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== References ==
== References ==
{{reflist}}
{{reflist}}

== External links ==
*[https://www.bloomsbury.com/author/divya-dwivedi/ Divya Dwivedi] Author page at [[Bloomsbury Publishing]]
*[https://thewire.in/books/gandhi-and-the-resurrection-of-philosophy The Resurrection of Philosophy] Biographical essay on Divya Dwivedi and Shaj Mohan at ''[[The Wire (Indian web publication)|The Wire]]''.
*[https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/international/270518/hindu-nationalism-and-why-being-philosopher-india-can-get-you-killed Hindu nationalism and why 'being a philosopher in India can get you killed'] Interview at ''[[Mediapart]]''.
*[https://www.thehindu.com/books/books-reviews/gandhi-and-philosophy-on-theological-anti-politics-review-leap-of-faith/article29118506.ece 'Gandhi and Philosophy – On Theological Anti-Politics' review: Leap of faith] Review of ''Gandhi and Philosophy'' by [[Tridip Suhrud]] at [[The Hindu]]
*[https://indianexpress.com/article/express-sunday-eye/a-new-book-examines-what-we-talk-about-when-we-talk-about-the-father-of-the-nation-5910744/ A new book examines what we talk about when we talk about the Father of the Nation] Interview with Dwivedi and Mohan, and an introduction to their philosophy by Aakash Joshi in [[The Indian Express]]
*[https://indianexpress.com/article/express-sunday-eye/gandhi-jayanti-anniversary-150-a-new-afterlife-6034217/ ''Courage to Begin''] Essay on the political crisis in India in [[The Indian Express]].
*[https://www.outlookindia.com/magazine/story/india-news-the-sirens-song/302174 ''Dissent and Tolerance''] Essay on [[Fascism]] and [[Liberalism]] published in [[Outlook (Indian magazine)|Outlook Magazine]]
*[https://www.ndtv.com/book-excerpts/book-excerpt-when-gandhi-threatened-nehru-with-making-a-letter-public-2080511?pfrom=home-topstories Book Excerpt: When Gandhi Threatened Nehru With Making A Letter Public] Excerpt from ''Gandhi and Philosophy'' at [[NDTV]].
*[https://www.franceculture.fr/emissions/les-chemins-de-la-philosophie/philosopher-en-inde Une nuit de philosophie (1/4) : Philosopher en Inde] Interview with [[:fr:Les Chemins de la philosophie|Les Chemins de la philosophie]] at the ''[[UNESCO]]'' Headquarters Paris, available as Podcast.
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZwd_Gl-aN0&t=2s Robert Bernasconi speaking on ''Gandhi and Philosophy: On Theological Anti-politics''] [[YouTube]] link.
*[https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000265538 N° 4-5 / December 2017 ''Intellectuals, Philosophers, Women in India: Endangered Species''] The Special Issue of the ''[[UNESCO]]'' journal ''La Revue des Femmes-Philosophes'' edited by Divya Dwivedi, released on the [[World Philosophy Day]] of 2018, download link.
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tiXdeCNRX8w Postcolonial Perspectives from South Asia] Lecture on postcolonial theory and philosophy at the Goethe-Institut Indonesia.
*[https://thewire.in/author/divya-dwivedi-and-shaj-mohan Divya Dwivedi and Shaj Mohan : Essays Online] at ''[[The Wire (Indian web publication)|The Wire]]''.
*[https://www.epw.in/author/divya-dwivedi Divya Dwivedi] Publications with [[Economic and Political Weekly]].


{{Continental philosophy}}
{{Continental philosophy}}

Revision as of 06:21, 10 October 2019

Divya Dwivedi
Divya Dwivedi speaking at the India International Centre, New Delhi
Alma materSt. Stephen's College, Delhi
EraContemporary philosophy
SchoolContinental philosophy
Deconstruction
Post-metaphysics[1]
InstitutionsIndian Institute of Technology, Delhi
Main interests
Ontology
Philosophy of literature
Philosophy of politics
Narratology
Anastasis
Notable ideas
Hypophysics
Anastasis
Functional isolation
Calypsology
Polynomia
Comprehending law[2]

Divya Dwivedi is a philosopher and author based in India.[3][1][4] She teaches at the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi.[5] Her writings and lectures deal with the resurrection of philosophy, and the specificity of literature and politics. As a narratologist she researches the specificities of narrative systems. A constant concern in her writings has been the state of politics in India.[6][7][8]

Biography

Divya Dwivedi moved from Allahabad to Delhi for her studies. Dwivedi completed her Bachelor's degree from Lady Shri Ram College Delhi and her Master's degree from St. Stephen's College where she taught for a brief period. She has a doctoral degree from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi on ontology of the literary.[9] When she was a student in 2006 Dwivedi co-organised a conference on "the state of philosophy in India" in Delhi School of Economics. She was "exiled to silence" as a result of questioning the way philosophy was practiced in India.[3] Dwivedi is a member of the Theory Committee of the International Comparative Literature Association with Robert J. C. Young, Stefan Willer and others.[10]

Works

Dwivedi said that philosophy is a disruptive practice following from the Socratic model, "philosophy would be the disruption of every given 'way of life' to be understood as unexamined life".[11] Following from it there is "a necessary relation between philosophy and politics". In an interview conducted by Adèle Van Reeth for France Culture at the UNESCO head quarters Dwivedi stated that one must not recognize tradition as an adjective of philosophical practice.[12] Her work has a relation to the school of deconstruction.[13]

She authored the book Gandhi and Philosophy: On Theological Anti-politics published by Bloomsbury Academic, UK[14] with the philosopher Shaj Mohan. Jean-Luc Nancy wrote the foreword to Gandhi and Philosophy and described the originality this work in terms of the relation shown by it between truth and suffering. Dwivedi and Mohan stated it as "in direct proportion to the exposure [of Truth] there is suffering, and in direct proportion to un-truth there is liveable life".[15] Nancy wrote that this work creates the new beginning for philosophy following the end of metaphysics,

"This is how this book comes to our attention and contributes to orient us, if I may say so, toward a thought, and even a world, neither humanist nor reduced to suffering in the name of Truth. In the terms of this work: neither metaphysics nor hypophysics"[16]

Gandhi and Philosophy: On Theological Anti-politics

M. K. Gandhi in 1942

According to Jean-Luc Nancy Gandhi and Philosophy leads to a new orientation outside of the theological, metaphysical and nihilistic tendencies in philosophy. Bernard Stiegler said that this work "give us to reconsider the history of nihilism in the eschatological contemporaneity and shows its ultimate limits" and offers a new path.[17][18] Gandhi and Philosophy calls this new beginning the anastasis of philosophy.[19] Robert Bernasconi said that the inventiveness and the constructivism behind the concept of ana-stasis, or the overcoming of stasis, has a relation to the project of re-beginning of philosophy by Heidegger.[20]

Gandhi and Philosophy proposed that parallel to the metaphysical tendency in philosophy there is hypophysics. Hypophysics is defined as "a conception of nature as value".[5] The distance from nature that human beings and natural objects come to have through the effects of technology lessens their value, or brings them closer to evil.[21] Gandhi's concept of passive force or nonviolence is an implication of his hypophysical committment to nature.[22] Dwivedi made a separation between metaphysics and hypophysics in her Royal Institute of Philosophy lecture, "While both seek to diagnose the 'west', each opens on to distinct futures: metaphysics to an "other thinking" than philosophy, hypophysics to the other of thinking itself".[23]

The philosophical direction outside of metaphysics and hypophysics is created through the invention of a new conceptual order. It is meant to enable philosophy to step outside the regime of sign, signifier, and text.[19][5] The Book Review said that the philosophical project of Gandhi and Philosophy is to create new evaluative categories, "the authors, in engaging with Gandhi's thought, create their categories, at once descriptive and evaluative" while pointing to the difficulty given by the rigour of a "A seminal if difficult read for those with an appetite for philosophy".[24] Some of these conceptual inventions have been noted to have come from mathematics and biology.

"The authors invent new formal concepts out of the sciences and mathematics. They engage closely and argumentatively with important thinkers including the biologist Jacques Monod, philosopher Foucault, mathematician Hermann Weyl, anthropologist Pierre Clastres and the burlesque artist Dita Von Teese."[19]

The Indian Express found that one of these inventions is Scalology. Scalology is the practice of using a scale, such as speed or size, to measure the moral state of a political or social system. Gandhi used the scale of speed to measure moral values because for him transporting oneself by foot would be more virtuous compared to taking a train which is effectively treating "slow" as good and "quick" as evil.[13]

The constructionist tendency of Gandhi and Philosophy places it between the dominant philosophical styles of continental philosophy and analytical philosophy.[19] The conclusion of Gandhi and Philosophy emphasizes the construction of a new dimension in philosophy.

"Anastasis is the obscure beginning which would gather the occidental and the oriental in order to make of them a chrysalis and set off the imagos born with their own spans and skies; these skies and the imagos set against them will refuse to trade in orientations; and these skies will be invisible to the departed souls of Hegel who sought mercury in the darkest nights."[25]

A Strandbeest of Theo Jansen

The cover image of Gandhi and Philosophy is a photograph of the kinetic art work by the Dutch artist Theo Jansen. Jansen's moving sculptures are autonomous systems that are able to maintain minimum homeostasis. The work on the cover is called Animaris Percipiere Rectus.[26][27] Gandhi and Philosophy acknowledges the conceptual influence of Jansen's work as "his 'Beach Animals', which hover over Gandhi in the following pages".[28]

Criticism of M. K. Gandhi

Gandhi and Philosophy identifies racism with caste practices and a reviewer wrote, "In the book, Mohan and Dwivedi argue that Gandhi not only upheld caste, but also viewed it as India's unique contribution to the world!".[13] When The Indian Express pointed to the developing controversies on Gandhi's racism Dwivedi said in response that Gandhi was a specific type of racist. She pointed out that the ongoing debates on the topic of Gandhi's racism are misleading which are conducted superficially by selectively quoting Gandhi for convenience,

"It misleads us into thinking that Gandhi is a garden variety racist who wanted to preserve traditional discriminations and segregation mainly because of the prestige of the past or to conserve existing social mores. In fact, Gandhi invented a new basis for racism, which is based on moral superiority".[5]

According to Krithika Varagur in the The Washington Post Divya Dwivedi said that Gandhi's political project created the conditions for the rise of Hindu nationalism in present day India by making religion an integral part of anti-colonialism. Dwivedi said to Washington Post "“Gandhi played a huge role in solidifying the Hindu majority identity in India today”.[29]

Tridip Suhrud, the political scientist and the translator of M. K. Gandhi, said that the critical approach taken by Dwivedi and Mohan towards Gandhi is not exactly criticism because criticism is merely about "expressing disagreement and disenchantment". Suhrud wrote in The Hindu that Gandhi and Philosophy "is a remarkably adventurous book [...] and subversive of the established Gandhi. Subversive but deeply affectionate".[30]

Truth can be recognized from its implications, and that power reduces the implications of truth, "Truth is that which has consequences, and with great power comes least consequence".[31] She said that Gandhi's abuses of his power were often interpreted as truthfulness. According to Gandhi and Philosophy Gandhi's ideal state and the absolute security state are virtually indistinguishable. Since Gandhi was not committed to liberal left politics his political programs have the risk of getting appropriated by the far right .[32]

"That is, the attempts in India which still continue to hold Gandhi as the fakir of peace between the ethnic groupings are still playing, often unwittingly, a game to bring about "Hindu Raj" interpreted as secularism."[33]

Mohan and Dwivedi wrote that M. K. Gandhi shares the responsibility for inventing Hindu religion and Hindi language. They said that Gandhi contributed to creating a political culture based on religion and for giving a Hindu character for India as a new country.[34] Gandhi and Philosophy argues that M. K. Gandhi's insensitivity towards the suffering of the Jewish people under the Nazi state follows from his theory of truth. Gandhi suggested to the Jewish people "to expose oneself to annihilation in order that one is conjoined to absolute truth. In their own annihilation the Jewish people were to have the non-experience of Absolute Truth – 'a joyful sleep'."[15]

Other works

Divya Dwivedi is opposed to postcolonial theory[35] and subaltern studies. The philosopher Barbara Cassin said that Dwivedi's theoretical stand reveals the actual political stakes in postcolonial theory. Cassin said "She is a philosopher" whose refusal to make "the post-colonial the first and the last word undoubtedly allows us to clarify with greater precision what is happening to women, philosophers and intellectuals in India today".[36] In an interview with Mediapart Dwivedi said that postcolonial theory and Hindu nationalism are two versions of the same theory, and that they are both upper caste political projects.[37] Dwivedi noted that in the field of feminism postcolonial theory remains an upper caste theoretical standpoint which has been preventing lower caste feminists from opening their own currents in the context of the Me too movement.[38] Dwivedi wrote in her editorial introduction to the UNESCO journal La Revue des Femmes-Philosophes that postcolonial theory is continuous with Hindu nationalism.

"Together, postcolonialism and subaltern theory have established the paradigm of research in humanities and social sciences—in India and abroad—over the past four decades. "Eurocentrism", "historicisation", and "postcolonialism" are also the operative terms through which the Hindu nationalist discourse conserves the caste order."[39]

Dwivedi has edited anthologies addressing political and philosophical issues. The volume titled The Public Sphere: From Outside the West[40] treated the radical transformation of the public sphere and cultural landscapes through new technologies and political forms such as populism. In the field of narratology or narrative theory Dwivedi explores the questions of the ontology of literature through several directions including the functions of distinct narrative voices.[41][42] The book Narratology and Ideology: Negotiating Context, Form, and Theory in Postcolonial Narratives published by Ohio State University Press,[43] which was edited by Dwivedi, with Henrik Skov Nielsen and Richard Walsh, is an intervention in the debate on form and context. The book examines the ambition of the central concepts of both fields, namely "post-colonial" and "narrative", to serve as global categories of cultural analysis.[44][45]

Reception

Dwivedi's work was criticised from the point of view methodological and stylistic difficulty. Robert Bernasconi noted that Dwivedi's Gandhi and Philosophy is a difficult book and it is "not a book that you will understand at first reading".[20] The difficulty due to the constructivist style was noted by other authors as well.[24][19] Tridip Suhrud pointed to the "opacity" of style in The Hindu and explained it as the effect of "reflections on language".[30] Gandhi and Philosophy was criticised from the point of view of the recent mounting criticisms of Gandhi in India and internationally. It was said that Gandhi and Philosophy might be exalting Gandhi while being very critical of him at the same time. The ambiguous approach to Gandhi was described in one of the commentaries in The Indian Express as "Mohan and Dwivedi have done a masterful job of avoiding the binary fork — hagiography or vituperation — as much of Gandhi and hagiography comes from a need to spiritualise Gandhi".[13] Economic and Political Weekly pointed to Dwivedi's participation in the paradigm of "western philosophy", especially when Gandhi's goal was to create an alternative to Eurocentrism. EPW said that her work may be of interest only to continental philosophy as she does not participate in Indic discourses.[46] In The Indian Express Aakash Joshi commented on the negative implications of Gandhi and Philosophy and said that through this book "Gandhi can be seen as a nihilist — someone who even decries sex for reproduction and would like human society to wither away". Joshi stressed that this point of view is opposed to "secularism of a particular kind, freedom from colonial concepts, caste without violence".[5]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "Divya Dwivedi – Bloomsbury". Bloomsbury Publishing.
  2. ^ "Book Review: Gandhi as Chrysalis for a New Philosophy". The Wire.
  3. ^ a b "The Resurrection of Philosophy". The Wire.
  4. ^ "Bio of Divya Dwivedi". Night of Philosophy. 2018-10-27.
  5. ^ a b c d e Joshi, Aakash (2019-08-18). "A new book examines what we talk about when we talk about the Father of the Nation :Reading the Mahatma, Interview". The Indian Express.
  6. ^ "L'antifascisme, un crime en Inde Par Divya Dwivedi et Shaj Mohan". Libération. 2018-09-05.
  7. ^ "Divya Dwivedi and Shaj Mohan : Essays online at The Wire". The Wire.
  8. ^ "Péril en Inde Par Divya Dwivedi et Shaj Mohan". Mediapart. 2018-09-02.
  9. ^ "Divya Dwivedi | Humanities & Social Sciences". hss.iitd.ac.in.
  10. ^ "Members ICLA Theory". www.iclatheory.org. 2015-07-06.
  11. ^ Mehta, Ashish (2019-04-05). "In search of Gandhi's answer to the question: 'What a human life should be', Interview". Governance Now.
  12. ^ "Une nuit de philosophie (1/4) : Philosopher en Inde". France Culture.
  13. ^ a b c d Ayyar, Raj. "Bending the binary". The Indian Express.
  14. ^ "Gandhi and Philosophy". Bloomsbury Publishing.
  15. ^ a b "Book Excerpt: What different theories of philosophy tell us about Gandhi's experiments with truth". Scroll.in.
  16. ^ Mohan, Shaj; Dwivedi, Divya; Nancy, Jean-Luc (December 13, 2018). Gandhi and Philosophy: On Theological Anti-Politics. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4742-2173-3 – via Google Books.
  17. ^ Stiegler, Bernard (2018-11-14). Qu'appelle-t-on Panser ?: 1. L'immense régression. Les Liens qui Libèrent. ISBN 979-1-02-090559-8 – via Google Books.
  18. ^ "Reviews Gandhi and Philosophy: On Theological Anti-politics". Bloomsbury Academic, UK.
  19. ^ a b c d e "Gandhi as Chrysalis for a New Philosophy". The Wire.
  20. ^ a b [1]
  21. ^ "Gandhi's Experiments with Hypophysics". Frontline.
  22. ^ Singh, Siddharth. "A philosophical appraisal of Gandhi's outlook and ideas". Open Magazine.
  23. ^ "Gandhi's Hypophysics (Dwivedi)". Royal Institute of Philosophy: Public Lectures.
  24. ^ a b Tankha, V. "Philosophizing Gandhi". The Book Review.
  25. ^ Mohan, Shaj; Dwivedi, Divya (December 13, 2018). Gandhi and Philosophy: On Theological Anti-Politics. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4742-2173-3 – via Google Books.
  26. ^ "Theo Jansen's Strandbeests Walk New England Beaches".
  27. ^ Mohan, Shaj; Dwivedi, Divya (2018-12-13). Gandhi and Philosophy Front Cover. ISBN 978-1-4742-2172-6.
  28. ^ Mohan, Shaj; Dwivedi, Divya (December 13, 2018). Gandhi and Philosophy: On Theological Anti-Politics. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4742-2173-3 – via Google Books.
  29. ^ Varagur, Krithika. "India's 2 biggest political parties vie for Gandhi's legacy". The Washington Post.
  30. ^ a b Suhrud, Tridip (2019-08-17). "'Gandhi and Philosophy – On Theological Anti-Politics' review: Leap of faith". The Hindu.
  31. ^ "Book Excerpt: When Gandhi Threatened Nehru With Making A Letter Public". NDTV.
  32. ^ "New book rubbishes BJP aim to assimilate Gandhi". Deccan Chronicle.
  33. ^ Template:Cite article
  34. ^ Dwivedi, Divya; Mohan, Shaj. "Courage to Begin". The Indian Express.
  35. ^ Dalziel, Alex. "Why is Southeast Asia lacking in postcolonial perspectives?". The Jakarta Post.
  36. ^ "Issue N° 4-5 | United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization". www.unesco.org.
  37. ^ Confavreux, Joseph. "Hindu nationalism and why 'being a philosopher in India can get you killed'". mediapart.fr.
  38. ^ "Amid changing nature of sex as an activity, debates over Raya Sarkar's list represent post-colonial binaries". Firstpost.
  39. ^ "N° 4-5 / December 2017 Intellectuals, Philosophers, Women in India: Endangered Species". www.unesco.org.
  40. ^ "The Public Sphere From Outside the West". Bloomsbury Publishing.
  41. ^ Dwivedi, Divya; Nielsen, Henrik Skov (2013). "The Paradox of Testimony and First-Person Plural Narration in Jensen's We, the Drowned". Clcweb: Comparative Literature and Culture. 15 (7). doi:10.7771/1481-4374.2388.
  42. ^ Dwivedi, Divya; Nielsen, Henrik Skov. "The Paradox of Testimony and First-Person Plural Narration in Jensen's We, the Drowned (Free Access)" (PDF). core.ac.uk.
  43. ^ "Narratology and Ideology: Negotiating Context, Form, and Theory in Postcolonial Narratives". ohiostatepress.org.
  44. ^ Dwivedi, Divya; Nielsen, Henrik; Walsh, Richard (May 13, 2018). Narratology and Ideology: Negotiating Context, Form, and Theory in Postcolonial Narratives. Ohio State University Press. ISBN 978-0-8142-5475-2 – via Google Books.
  45. ^ Vuletic, Snezana (October 26, 2018). "From Colonial Disruption to Diasporic Entanglemens: Doctoral Dissertation presented at Stockholm University" (PDF). Stockholm University.
  46. ^ Raghuramaraju, A. "Gandhi in the Company of Western Philosophers". Economic and Political Weekly, Economic and Political Weekly, Economic and Political Weekly, Economic and Political Weekly, Economic and Political Weekly. 50, 50, 50, 50, 50, 54 (23, 23, 23, 23, 23, 31): 7, 7, 7, 7, 7–8, 8, 8, 8, 8.
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