Beyond Hindu and Muslim by Peter Gottschalk

Beyond Hindu and Muslim by Peter Gottschalk

Ethnography about the Arampur Nexus in India, published 2000

“Many Western scholars assume that modern Westerners act out of secular rational concerns while South Asians act under a primary impulse of religious sentiment.  This is a particular feature of “Oriental” thought.” P.12

“As a means of describing (and differentiating) those among them who publicly adopt a religious persona and politically express their religious doctrines and ethics, Westerners increasingly rely on the label ‘fundamentalist.’  This often ill-defined tern becomes synonymous with ‘Pre-Enlightenment’ when applied to those who want to return to an age (as imagined by some) when religious ideology weighed heavily in Western political discourse and public live…”p.13

“Many Westerner categorize residents of the Subcontinent primarily according to their supposed religious identities that are juxtaposed, according to the implicit typology, to the seemingly secular identities of the West…The writers imply that the Hindus and Sikhs who moved into the newly independent India and battled with Muslims immigrating to Pakistan reflect the population of India today—religiously Hindu or Sikh and blinded by anger.” P.13

·      Current scholarship does not express the trend of other identities influencing India because they focus on more extreme viewpoints in the political sphere p.13

“Amplifying this problem is the focus of many contemporary scholars of South Asia on social conflict that has often overlooked how the interests and identities of Hindus and Muslims may intersect and overlap in certain contexts.” P.18

·      While scholars assert that religious tensions in India arose due to colonization, they ignore the fact that there tensions existed before colonization. P.19

“Such arguments, however, ignore evidence from a variety of sources that demonstrates that Western imperialism only aggravated and gave modern shape to religious discrimination that existed long before.” P.19

·      Kabir’s poetry in the Middle Period: Poem about common humanity between Muslims and Hindus

Poem by Kabir:

“It's a heavy confusion.

Veda, Koran, holiness, hell --

who's man? who's woman?

A clay pot shot with air and sperm.

When the pot falls apart, what do you call it?

Numskull! You've missed the point.” 

·      Western view that Muslims were the "perennial outsider” living in India

British drew the land divide between Pakistan and India in 1947:

“Thus, the British intellectually constructed their view of South Asia based on observations that they interpreted according to their preconceptions and agendas and recorded categorically in historiography, ethnography, and statistics.” P.29

Western scholarship on the various approaches to religious identity (p.35):

·      Singular identity approach

·      The conflict approach

·      Historical approach

·      Composite identity approach

·      Multiple group identities

Indian national identity allows for Muslims and Hindus to get along:

Poem by Indian Muslim Muhammad Iqbal (1877-1938):

“Religion does not teach

            being hostile to others.

We are Indian,

            our home is India.” P.64