Europe's view of India discussed

Reading from an original paper, Modern Indian Literature Professor Peter Gaeffke challenged the notion that Indian culture is inferior to its Western counterparts in an hour-long speech last week. In the speech, entitled "India and the European Pessimistic Tradition," Gaeffke traced the European "tradition" of treating India as inferior through the writings of several Western philosophers. Gaeffke said that one theorist in particular, 19th century German author Schopenhauer, is responsible for the negative information Europe received about India. Gaeffke said that Schopenhauer mistranslated a line from the sacred Indian Upanishads, changing its meaning to say something that was "not an Indian idea." He added that Schopenhauer also misinterpreted aspects of the Hindu religion which gave Europeans a false sense of Indian culture. Gaeffke also said that the European pessimistic view of India was carried on by Sigmund Freud, because he extensively quoted Schopenhauer in his publications. "[Freud] was the most formidable educator of pessimistic ideas," he said. Following the speech, Gaeffke fielded questions from the audience of 20 students on the definitions of some of the Indian terms he used in the speech. "I thought it was interesting," said College sophomore Renez Qureshi, who organized the speech. "It allowed one to view familiar philosophical ideas with a new perspective, enlightening insofar as it demonstrated a certain degree of intercourse between India and Europe." The speech was the second in a seven-part lecture series presented by the Philomathean Society entitled "Dialogues: Cultural Intercourse Between Asia and the West." The series is co-sponsored by the Oriental Studies and South Asia Regional Studies departments, the Comparative Literature and Literary Theory Program and the Art History Undergraduate Club.

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