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In this book, we analyze the psycho-social consequences faced by Indian American children after exposure to the school textbook discourse on Hinduism and ancient India. We demonstrate that there is an intimate connection—an almost exact correspondence—between James Mill’s colonial-racist discourse (Mill was the head of the British East India Company) and the current school textbook discourse. This racist discourse, camouflaged under the cover of political correctness, produces the same psychological impacts on Indian American children that racism typically causes: shame, inferiority, embarrassment, identity confusion, assimilation, and a phenomenon akin to racelessness, where children dissociate from the traditions and culture of their ancestors.


This book is the result of four years of rigorous research and academic peer-review, reflecting our ongoing commitment at Hindupedia to challenge the representation of Hindu Dharma within academia.

Āṇavamala

From Hindupedia, the Hindu Encyclopedia

By Swami Harshananda

Āṇavamala literally means ‘impurity of being atomic’.

The Śaiva schools of philosophy including the Pāśupata, Pratyabhijñā and the Vīraśaiva, consider Śiva as the supreme Deity. He is the Pati (the Lord) whereas the jīvas (individual souls) are paśus (animals, the bound ones). Though the jlva is similar to Śiva, the Paśupati, he is not identical with Him.

The difference is rather in quantity than in quality. It is pāśajāla (web of bonds) that makes him small, limited, bound, and forces him to transmigrate. The first of these pāśas also known as malas or impurities—is avidyā or ignorance which makes him feel he is aṇu, small, finite and limited. Hence it is called ‘āṇavamala.’

Due to this, the jiva, though he is pure consciousness, imagines himself finite, confined to the body and of limited knowledge and power. The other two are:

  1. Kārmamala
  2. Māyīyamala


References[edit]

  • The Concise Encyclopedia of Hinduism, Swami Harshananda, Ram Krishna Math, Bangalore

Contributors to this article

Krishna Maheshwari, Deval Sancheti

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