Wulf - Exploring Alterity in a Globalized World

This volume develops a unique framework to understand India through indigenous and European perspectives and examines how it copes with the larger challenges of a globalized world. Through a discussion of religious and philosophical traditions, cultural developments as well as contemporary theatre, films and media, it explores the manner in which India negotiates the trials of globalization. It also focuses upon Indias school and education system, its limitations and successes and how it prepares to achieve social inclusion. The work further shows how contemporary societies in both India and Europe deal with cultural diversity and engage with the tensions between tendencies towards homogenization and diversity.

This eclectic collection on what it is to be a part of global network will be of interest to scholars and researchers of South Asian studies, philosophy, sociology, culture studies and religion.

Christoph Wulf is Professor of Anthropology and Education and a member of the Interdisciplinary Centre for Historical Anthropology and the Graduate School InterArts at Freie Universitt Berlin. Widely published, his books have been translated in more than 15 languages. He is Vice-President of the German Commission for UNESCO. His major research areas include historical and cultural anthropology, educational anthropology, rituals, gestures, emotions, intercultural communication, mimesis and aesthetics.

Edited by Christoph Wulf

First published 2016

by Routledge

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2016 Christoph Wulf

The right of Christoph Wulf to be identified as the author of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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ISBN: 978-1-138-99898-8 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-1-315-65846-9 (ebk)

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CHRISTOPH WULF

Part I
Religion, philosophy and culture

ARCHITA VAJPAYEE AND MATTHIAS SEMMLER

KRISTINA SCHMITZ-VALKENBERG

BHAKTI PATIL

THERESA VOLLMER

FRANZISKA ROGGENBUCK

TANU BISWAS

SUSAN VISVANATHAN

MEERA BAINDUR

Part II
Dance, theatre and media

TESSA JAHN

SHARMISTHA SAHA

SARAH RALFS

JULIA THIBAUT

NIKA DARYAN

Part III
Education, self-education and human development

CHRISTOS VARVANTAKIS

URS KBLER

MARTIN BITTNER

BEATRICE LANGE

SANDY HALLMANN

NAGESWARA RAO AMBATI

MALLIKA SWAMINATHAN

FRIEDERIKE SCHMIDT

IRIS CLEMENS

Part IV
Homogenization versus diversity

BENJAMIN WAGENER

MARIA SCHNEIDER

CHRISTIANE MLLER

ALEXANDER J. WULF

SOFIA GETZIN

MARKUS WIENCKE

WILLIAM N. SINGH

S. K. ARUN MURTHI

(All figures and images are courtesy of the authors of the respective chapters)

Meera Baindur is Assistant Professor at the Manipal Centre for Philosophy and Humanities, Manipal University, India. Her research interests cover nature, ecological ethics and conservation in environmental humanities. She is currently working on place studies and Indian philosophical thought.

Tanu Biswas is a doctoral candidate at the University of Bayreuth, Germany. She took a degree in philosophy at the University of Pune and a degree in childhood studies from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. Her project is to explore the scope of doing philosophy with children for the development of a world society.

Martin Bittner obtained his doctorate at Freie Universitt; he is researcher at the Research Library for the History of Education at the German Institute for International Educational Research (DIPF), Berlin, Germany. His main focus of theory and research are ethnography, research on school pedagogic and teachings, progressive education, reconstructive methods as well as questions concerning the interrelation between practice and discourse.

Iris Clemens is Professor for Educational Science at the University of Bayreuth, Germany. She works mainly on globalisation, urbanisation and the world society. She has been researching for many years in the areas of systems theory, network theory, cultural theoretical perspectives on educational science and issues related to India.

Nika Daryan is Lecturer at the Department of Anthropology and Education, Faculty of Education and Psychology at Freie Universitt Berlin, and Research Assistant at the Institute for Educational Science, University of Lneburg. Her research focuses on historical and educational anthropology, theories of imagination and mediology.

Sofia Getzin is a doctoral candidate at Leuphana Universitt Lneburg and previously studied educational sciences at Freie Universitt Berlin. She works in the field of sustainability transitions, international attitudes towards sustainability and education for sustainable development.

Sandy Hallmann has a masters degree in Educational Sciences from Freie Universitt Berlin. Her key areas of interest are education for sustainable development, landscapes of education and learning organisations. She is also a consultant in the field of renewable energies.

Tessa Jahn is a doctoral candidate at Freie Universitt Berlin. She studies dance history of the twentieth century, exoticism in dance and the relationship between visual culture(s) and dance.

Urs Kbler has a masters degree in the course Education, Culture and Forms of Knowledge from the Freie Universitt Berlin. His focus areas are pedagogical anthropology, corporeality of social interaction and theatre education.

Beatrice Lange is a masters student at the Department of Education and Psychology at Freie Universitt Berlin. She focuses on institutionalised education and on the area of research and development.

Christiane Mller studied Science of Education and European Ethnology at the Humboldt Universitt zu Berlin. Her Masters degree is in Education, Culture and Forms of Knowledge at Freie Universitt Berlin. She is also a freelancer in non-formal, political education.

S. K. Arun Murthi is Assistant Professor at Indian Institute for Science Education and Research and is an alumnus of the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bangalore. His areas of research include philosophy of science and Indian philosophy in the analytic perspective.