A History Of The Indian Subcontinent From C. 7000 BCE To CE 1200
A History Of The Indian Subcontinent From C. 7000 BCE To CE 1200
When thinking of India, it is hard not to think of caste. The Vedic hymns of the migrant Aryan tribes are the earliest literary source of information about healing practices in the sub-continent. These hymns provide insights into diseases prevalent during the period and their perceived causes. Most ailments, both physical and mental, were attributed to malevolent spirits and cures consisted of rituals, charms, mantras, medicines and surgical intervention. The hymns in the Atharva Veda, the last of the four Vedas, and largely composed after the Aryans were well settled in the sub-continent, indicate that indigenous non-Aryan healing practices had influenced the Vedic Aryan healers (2).
What most non-Indian people may not know about American Tribal sovereignty is it legally exempts federally-recognized Indian tribes and their tribal lands from many of the local, city, state, federal and international laws and regulations, including some types of taxes, permits and zoning issues that strictly govern most non-Indians, their communities and businesses.
The tendency of modern scholarship of ancient India has been to make the culture, languages and peoples of the region into outsiders, coming fairly late in the ancient historical period. Such new and more scientific evidence shows that the peoples of India can no longer be made into recent immigrants. This makes it very difficult to superimpose their languages or cultures upon them at a late period as well. All these factors are intimately connected to the natural environment and natural history of the region.
To engage students' philosophic imagination-their interest in the world of abstract ideas -we will want to step back from specific historical details about particular Revolutions and, instead, focus on the larger processes and theories that explain those specific historical (or current) events. We might explore how Revolutions work—what narratives, first, do we find in them, and then how we can generalize towards a meta-narrative (connecting separate theories/narratives tied to specific events into a whole).
Reading the book was like a trip down memory lane. This feeling was not because I am fully well versed with Indian history but more because this is written in a style that reminded me of high school history classes. I harboured no special liking for this subject in school and to this day I have no idea how I managed to clear that paper. The dry and factual descriptions in the book brought me back to those soporific afternoon classes…sigh !
When thinking of India, it is hard not to think of caste. The Vedic hymns of the migrant Aryan tribes are the earliest literary source of information about healing practices in the sub-continent. These hymns provide insights into diseases prevalent during the period and their perceived causes. Most ailments, both physical and mental, were attributed to malevolent spirits and cures consisted of rituals, charms, mantras, medicines and surgical intervention. The hymns in the Atharva Veda, the last of the four Vedas, and largely composed after the Aryans were well settled in the sub-continent, indicate that indigenous non-Aryan healing practices had influenced the Vedic Aryan healers (2).
What most non-Indian people may not know about American Tribal sovereignty is it legally exempts federally-recognized Indian tribes and their tribal lands from many of the local, city, state, federal and international laws and regulations, including some types of taxes, permits and zoning issues that strictly govern most non-Indians, their communities and businesses.
The tendency of modern scholarship of ancient India has been to make the culture, languages and peoples of the region into outsiders, coming fairly late in the ancient historical period. Such new and more scientific evidence shows that the peoples of India can no longer be made into recent immigrants. This makes it very difficult to superimpose their languages or cultures upon them at a late period as well. All these factors are intimately connected to the natural environment and natural history of the region.
To engage students' philosophic imagination-their interest in the world of abstract ideas -we will want to step back from specific historical details about particular Revolutions and, instead, focus on the larger processes and theories that explain those specific historical (or current) events. We might explore how Revolutions work—what narratives, first, do we find in them, and then how we can generalize towards a meta-narrative (connecting separate theories/narratives tied to specific events into a whole).
Reading the book was like a trip down memory lane. This feeling was not because I am fully well versed with Indian history but more because this is written in a style that reminded me of high school history classes. I harboured no special liking for this subject in school and to this day I have no idea how I managed to clear that paper. The dry and factual descriptions in the book brought me back to those soporific afternoon classes…sigh !
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