nationalist stance.

What's interesting to note, however, is that both the concept of a Hindu and India as a unified nation-State were colonial constructs. India had never been a united country until it was part of the British Empire, and even during British colonialism there were semi-autonomous kingdoms within British India. There was also no mention of Hinduism prior to British colonialism. Hindu was the Persion name for the Indus Valley region (located in present day Pakistan) as well as the people living there. In the eighteenth century, Europeans used the term Hindu to refer to non-Europeans; members of non-Abrahamic religions were termed heathens. Eventually Hindu and heathen merged to refer to anyone who wasn't Muslim, Christian or Jewish.

When European scholars began examining the religious beliefs and practices of 'Hindus' (a homogenization of many, many distinctly different groups) they turned to the beliefs of the Brahmin caste to construct a religion based on a European Judeo-Christian model. As a result, there was a strong emphasis on Sanskrit and yogic texts such as the Bhagavad Gita and the Yoga Sutra were singled out and romanticized by European scholars to be far more influential than they actually were at the time. Traditional Hatha yoga texts and traditions were looked down upon and ostracized by both Brahmins and Europeans, who were not fond of the more violent, ash-covered ascetics. Hatha yoga, a product of the Tantra period, was viewed as source and symbol of India's degeneracy. 

Hindu nationalists such as Swami Vivekananda borrowed from European scholars a romanticized, Brahmin-centered understanding of Hinduism, which they argued was India's greatest strength and made them spiritually superior to Europeans. To reclaim India's glory, Hindus had to return to the Brahmin-centered Raja yoga practices. With this in mind, Swami Vivekananda arrived at the 1893 World Parliament of Religions in Chicago uninvited with two primary goals: To propagate the wisdom of Indian spiritual tradition and to combat the crushing poverty of the Indian people. In India, Vivekananda's ideas were a stark contrast to the colonial narratives being taught in schools that presented Hindus as a weakling race that deserved to be dominated.

In nineteenth century Europe, physical strength was equated with moral and spiritual superiority. In Hindu Nationalist movements physical, bodybuilding activities came to be seen as a way for Indian individuals and society to rise up out of their cultural and political slump and vanquish their European colonizers. Swami Vivekananda was a strong supporter of the physical culture movement in India, arguing that a strong body is essential to achieving enlightenment. With time campaigns of militant physical resistance began to operate out of local gyms, focusing on Indianized forms of exercise that combined yoga asana and pranayama with modern bodybuilding, increasingly referred to as 'yoga'.

The ultimate merging of bodybuilding practices such as Suryanamaskar (sun salutations) with yoga came in the 1930s when Sri Krishnamacharya, a Sanskrit scholar with a particular focus on the Yoga Sutras, was invited to teach at Mysore palace. The physical culture movement had a strong following in Mysore in the 1930s, when Sri Pattabhi Jois and B.K.S. Iyengar studied under Krishnamacharya, and as result the schools of yoga they founded and shared in the West have a strong physical emphasis. Krishnamacharya claimed the hatha yoga he taught to have a direct lineage with the ancient, Raja yoga texts he had studied. This myth that the physical, modern hatha yoga practice spread around the globe by Iyengar and Jois has direct lines back to the Yoga Sutra, or even the Vedas, continues to be prominent today.

The yoga that I teach, that most of us in Turtle Island practice today, is in part a product of British colonialism in India. That is not to say that the yoga we practice isn't yoga or isn't Indian, however there are Orientalist myths that persist in our practice today. We need to decolonize our understanding of Hinduism as a singular tradition and begin to talk about Hinduisms. We need to explore non-Brahmin-centric yoga practices such as traditional Tantric, hatha yoga and pay those traditions the respect we usually save for Raja yoga. We need to realize that Jois and Iyengar are products of a particular time and place, and that their teachings are not ancient, timeless pieces of wisdom. We need to move beyond the binary of everything Eastern being inherently wise, perfect and static and everything Western being devoid of any spiritual knowledge or content. We need to embrace the fact that yoga is and has been many different things to many different people and will continue to shift and change with time.

For more information see

Yoga PH.D. by Carol Horton

Yoga Body  by Mark Singleton

"Orientalism and the Modern Myth of 'Hinduism'" by Richard King

Orientalism and Religion by Richard King

"Ghosts ofYoga's Present and Past" by Prachi Patankar

Decolonizing Yoga Part 1- Decolonizing Yoga or Recolonizing Yoga?

On a rainy April day about a year ago, I was scrolling through Facebook when I came across a page entitled "Decolonizing Yoga". I scrolled through some of their posts, posts about the lack of diversity in yoga studios, posts about how to make yoga more welcoming for larger bodies, posts linking gender/queer and race issues with yoga. I was in love, someone had read my mind and created a blog voicing all the things I kept bottled up inside me every time I went to go teach a yoga class. And it has the word decolonize in the title, one of my primary academic intersts. What more could I possibly want from a blog?

           

An acknowledgement of ongoing settler colonialism in North America, aka Turtle Island, would be nice.  

Don't get me wrong, it's been a year, and Decolonizing Yoga is still my favorite yoga blog out there. As a yoga teacher who firmly supports the growing yoga and diversity movement, Decolonizing Yoga is a fantastic resource. However, it seems to me that a self-proclaimed movement called Decolonizing Yoga based in Turtle Island that to date has no posts on the issues specifically faced by Native American and Aboriginal peoples is missing something important.

That's not to say that "Decolonizing Yoga" doesn't address issues of colonialism and attempt to decolonize yoga. There are multiple experiences of colonialism. People in India experienced one form of colonialism (white people came in, took over administration, screwed things up and left), while the many different African peoples who were brought to the Americas as slaves experienced another form of colonialism (white people took them away from their homelands and continues to screw them over while acting like everything is cool). "Decolonizing Yoga" does address those experiences and how they relate to the modern, North American yoga culture.

There is however, a third experience of colonialism: Settler colonialism. In settler colonialism, indigenous peoples have their land taken and occupied by settlers (who do not have to be of European descent) who create a new society on the stolen land. In order to support the project of settler colonialism, Indigenous nations must be eliminated through genocide, containment and assimilation. The mere existence of indigenous peoples is counterproductive to the colonial project. The poverty of Indigenous peoples in Turtle Island is a deliberate part of settler colonialism. Ongoing environmental degradation is a deliberate part of settler colonialism. The estimated 800+ missing and murdered Indigenouswomen is a result of the deliberate use of patriarchy in settler colonialism. Settler colonialism in Turtle Island isn't just a thing of the past, settler colonialism, as one of my professors, Scott Morgenson puts it, is happening right here, right now.

In the year that I've been following "Decolonizing Yoga" there has only been one Facebook post that has anything to do with settler colonialism: A mixtape on soundcloud featuring indigenous artists. Not a single blog post or shared article that directly addresses settler colonialism. I have a problem with that. As a yoga teacher in Kingston ON, I have had more students identify to me as being or having Indigenous heritage (which is ultimately determined by the government) than I have had of other visible minority demographics combined. Where are my students and their experiences of racism, colonialism and oppression in "Decolonizing Yoga"? Erased.

It's not unusual for Indigenous peoples and their experiences of settler colonialism to be missing in social justice circles as Bonita Lawrence and Enakshi Dua describe:

"Settler states in the Americas are founded on, and maintained through, policies of direct extermination, displacement, or assimilation. The premise of each is to ensure that Indigenous peoples ultimately disappear as peoples, so that settler nations can seamlessly take their place. Because of the intensity of genocidal policies that Indigenous people have faced and continue to face, a common error on the part of antiracist and postcolonial theorists is to assume that genocide has been virtually complete, that Indigenous peoples, however unfortunately, have been 'consigned to the dustbin of history" (Spivak, 1994) and no longer need to be taken into account. Yet such assumptions are scarcely different from settler nation-building myths, whereby "Indians" become unreal figures, rooted in the nation's prehistory, who died out and no longer need to be taken seriously.

"Being consigned to a mythic past or "the dustbin of history" means being precluded from changing and existing a real people in the present. It also means being denied even the possibility of regenerating nationhood. If Indigenous nationhood is seen as something of the past, the present becomes a site in which Indigenous peoples are reduced to small groups of racially and culturally defined and marginalized individuals drowning in a sea of settlers-- who needn't be taken seriously."

Decolonization in a settler colonial context, such as the one we have here in Turtle Island, cannot ignore Indigenous peoples or their experiences. Decolonization in Turtle Island cannot be reduced to a metaphor for generalized anti-oppression movements. It needs to take Indigenous nationhood seriously; it needs to be unsettling for settlers regardless of whether they're white, black, brown or purple. Unfortunately, "Decolonizing Yoga" fails to do both.

Yoga has come into contact with multiple forms of colonialism, therefore if yoga is to be decolonized that decolonization needs to address multiple experiences of colonialism. In this series of posts I will be exploring what a more holistic view of what decolonizing yoga could look like. In Part 2 Extreme Makeover: Yoga in the British Empire Edition I examine how British colonialism in India influenced yoga. In Part 3 Settling Yoga, I explore settler colonialism further and examine how yoga has become complicit with ongoing settler colonialism. In the final part Yoga as an Unsettling Practice I explore some of the potential ways yoga can help the decolonization process.

For more information check out  

"Decolonizing Antiracism" by Bonita Lawrence and Enakshi Dua

"In Canadaevery system of oppression is organized around settler colonialism" an interview with Harshia Walia

"The Biopolitics of Settler Colonialism: Right Here, Right Now" by Scott Morgenson

"Decolonization is not a metaphor" by Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang

"Why theterm settler needs to stick" by Corey Snelgrove and Klara Woldenga

"I am not a nation-State" by Leanne Simpson

A Dialogue on Yoga and Orientalism (part 2)

The following dialogue takes place between a Patanjali yoga Teacher, Vidya, and a student, Brahmari.

Part 1

Part 2

V: What are your thoughts now, Brahmari, is Orientalism something that we have moved beyond or is it something that continues today?

B: I went back and read through Orientalism again, and it seems that Orientalism, according to Said, is an ongoing project, because although European colonialism has formally ended, NATO nations maintain an imperial influence over the former colonial world[1].

V: How then are Orientalist discourses perpetuated today?

B: Mostly through media and popular culture. For example, Said argues that Western media largely ignores the Orient except to portray Orientals in a negative light, usually as terrorists or helpless victims of patriarchal societies, natural disasters and disease[2]. In popular culture, Said says Orientals are typically portrayed as "oversexed, degenerate...cleverly devious intrigues, but essentially sadistic, treacherous, low"[3].

V: Do you think Orientalism continues to influence how popular culture portrays Hindu images?

B: Absolutely, an obvious example is the film "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom". The majority of the film takes place in 1935 Northern India. Indiana Jones and company crash a plane in the Himalayas and are immediately assumed by the local Hindus to be saviors sent by Shiva. Already one can see the Orientalist power relationship between the Occident and the Orient being utilized by the filmmakers. Considering that during 1935 India's fight for independence was in full force it is highly unlikely that a group of foreigners would be perceived as being God-sent.

B: Further misrepresentations of Hindus are present during the banquet scene, when Indiana Jones and company are served dishes such as baby snakes, human eyeballs and monkey brains. Snakes, monkeys and eyes are all sacred icons in Hinduism, but this is ignored in favor of establishing Hindus as barbaric Heathens. The portrayal of the goddess Kali as a bloodthirsty demoness further engrains the portrayal of Hindus as barbaric Heathens. This portrayal of Kali is also highly inaccurate and ignores the sophistication of her iconography. During the first sacrificial scene in which the audience witnesses a Hindu being sacrificed to Kali, the nameless Hindu is portrayed as small, and skinny, praying to Shiva to save him. The image contrasts Indiana Jones' portrayal as the rational, brave, active Occidental hero. As the priest, Mola Ram, shows the heart he has removed from the (still living) victim's chest to the masses of followers the audience sees masses of faceless Hindus waving their arms and beating drums. As Said note: "the [Oriental] is always shown in large numbers. No individuality, no personal characteristics or experiences. Most of the pictures represent mass rage and misery or irrational...gestures"[4]. While Temple of Doom takes place in a Hindu region of India, many of the background characters portrayed are dressed in more Islamic styles, further perpetuating the idea that all Orientals are the same.

V: While the Indiana Jones films are classics and certainly perpetuate Orientalist stereotypes, on some level the audience knows that what they are watching is not a reflection of reality. Can you think of any more subtle expressions of Orientalism present in today's popular culture?

B: The other day I saw former Disney channel star, Selena Gomez's music video for her song "Come and Get It" playing on a TV that was for sale. While it is less blatantly disrespectful than the Indian Jones example, the song and music video rely heavily on Orientalist assumptions. For example, the song relies heavily on the use of technology to create the overall texture of the song, but underneath the dense sound of technology, is an Indian tabla drum, which creates the beat. The tabla gives this otherwise unremarkable, if catchy, pop song an exotic flavor. Coupled with the sexual lyrics the song relies on the listener's Orientalist samskaras to reinforce the idea in our minds that this song is exotic and erotic due to its Oriental flavors. While promoting the song Selena, a half Caucasian half Latina American, wore a variety of colorful, sparkly bindis while performing the song on television.

V: What is the significance of the bindi?

B: Traditionally the bindi is representative of the third eye chakra, one of the major energy centres located in between the eyebrows. The bindi is reminiscent of the Hindu god Shiva, as well as the goddess Shakti. The bindi is also indicative of a woman's marital status and it also indicates that the wearer is committed to her Hindu beliefs[5]. Selena Gomez is not married, she is not Hindu and the lyrical content of the song is more appropriate for the sacral chakra than the third eye chakra. Instead Gomez is using the bindi to appear more erotic without upsetting her Disney channel fan base by channeling an Oriental persona. She has created her own meaning, her own significance for the bindi, one that is completely detached from the significance it traditionally holds in Hindu culture.

V: The argument can be made, however, that the bindi is now detached from its traditional meaning in India as well, it has become more of a fashion accessory than a religious icon[6]. Why does it matter that Gomez is wearing a bindi?

B: The meaning that Gomez creates for the bindi when she wears it to perform "Come and Get It" is very different than the meaning that is attributed to Hindu Non-Resident Indians (NRI) in the West. On Selena the bindi is cool and sexy, but on an NRI woman it is a sign of failed assimilation, it brings to mind the image of the immigrant who is 'fresh off the boat' and inherently backwards. The colonial and Orientalist samskara that 'they' (the Orientals) need to become more like 'us' (the Occidentals) in order to develop as a civilization is still present in our minds. Gomez is associated with Disney, a company that embodies Occidental ideals, and therefore she can adopt the bindi and all it's Orientalist associations without demeaning herself, while a Hindu NRI woman must adopt Western dress and practices in order to experience the same level of respect in society in general. While there are exceptions, by and large North American and European culture demands that immigrants conform with cultural norms in order to be accepted, and the bindi does not fit into that cultural norm.

V: How do you feel when you see instances of ongoing Orientalism?

B: I feel very uneasy. I have an enormous amount of respect for the beliefs and the culture and that is not represented in Orientalist discourses. Orientalism tends to not only be inaccurate but also degrading and dominating. To see that Orientalism is ongoing implies that the corresponding colonial power relationships are also ongoing. It implies that the West is still a colonizing force, and so long as that persists there will be enormous inequity. The British wanted India's natural resources, and so took them by force, justifying it with the lies one finds in Orientalism. We still use those lies, but instead now we are taking what we want out of India's cultural knowledge and iconography and using them how we want.

V: Would you define what is happening here as cultural appropriation?

B:  Yes, Selena Gomez is absolutely appropriating the bindi in her performances. The main thing I struggle to comes to terms with in regards to cultural appropriation is this sense that only the more dominant group can appropriate cultural products, when technically cultural appropriation can go both ways.

V: While this may be true, ongoing Orientalism and colonial power relationships shape any kind of cultural exchange that occurs between India and the West. Specifically, your initial concern about Lululemon's Brahmacharya bag is about a Canadian clothing company appropriating the Hindu cultural concept of Brahmacharya and recreating it in its own image. Very clearly this is an instance of cultural appropriation.

B: I can see how ongoing Orientalism is insulting, but stealing on such a large scale? It does not seem that simple when one takes into account the history of Hindu Nationalism.

V: How so?

B: Hindu Indians such as Ram Mohan Roy, Swami Vivekananda and Mohandas K. Gandhi used Orientalist discourses that romanticize the Orient to justify a Hindu Nationalist movement based on the supremacy of Hinduism[7]. In the Hindu Swaraj, Gandhi repeatedly refers to how India's (Hindu Brahmin) ancestors had the foresight and wisdom to predict many of the pitfalls of Europeans' concepts of modernization, civilization and development and forge a different path. Instead, Gandhi argues for a dharma-based concept of the civilization, in which morality and self-control are the measurements of success[8]. In justifying his conceptualization of civilization he relies on the accounts of British Orientalist writers to justify the superiority of Indian Hindu culture over all other cultures, saying, "If this definition be correct, then India, as so many British writers have shown, has nothing to learn from anybody else"[9]. Years later he goes on to say "that the Europeans themselves will have to remodel their outlook if they are not to perish under the weight of the comforts to which they are becoming slaves"[10]. Not only does Hindu Brahmin India have the greatest cultural base for a thriving civilization, but the Occident would be advised to adopt the system Gandhi is arguing for as well. Gandhi is not the only Hindu Nationalist to argue that Hinduism and yoga are India's greatest goods to export; most notably Swami Vivekananda made similar arguments. Swami Vivekananda re-imagined Hinduism and yoga in an Orientalist-inspired, Hindu Nationalist vein, one that rejected the hatha yoga tradition that fuelled Orientalist heathen stereotypes, and exported it to North America and Europe[11]. If Vivekananda wanted to, in some respects, export religious and spiritual practices to the West, then not only is he countering Orientalist/colonial power dynamics, but he is inviting non-Indians to engage with these cultural beliefs and practices; therefore, it cannot by definition be appropriation. These religious and cultural ideas i.e. yoga have been freely given, not stolen, asteya. There seems to be, in a sense, a conversion process.

V: Is it a conversion process? Perhaps you can make that argument with Buddhism but Hinduism was never intended as a conversion religion[12].

B: If this huge acceptance of certain Hindu images in Western popular culture is not the result of a conversion process, does that necessarily mean that Hinduism is being appropriated en masse? Is there no middle way in which the popularity of Hindu images and practices is the result of mass appreciation?

V: Appreciation of what? Of a glorified, exotic exercise regime? Or the actual teachings? And which teachings? The ones favored by Orientalist scholars? There is a mass cultural appropriation of Hinduism taking place in the West. Yoga may be appreciated en masse, but most people in the West who practice yoga are not engaging with yoga's background; instead, yoga is being primarily used according to Western cultural norms. That is not to say that all yogis in the West are appropriating yoga, but on a popular culture level, absolutely. How many people who buy Urban Outfitters' Ganesh tapestry, have any clue who Ganesh is and what his significance is? Bhakti art is a fashion accessory in the West; do you see other religion's iconography exploited the same way?

B: People can identify the Buddha, the cross and the Star of David, but Hindu deities are not nearly as well known by name nor are their significance understood, and yet they are easy to purchase.

V: These religions have different relationships with Orientalism than Hinduism. We have proven that Orientalism is not dead and therefore our society's larger cultural attitudes towards Hinduism are still informed by those samskaras. Orientalism gives us the feeling that we have the right to appropriate Hindu icons and concepts and recreate them however we so please. We can glorify them or we can tear them down depending on what we feel like.

B: So the Ganesh tapestry and the Brahmacharya bag are only two visible examples of how these colonial samskaras are still within our minds... 

V: Exactly. Are these samskaras something Sri Patanjali would teach us to stop through our yoga practice?

B: Of course, in the passage you were discussing at the beginning of the lesson Sri Patanjali tells us that Isvara, pure awareness is part of the path to enlightenment and that Isvara is without samskaras. Furthermore, the actions that arise out of these latent impressions are harmful to others. As Said puts it so aptly, "The nexus of knowledge and power creating 'the Oriental' and in a sense obliterating him as a human being is therefore not...an exclusively academic matter. Yet it is an intellectual matter of some obvious importance"[13]. Orientalism deems Hindus as lesser human beings due to the othering of their culture. Not only is that harmful, but it is untruthful as well. Orientalism is also contributing to our belief that we in the West have the right to continue acting like our colonizer forefathers did. We believe that we have the right to take what we want from other people and use it as we please, that is stealing, and it is stealing based on greed and possesiveness. That is four of the five yamas or self-restraints broken, and considering the relationship between Orientalism and eroticism it is not a stretch to believe that the fifth yama, brahmacharya is also threatened. More importantly than that Orientalism forces us to perceive the world and the people in it incorrectly, it allows our minds to turn things around. If the goal of yoga is to stop the mind from turning, we need to combat our internalized Orientalism and our internalized experiences of colonialism, which in the West put us on a false pedestal. That is our yoga today in the West.

V: How are we to do that?

B: Sri Patanjali identifies a number of practices to engage in to work towards Isvara, among them beginning to discern between correct perceptions and the mind turning, good actions or karma through the practice of the yamas and niyamas, in addition to the external work of the asanas and pranayams etc.

V: What Sri Patanjali describes in the Yoga Sutras is how to engage in a process of 'unlearning', which is what Said himself calls for[14]. In place of all the samskaras which we are 'unlearning' Said urges us to search out alternative, nonrepressive and nonmanipulative perspectives to Orientalism[15]. Living a life according to the yamas and niyamas forces us to do just that while also furthering us along the path to enlightenment.

B: Said also notes though that, in his words, "One would have to rethink the whole complex problem of knowledge and power,"[16]. Is that not extreme?

V: Inspired by the Upanisads to question the power relations laid out in the Vedas and challenge our understanding of the world, is that not the lineage of our practice?

B: It is.

V: Then perhaps Patanjali yoga is extreme, but the ongoing effects of Orientalism and colonialism are also extreme and stretch far beyond the issue of cultural appropriation of Hindu images. That is why we need to practice yoga.

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[1] Said, Edward. 1978. Orientalism: Western Conceptions of the Orient. London: Penguin Press. p. 285

[2] Ibid. p. 286

[3] Ibid. p. 286-7

[4]  Ibid. p. 287

[5] Antony, Mary Grace. 2010. 'On the Spot: Seeking Acceptance and Expressing Resistance through the Bindi.' Journal of International and Intercultural Communication. 3(4): 346-368 (http://journals1.scholarsportal.info/show_html.xqy?uri=/17513057/v03i0004/346_otssaaerttb.xml&school=queens).

[6] Ibid.

[7] King, Richard. 1999. 'Orientalism and the Modern Myth of "Hinduism"." Numen. 46(2): 146-185. p. 151

[8] Gandhi, Mohandas K. 1909. Hind Swaraj. Ahmedabad: Navjivan, p. 65

[9] Ibid.

[10] Ibid. p. 66

[11] Singleton, Mark. 2010. Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice. Oxford: Oxford UP. p. 42

King, Richard. 1999. 'Orientalism and the Modern Myth of "Hinduism"." Numen. 46(2): 146-185. p. 160

[12] Rodrigues, Hillary. 2006. Hinduism the eBook: An Online Introduction. Journal of Buddhist Ethics. p. 463-464

[13] Said, Edward. 1978. Orientalism: Western Conceptions of the Orient. London: Penguin Press. p. 27

[14] Ibid. p. 28

[15] Ibid. p. 24

[16] Ibid.