David Cameron, Prime Minister of UK,
Racism is still alive and well in Oxford, UK. Let the statues of Cecil Rhodes and William Jones in Oxford fall to demonstrate that UK is NOW serious about enforcing the UK's Race Relations Act, after 50 years.
S.Kalyanaraman
Sarasvati Research Center
It was racism at Oxford, not a statue, that made me buckle
Victoria PrincewillYes, the statue of Cecil Rhodes must fall. But I was a black student at the university, and I know tackling prejudice has to go beyond that
Cecil Rhodes on Oriel College in Oxford. ‘The trickle-down effect of imperialist culture, from its celebrated history to its quiet present, is more oppressive than its symbols.’ Photograph: The Independe/REX/Shutterstock
Tuesday 22 December 2015 15.13 GMT
It was a work colleague who first said that he was surprised to hear I had gone to Oxford because I was black. While I had encountered similar reactions before, this was the first time it had been stated so explicitly. The notion that “black” and “Oxbridge” don’t mix is one that seems to go largely unquestioned.
When I heard of the #RhodesMustFall movement in Oxford, it was from an enthusiastic academic urging me to show my support. Rhodes Must Fall is a protest movement that began in the University of Cape Town in South Africa, directing its attention towards the removal of a Cecil Rhodes statue on the campus. It has since gathered momentum within South Africa, and throughout the world. Its intention being to decolonise education, it has largely focused on removing statues and plaques in university spaces that commemorate colonial history. It is a progressive step and an important one – distancing ourselves from the brutality and evil that was colonialism is an action well overdue.
But the imperialist structure is not confined to physical structures. As a minority in Oxford, I did not buckle under the oppressive weight of history that took form in the monuments to historical figures. In an English class our tutor followed a discussion of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness with a video of a comedian speaking with a distinctive Indian accent. After everybody in the room laughed except me, the comedian on the video then explained why to laugh was to mock the Indian individual, at which point everyone in our class proceeded to get angry. I buckled then, sitting silently as a class of opinionated white students declared the racism in Conrad’s novel unworthy of discussion, and derided the comedian’s comments: unconscious bigotry was unworthy of reflection.
A black Rhodes scholar recently wrote an article about his minority experience at Oxbridge. It involved being repeatedly questioned when walking the college grounds and being mistaken for a construction worker on many occasions. When I posted his article to my Facebook page, a former Oxford student of mixed heritage described an experience where she entered a student bar and was immediately dismissed as a potential employee, vying for a chance to serve the students of Oxford.
These are not isolated experiences. I have heard many others, casually relayed as anecdotes by black students. To be mistaken as an employee, to be deemed as something other than a student, is incredibly common for a minority. #RhodesMustFall will do a lot of noisy and symbolic things – but the removal of a plaque or a monument honouring a brutal imperialist won’t insulate minorities from this quieter, more insidious form of imperialism.
Allow me to spell out clearly what these everyday experiences mean. They say repeatedly that Oxford is an institution that accepts a certain calibre of people, and that black people are not intrinsically of that calibre. Blackness is not associated with intellect. More important, blackness is at odds with intellect. Blackness is associated with servitude and thus, upon entering predominantly white establishments, black people are expected to fit into those very roles.
One of the #RhodesMustFall campaigners stated: “There’s a violence to having to walk past the statue every day on the way to your lectures.” But violence is not the only form of oppression. The trickle-down effect of imperialist culture, from its celebrated history to its quiet present, is more oppressive than its symbols. It is more oppressive because the subtlety of its prevalence garners plausible deniability, because unconscious bias and unthinking generalisations are harder to prove and explain. It is easier to dismantle something on the grounds that it is evil in an environment where people strive to be good. It is much harder to tell people who strive to be good that their actions, thoughts and intentions facilitate oppression.
So let the statue fall. But insist that racial prejudice follow. The two movements need not be in competition; we can easily spread our focus. But it needs to be done, and imminently, otherwise Rhodes may fall, but racism will thrive.
http://tinyurl.com/hwc2fwn
Remove William Jones plaque in Oxford Chapel. It is time to revamp history distortions.
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Oxford asked to remove the offending panel depicting William Jones and three Indian scholars
University College, Oxford asked to remove the offending panel depicting William Jones and three Indian scholars
By Kalyanaraman
William Jones' third discourse published in 1798 with the famed "philologer" passage is often cited as the beginning of comparative linguistics and Indo-European studies. Indo-European is a family of languages that by 1000 BC were hypothesised as spoken throughout Europe and in parts of southwestern and southern Asia.This is his
quote, claiming to establish a "tremendous" find in the history of linguistics:
The Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have spring from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists. (Sir William Jones, Supreme Court Judge of the British East India Company, 1786, Singer 1972, 29)...
On 27 April 1794 Jones died at Calcutta in the forty-eighth year of his age, and was buried there... the directors of the East IndiaCompany showed their sense of his services by the erection of a monument to him in St. Paul's Cathedral. His wife also placed a monument to his memory, executed by Flaxman (1796-1798), in the
ante-chapel of University College, Oxford.
http://www.eliohs.unifi.it/testi/700/jones/Jones_DNB_article.html
Let us take a look at this Oxford memorial monument. Why is Jones shown in a skull-cap of the type worn by a Pope?Click
To justify the depiction of the marble frieze in a chapel?
Arindam Chakrabarti, Professor of Philosophy, University of Hawaii, brought to Rajiv Malhotra's attention a colonial wall carving in Oxford which blatantly boasts of the intellectual conquest of Sanskrit by the British.
There is a monument to Sir William Jones, the great eighteenth-century British Orientalist, in the chapel of University College, Oxford. This
marble frieze shows Sir William sitting on a chair writing something down on a desk while three Indian traditional scholars squatting in front of him are either interpreting a text orcontemplating or reflecting on some problem.
It is well known that for years Jones sat at the feet of learned pandits in India to take lessons in Sanskrit grammar, poetics, logic, jurisprudence, and metaphysics. He wrote letters home about howfascinating and yet how complex and demanding was his new learning of these old materials. But this sculpture shows – quite realistically –the Brahmins sitting down below on the floor, slightly crouching and bare-bodied – with no writing implements in their hands (for they knew by heart most of what they were teaching and did not need notes orprinted texts!) while the overdressed Jones sits imperiously on a
chair writing something at a table. The inscription below hails Jones as the "Justinian of India" because he "formed" a digest of Hindu and
Mohammedan laws. The truth is that he translated and interpreted into English a tiny tip of the massive iceberg of ancient Indian
Dharmashastra literature along with some Islamic law books. Yet the monument says and shows Jones to be the "law-giver," and the "native
informer" to be the "receiver of knowledge."
What this amply illustrates is that the semiotics of colonial encounters have – perhaps indelibly – inscribed a profound asymmetry of epistemic prestige upon any future East-West exchange of knowledge.
(Arindam Chakrabarti, "Introduction," Philosophy East & West Volume 51, Number 4 October 2001 449-451.)
See also: Teltscher;and Kate, 1995, India Inscribed : European And British Writing On India 1600 – 1800, Figure 6. Memorial to Sir
William Jones by John Flaxman (1796-8), University College, Oxford.203, New Delhi, Oxford University Press.
It took Rajiv Malhotra nearly two years to locate the marble frieze in a chapel at Oxford, which he had to personally visit to see and then to go through a bureaucratic quagmire to get the picture of it. RajivMalhotra notes: [quote] The picture symbolizes how academic Indians
today often remain under the glass ceiling as "native informants" of the Westerners. Yet in 19th century Europe, Sanskrit was held in great
awe and respect, even while the natives of India were held in contempt or at best in a patronizing manner as children to be raised into their
master's advanced "civilization." [unquote]
Is the display in the chapel of the University College, Oxford a true depiction of William Jones in his true colours – as an evangelist?[quote] The Bible Is a Wonderful Book because of its literary characteristics. It contains the highest literature of the world. It appeals to the aesthetic and intellectual as well as moral and spiritual faculties... Sir William Jones sums it all up in the following beautiful eulogy: "The Scriptures contain, independently of a divine origin, more true sublimity, more exquisite beauty, purer morality, more important history, and finer strains both of poetry and eloquence, than could be collected, within the same compass, from all other books that were ever composed in any age or in any idiom."[unquote] Click
In the face of this monument, Jones' eulogy on Sanskrit sounds hollow.Maybe, the scholars who participated in conferences held in Calcutta and Pune in April, 1994 to mark the bicentenary of his death did not
know that this eulogy was only a camouflage for the depiction of a supreme court judge sitting on a high chair and three indian scholars sitting at his feet. The eulogy of Sanskrit didn't last long in the eurocentric studies called IE linguistics with the invention of a hypothetical PIE with *.
The authorities of University College, Oxford should: 1) apologise to Indians for this gross, humiliating, insulting representation of
Indian scholars, on a monument displayed on the walls of the College chapel; and 2) remove the offending marble frieze from display.Note: I had posted this on July 18, 2005. I am reposting this in the context of a post made reproducing an article by Sistla Lakshmipathy Sastry on Reconstruction of Indian History. http://bharatkalyan97.blogspot.com/2014/09/reconstruction-of-indian-history-sistla.html
University College, Oxford asked to remove the offending panel depicting William Jones and three Indian scholars
By Kalyanaraman
William Jones' third discourse published in 1798 with the famed "philologer" passage is often cited as the beginning of comparative linguistics and Indo-European studies. Indo-European is a family of languages that by 1000 BC were hypothesised as spoken throughout Europe and in parts of southwestern and southern Asia.This is his
quote, claiming to establish a "tremendous" find in the history of linguistics:
The Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have spring from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists. (Sir William Jones, Supreme Court Judge of the British East India Company, 1786, Singer 1972, 29)...
On 27 April 1794 Jones died at Calcutta in the forty-eighth year of his age, and was buried there... the directors of the East IndiaCompany showed their sense of his services by the erection of a monument to him in St. Paul's Cathedral. His wife also placed a monument to his memory, executed by Flaxman (1796-1798), in the
ante-chapel of University College, Oxford.
http://www.eliohs.unifi.it/testi/700/jones/Jones_DNB_article.html
Let us take a look at this Oxford memorial monument. Why is Jones shown in a skull-cap of the type worn by a Pope?Click
To justify the depiction of the marble frieze in a chapel?
Arindam Chakrabarti, Professor of Philosophy, University of Hawaii, brought to Rajiv Malhotra's attention a colonial wall carving in Oxford which blatantly boasts of the intellectual conquest of Sanskrit by the British.
There is a monument to Sir William Jones, the great eighteenth-century British Orientalist, in the chapel of University College, Oxford. This
marble frieze shows Sir William sitting on a chair writing something down on a desk while three Indian traditional scholars squatting in front of him are either interpreting a text orcontemplating or reflecting on some problem.
It is well known that for years Jones sat at the feet of learned pandits in India to take lessons in Sanskrit grammar, poetics, logic, jurisprudence, and metaphysics. He wrote letters home about howfascinating and yet how complex and demanding was his new learning of these old materials. But this sculpture shows – quite realistically –the Brahmins sitting down below on the floor, slightly crouching and bare-bodied – with no writing implements in their hands (for they knew by heart most of what they were teaching and did not need notes orprinted texts!) while the overdressed Jones sits imperiously on a
chair writing something at a table. The inscription below hails Jones as the "Justinian of India" because he "formed" a digest of Hindu and
Mohammedan laws. The truth is that he translated and interpreted into English a tiny tip of the massive iceberg of ancient Indian
Dharmashastra literature along with some Islamic law books. Yet the monument says and shows Jones to be the "law-giver," and the "native
informer" to be the "receiver of knowledge."
What this amply illustrates is that the semiotics of colonial encounters have – perhaps indelibly – inscribed a profound asymmetry of epistemic prestige upon any future East-West exchange of knowledge.
(Arindam Chakrabarti, "Introduction," Philosophy East & West Volume 51, Number 4 October 2001 449-451.)
See also: Teltscher;and Kate, 1995, India Inscribed : European And British Writing On India 1600 – 1800, Figure 6. Memorial to Sir
William Jones by John Flaxman (1796-8), University College, Oxford.203, New Delhi, Oxford University Press.
It took Rajiv Malhotra nearly two years to locate the marble frieze in a chapel at Oxford, which he had to personally visit to see and then to go through a bureaucratic quagmire to get the picture of it. RajivMalhotra notes: [quote] The picture symbolizes how academic Indians
today often remain under the glass ceiling as "native informants" of the Westerners. Yet in 19th century Europe, Sanskrit was held in great
awe and respect, even while the natives of India were held in contempt or at best in a patronizing manner as children to be raised into their
master's advanced "civilization." [unquote]
Is the display in the chapel of the University College, Oxford a true depiction of William Jones in his true colours – as an evangelist?
By Kalyanaraman
William Jones' third discourse published in 1798 with the famed "philologer" passage is often cited as the beginning of comparative linguistics and Indo-European studies. Indo-European is a family of languages that by 1000 BC were hypothesised as spoken throughout Europe and in parts of southwestern and southern Asia.This is his
quote, claiming to establish a "tremendous" find in the history of linguistics:
The Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have spring from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists. (Sir William Jones, Supreme Court Judge of the British East India Company, 1786, Singer 1972, 29)...
On 27 April 1794 Jones died at Calcutta in the forty-eighth year of his age, and was buried there... the directors of the East IndiaCompany showed their sense of his services by the erection of a monument to him in St. Paul's Cathedral. His wife also placed a monument to his memory, executed by Flaxman (1796-1798), in the
ante-chapel of University College, Oxford.
http://www.eliohs.unifi.it/testi/700/jones/Jones_DNB_article.html
Let us take a look at this Oxford memorial monument. Why is Jones shown in a skull-cap of the type worn by a Pope?Click
To justify the depiction of the marble frieze in a chapel?
Arindam Chakrabarti, Professor of Philosophy, University of Hawaii, brought to Rajiv Malhotra's attention a colonial wall carving in Oxford which blatantly boasts of the intellectual conquest of Sanskrit by the British.
There is a monument to Sir William Jones, the great eighteenth-century British Orientalist, in the chapel of University College, Oxford. This
marble frieze shows Sir William sitting on a chair writing something down on a desk while three Indian traditional scholars squatting in front of him are either interpreting a text orcontemplating or reflecting on some problem.
It is well known that for years Jones sat at the feet of learned pandits in India to take lessons in Sanskrit grammar, poetics, logic, jurisprudence, and metaphysics. He wrote letters home about howfascinating and yet how complex and demanding was his new learning of these old materials. But this sculpture shows – quite realistically –the Brahmins sitting down below on the floor, slightly crouching and bare-bodied – with no writing implements in their hands (for they knew by heart most of what they were teaching and did not need notes orprinted texts!) while the overdressed Jones sits imperiously on a
chair writing something at a table. The inscription below hails Jones as the "Justinian of India" because he "formed" a digest of Hindu and
Mohammedan laws. The truth is that he translated and interpreted into English a tiny tip of the massive iceberg of ancient Indian
Dharmashastra literature along with some Islamic law books. Yet the monument says and shows Jones to be the "law-giver," and the "native
informer" to be the "receiver of knowledge."
What this amply illustrates is that the semiotics of colonial encounters have – perhaps indelibly – inscribed a profound asymmetry of epistemic prestige upon any future East-West exchange of knowledge.
(Arindam Chakrabarti, "Introduction," Philosophy East & West Volume 51, Number 4 October 2001 449-451.)
See also: Teltscher;and Kate, 1995, India Inscribed : European And British Writing On India 1600 – 1800, Figure 6. Memorial to Sir
William Jones by John Flaxman (1796-8), University College, Oxford.203, New Delhi, Oxford University Press.
It took Rajiv Malhotra nearly two years to locate the marble frieze in a chapel at Oxford, which he had to personally visit to see and then to go through a bureaucratic quagmire to get the picture of it. RajivMalhotra notes: [quote] The picture symbolizes how academic Indians
today often remain under the glass ceiling as "native informants" of the Westerners. Yet in 19th century Europe, Sanskrit was held in great
awe and respect, even while the natives of India were held in contempt or at best in a patronizing manner as children to be raised into their
master's advanced "civilization." [unquote]
Is the display in the chapel of the University College, Oxford a true depiction of William Jones in his true colours – as an evangelist?
[quote] The Bible Is a Wonderful Book because of its literary characteristics. It contains the highest literature of the world. It appeals to the aesthetic and intellectual as well as moral and spiritual faculties... Sir William Jones sums it all up in the following beautiful eulogy: "The Scriptures contain, independently of a divine origin, more true sublimity, more exquisite beauty, purer morality, more important history, and finer strains both of poetry and eloquence, than could be collected, within the same compass, from all other books that were ever composed in any age or in any idiom."[unquote] Click
In the face of this monument, Jones' eulogy on Sanskrit sounds hollow.
In the face of this monument, Jones' eulogy on Sanskrit sounds hollow.
Maybe, the scholars who participated in conferences held in Calcutta and Pune in April, 1994 to mark the bicentenary of his death did not
know that this eulogy was only a camouflage for the depiction of a supreme court judge sitting on a high chair and three indian scholars sitting at his feet. The eulogy of Sanskrit didn't last long in the eurocentric studies called IE linguistics with the invention of a hypothetical PIE with *.
The authorities of University College, Oxford should: 1) apologise to Indians for this gross, humiliating, insulting representation of
Indian scholars, on a monument displayed on the walls of the College chapel; and 2) remove the offending marble frieze from display.
know that this eulogy was only a camouflage for the depiction of a supreme court judge sitting on a high chair and three indian scholars sitting at his feet. The eulogy of Sanskrit didn't last long in the eurocentric studies called IE linguistics with the invention of a hypothetical PIE with *.
The authorities of University College, Oxford should: 1) apologise to Indians for this gross, humiliating, insulting representation of
Indian scholars, on a monument displayed on the walls of the College chapel; and 2) remove the offending marble frieze from display.
Note: I had posted this on July 18, 2005. I am reposting this in the context of a post made reproducing an article by Sistla Lakshmipathy Sastry on Reconstruction of Indian History. http://bharatkalyan97.blogspot.com/2014/09/reconstruction-of-indian-history-sistla.html