Houston college in US defends course on Hinduism, says it values ‘tutorial freedom’

This comes after a scholar of the College of Houston reportedly objected to the content material of the course, calling it ‘Hinduphobic’, in line with an India At the moment report.

The College’s response

The College of Houston has defended its course titled ‘Lived Hindu Faith’, saying that “the course is grounded within the tutorial self-discipline of spiritual research, which makes use of particular terminology — akin to ‘fundamentalism’ –as analytical instruments to know non secular actions throughout traditions, together with these rooted in Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism.”

Explaining what may have led to a misunderstanding, the college added that “these tutorial phrases can carry completely different meanings from how they’re utilized in public or political discourse, which generally results in misunderstandings.”

The college additionally mentioned in a press release that it doesn’t sometimes overview particular person lectures and permits school to discover advanced and generally difficult subjects of their instructing. “Whereas UH doesn’t sometimes overview particular person lectures, the college maintains oversight of the curriculum to make sure it meets established tutorial and pedagogical requirements,” it mentioned, in line with a information company ANI report.

The college’s assertion is available in response to a scholar criticism in opposition to the course. Following the criticism, the college’s dean and the director of spiritual research reviewed the issues and mentioned them with the teacher, the ANI report added.

What the professor mentioned

The course which is within the heart of the controversy, titled ‘Lived Hindu Faith’, is being taught by Professor Aaron Michael Ullrey. He has responded to the criticism of his instructing of the course by means of the assertion accessed by ANI, which quotes him as saying, “The essence of this course’s methodology is to make use of descriptive anthropology moderately than any prescriptive theology. All through the course, my purpose is to point out the sophistication, rationality, and historic complexity of the various religions deemed Hindu all through the historical past of South Asia. I by no means declared something to be the essence of Hinduism, which might not solely contradict the course however would additionally contradict my very own analysis and instructing over the past 25 years.”

He additionally added that his a number of statements have been taken out of context and even debunked some reviews that quoted him as saying – “Hinduism … was not an historical, lived custom however a colonial assemble, a political instrument weaponized by Hindu nationalists, and a system of oppression in opposition to minorities.”

To this, he mentioned, “I didn’t say something like this. I by no means confer with Hinduism as something important.”

Shedding extra mild on the course and the way it focuses on the origin of the Hindu faith, the professor mentioned, “the religions who worship the Hindu gods are historical, which I be aware typically within the class, and I deal with historical South Asia and its premodern Hinduisms for greater than half the category; the course traces religions who revere Hindu gods again to the earliest scriptures in 1500 BCE, noting that these gods’ worship predates these historical texts, and explores the event of rituals and mythologies from that historical interval into the current.”

“Any declaration that I say “Hinduism” shouldn’t be historical is fake. Actually, the video that has been shared extracted a quote from a small part on political Hinduism, introduced alongside 25 different facets of Hinduism; all of that is to show that anybody declaration of Hinduism, as discovered within the quote beginning “Hinduism…,” is to not be accepted,” he added.

The controversy

The controversy across the course and its content material erupted after a political science scholar of UH, Vasant Bhatt, accused it of being ‘Hinduphobic’ and “distorting India’s political panorama”. “Hinduism, in line with Professor Ullrey, was not an historical, lived custom however a colonial assemble, a political instrument weaponised by Hindu nationalists, and a system of oppression in opposition to minorities,” Vasant Bhatt instructed India At the moment.

HT.com couldn’t independently confirm the claims.

Vasant Bhatt had lodged a criticism earlier than the dean of the Faculty of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences which presents the course.