hinduism with others. 291
their material conditions. This can be morally problematic if it implies an equiva-
lence between themselves and those in truly marginal positions in society in India.
Yet to draw attention to the contradiction in diasporic Hindus’ self-representation
is not to deny that there is a genuine historical-structural problem of knowledge and
power. Our world of culturally plural interpretive strategies and sensibilities is so
far from being truly de-centered that we must recognize the need to find ways to ac-
knowledge epistemic marginality. This sense of marginality may arise, in part, from
the experience of lacking terms, concepts, performances, and meanings that are or-
ganically derived from the tradition in which one imagines oneself at home. This is
not to say that the academy is invariably insensitive to such needs on the part of a
diasporic group; rather, we are simply suggesting that all sides should recognize that
there are diverse subalternities.
By engaging in this sort of recognition, we create a continuing process of moral
inventory about our own intellectual practices. This is a kind ofsamkalpa,an in-
ventory of intention, as discussed in the Yoga Sutras and other early Indian texts
concerning meditation and enlightenment. The word samkalpacarries with it both
the connotation of “conceptions” formed in the mind or heart and that of “inten-
tions” or “expectations.” What are our intentions in beginning any endeavor,
whether it be thejnana marga of Hindu knowledge, or some larger knowledge of
Hinduism in a global context, and how can we assess their relative purity? We might
think of purity here as the acknowledgment of bias, of potential doshas(faults) to
be overcome in the process of inquiry. The discovery and naming of bias does not,
in and of itself, give us the intellectual or moral high ground, as it itself may sow
the seeds of new bias. Yet we suggest that such a process of inventory might help to
minimize the kind of unproductive oppositional thinking that plagues us at present.
Let us expand our thinking here. In representing the other, the challenge is to not
let our presuppositions determine our argument. This is easier said than done, but
in multicultural contexts, as in the university, there are practices that, if followed
scrupulously, provide us with at least an intellectual procedure for limiting preju-
dice. In his work We Scholars,^3 David Damrosch argues that in a multicultural uni-
versity it is best to follow the Talmudic intellectual discipline of beginning by lay-
ing out all the options—itself a Herculean task but one that is essential to perform
before even thinking about choosing or prioritizing one ’s final arguments. Dam-
rosch is not familiar with Sanskritic forms of argumentation, but the intellectual
practice he recommends is quite similar to the procedures followed in many tradi-
tional commentaries. For example, the fourth-century b.c.e.Vedic commentator