Speaking for Hinduism in the Absence of a Conversation
April 22, 2014
12:24PM
Post by Murali Balaji
In his article in RD last week, Michael Jerryson painted a picture in which Wendy Doniger’s The Hindus— and the fallout from its withdrawal from India—was ushering in a new and “ominous”* era in which religious advocacy groups were trying to exert influence over the academic study of religion. In the piece, Jerryson cited the Hindu American Foundation (HAF) as one of those groups, noting HAF’s Executive Director Suhag Shukla’s critique of an American Academy of Religions (AAR) statement allowing for any interpretation of religion.
Jerryson wrote that “Shukla and the HAF’s stance present several disturbing elements,” citing a supposed mischaracterization of Doniger’s work and Shukla’s take on the academy study of religion, which he called “troublesome.”
Over the past week, Jerryson and I engaged via email. Our correspondences were cordial, but I think it’s safe to say that we agree to disagree, both on his interpretation of HAF’s critique of Doniger and AAR, as well as his own understanding of the politics of academic study of religion.
On the first matter, much has already been said about The Hindus. HAF—as well as a number of Doniger’s academic colleagues, including those who are active in AAR—had substantive issues with her scholarship, including her use of psychoanalysis (long considered a pseudoscience), her misinterpretation of key texts, and an unusually high number of factual inaccuracies (by some independent estimates, up to 500 errors). Doniger had every right to publish her book, and like every academic work, it will have its supporters and detractors. However, by dismissing her intellectual critics outright and not fully explaining the inaccuracies of her book, Doniger did a fundamental disservice to the nature of academic discourse.
http://www.religiondispatches.org/dispatches/guest_bloggers/7806/speaking_for_hinduism_in_the_absence_of_a_conversation/
