Why would it matter where I might guess the word came from? Are you perceiving people's ignorance to the origins of English words as some sort of cultural disrespect?
I'm discerning that there's a lot of anger about western appropriation of Indian culture, which is, well, fine, and I definitely didn't really know about it before this. But...
"First of all, why do u use YOGA in ur name??????????????? This belongs 2 us Indians"
I'm not trying to call you names. The poster above mentioned those comments so I took a look at them and was disappointed. Though, I was surprised to see that much anger about this from, well, as you said - inarticulate folk on the internet. I didn't realize it was a point of anger among any folk until today.
> I realize that people here don't have much of a reading on colonial and current Indology (why do you think the Germans called themselves "Aryans" ?), let alone general history, but there isn't much point talking about this to the ignorant (\pm arrogant).
That's because HN is an international crowd. As a European continental citizen I am much more aware of Aryanism than the current Indian recognition movement (I assume there seems to be one, right ?).
With that said I suggest you adopt a more diplomatic stance (because when all is said and done I believe that we are losing way too much information when `adopting/stealing` concepts from other societies and risk of making unintended mistakes when applying techniques without the full knowledge and body of experience that comes with it. And stealing/misattribution is bad and infuriating (to me). Thus I agree with you.)
edit: Which reminds me, fwiw: I had some intense debate with some 3rd generation migrants from turkey (who were at that time rediscovering their Islam heritage) in college about zero. I held the opinion it came from India but they stick to the `arab numbers`.
First of all, I see that you are in no position and in 'mindfulness' to ask someone to get-out.
As it doesn't matter for you, where the word comes from, why not acknowledge it? In fact why not acknowledge that it is really "vipAsanA" when someone has already taken effort to show that it is?
This shows that YOU are perceiving people's ignorance to the origins of English words as some sort of cultural superiority/respect which is kind-of linguistic racism.
"get out" is just an expression. Short for "get out of here", meaning "that's ridiculous". I regret using it.
I'll happily acknowledge where words come from. No one is denying the origin of these words. I just don't see how it matters. It's okay for something to have a different word in another language.
I object to your use of the phrase "it is really 'vipAsanA'". "It is really" implies there must be one true name for a thing, which isn't true. It can have different names to different people. That's fine. I mean - Certainly we do not use the Chinese word for "firework" just because they invented fireworks first. There is no moral obligation to pay homage to the inventor of something in its name.
But it is mine. Well, that's ambiguous. It depends on what 'it' and 'mine' mean.
Of course I don't think that the cultural tradition of meditation is mine (or 'ours', or whatever, for whatever group I'm pretending to speak for. 'Western' if you will.) But the behavior of meditating, or doing yoga, is mine if I'm doing it. It can be yours too. I don't have to cite anything for it to be mine.
That book in your link doesn't mention meditation because: 1) CBT is quote-unquote 'slightly different' (I don't know if this is true, but a commenter says it is) and 2) meditation, especially with all historical terminology you seem to be advocating for, has a non-scientific connotation to some people, so they deemed it beneficial to avoid talking about it. (I'm not saying it should have an unscientific connotation, I'm saying that it has ended up that way. I think you would agree? I also think this is lessening over time.)
I think there's no denying that it is unnecessary to bring any sort of religion, or a complicated and foreign naming scheme, into meditation in order to make it useful as a medical suggestion. A medical book on a medical therapy does not need to cite the historical details of the therapy. It should cite other medical books. A history book should cite history.
