Indian Culture in the US
by Arnold Perey
New York: How is it possible
for people of different backgrounds to see one another with respect and
not with contempt? Aesthetic Realism, the philosophy founded in 1941 by Eli Siegel, the great American critic, poet, and social scientist, is the
means for this. The honest respect for people that Aesthetic Realism describes
is needed sorely in the world now.
In this article, I explain how such
respect is encouraged in students as I teach cultural anthropology - just
as it is encouraged in me, in my study of Aesthetic Realism. Since 1970,
I have used the Aesthetic Realism Teaching Method to teach about the world's
cultures, including the culture of India, which I have studied for years.
And the question always is: How can the traditional culture of any nation
be taught in the classroom so that the students and the teacher see how
people far away, or of a different background are related to oneself?
The Aesthetic Realism teaching method is used by teachers in New York City public schools to teach every subject
with great success - from kindergarten mathematics to high school English.
The fundamental idea on which it is based is the following, by Eli Siegel: "The purpose of all education is to like the world through knowing it."
This statement says the deep reason for teaching the facts of every subject
is in order for students to see more meaning in the world, not less; and
become truly kinder. It is what every parent, teacher and student is hoping
for. And the principle which enables one to see that meaning is this: "The
world, art. and self explain each other," Mr. Siegel stated, "each is the
aesthetic oneness of opposites."
The opposites that are often not
seen fairly as one teaches about another culture are sameness and difference. In the examples I give now, however, we will see some
instances of how the sameness, and the difference, of India and the US
can be looked at in a fair way. And the result is more respect, greater
knowledge and kindness.
Liking the World: India and New York
A staple, constantly recurring thing
in anthropology is that people find a sacred meaning in objects. The religions
most Americans grow up in, Christianity and Judaism, are monotheistic.
I grew up thinking that God seen as one is the only sensible way
of seeing divinity. Immediately this makes less of the religions of millions
of people. I remember scarcely being able to conceal my disbelief and even
disdain when I was told in New Guinea about a spirit whose dwelling place
was a large tree.
Though seeing divinity in objects
can be misused to serve oneself, the deepest purpose for it is explained
by Eli Siegel in his "Outline of Aesthetic Realism" under the heading "Religion
Likes the Cause of the World": "The tendency of all religion is to see
something of a personal cause for the world." In village India, there are
small trees where little food offerings are made, to show love for the
immortal personal spirit within the tree, representing the cause of the
world. A stone outside a village may be anointed with oil, an offering
to the spirit within.
I learned from Eli Siegel to present
a custom of a people far away and ask the class if they have anything like
it in their own lives. "What do you feel that is like loving a spirit within
a stone in India?" A person may wear a good luck charm or a religious ornament.
There are many: the rabbit's foot, or mojo, has an African origin. A silver
Hand of Fatima pendant is of Moslem origin. A cross, or the Hebrew letters
CHAI in gold, around one's neck, also symbolize loving the cause of the
world. And people have talked to plants. People have even made offerings,
in desperation, to a car that wouldn't start. In each instance, a force
or personality deep in reality is seen as somehow in the object. Its meaning
goes beyond the metal, stone, plastic, or fur that it is made of. This
is evidence that people everywhere want to find meaning in the world, to
Totem and taboo are pervasive anthropological
opposites. The totem is the loved thing; the taboo, the feared thing. We
call it "forbidden" or "in bad taste" or say "What will the neighbors think?"
while the Polynesians call it "taboo."
The cow is a loved thing in India,
is sacred. To respect people's minds, we have to seek out the cause.
The cow is a oneness of economic
utility and a gentle and generous animal that can be cared for. In his
article "Mother Cow" (Anthropology 81/82, Annual Editions), anthropologist
Marvin Harris shows that cows, wandering everywhere in India, eat waste
like rice straw and husks; they provide bull calves that grow up and plow
the soil; their dung, in a land stripped of trees, is a hot smokeless fuel;
and though half the cows of India give no milk, every farmer prays that
rains will come so rich that the cow will grow fat, have a calf, and give
milk - and sometimes that prayer is answered. Cows save energy and food
and do not waste it. "Cow love," Marvin Harris says, "is an active element
in a complex, finely articulated material and cultural order." Seeing this
makes for more respect for the people of India. It is important to increase
respect for how a foreign people feels about and uses the world we are
all born into.
Caste, and Our Contempt
Eli Siegel has given this definition
of contempt: "There is a disposition in every person to think he will be
for himself by making less of the outside world."
Throughout anthropology people lessen
one another to feel important. American Indians showed contempt for the
enemy. Insults are given in New Guinea between villages. According to Ashley
Montagu in Man: His First Two Million Years, "Many tribes call themselves
... 'we-are-men,' implying that all others are not."
I want my students to see that ordinary
contempt, including theirs, is what has hurt humanity for centuries and
is hurting America now.
Every person knows something about
the caste system. Students in a class I taught pointed out that it is a
system of superiority and inferiority in which contempt for people is organized.
It also has to do with color. Edward B. Tylor, in his classic Anthropology, says, "In the history of the world, colour has often been the sign by which
nations accounting themselves the nobler have marked off their inferiors.
The Sanskrit word for caste is varna, that is, 'colour.'"
A person is born into a caste which,
for most people of India, determines his general occupation and income
level. He can never rise out of it, but can fall from it. The highest castes
are Brahmins, priests; the lowest are servants; and beneath all are the
This situation affects students here
just as much as in India. I encourage students to use this to understand
how they themselves see people who look different, and to ask about their
own daily state of mind. In Self and World, Eli Siegel writes, "We
are looking for contempt at any moment of our lives. Contempt is our soothing
revenge for a world not sufficiently interested, as we see it, in what
we are hoping for. Contempt is not an incident; it is an unintermitting
counteroffensive to an uncaring world." Some questions that arise are:
Do you feel the world is caring or uncaring? Does that affect how you see
A person cannot eat with anyone from
a lower caste. I told my students about a lady who was, many years ago,
degraded from her caste "indelibly" when "a low-caste Rodiya" transferred
something from his mouth to hers. Ernest Crawley tells this in The Mystic
Rose. Each person knows in his or her heart that contempt, regarding
people who are different as inferior, dirty, or repulsive - has been present
in how he perceives and is perceived. I ask, "How many people have felt
they didn't want to be touched by any person in a crowded subway? What
does this stem from?"
Aspects of the caste system, one
student pointed out, are technically illegal in India. But they continue
to exist. In our class discussions we agreed that the reason is, caste
can afford a contempt for the world which people find attractive. It is
the same reason why we have kept the profit system and its injustice. Through
Aesthetic Realism, we can criticize our own contempt, and see what we have
in common with people thousands of miles away. The result is the good will
that the world so urgently needs.
Right of Aesthetic Realism to Be Known,
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